2. A precious stone; a gem. "Many a rich stone." Chaucer. "Inestimable stones, unvalued jewels." Shak.
3. Something made of stone. Specifically: -
(a) The glass of a mirror; a mirror. [Obs.]
Lend me a looking-glass;
If that her breath will mist or stain the stone,
Why, then she lives.
Shak. (b) A monument to the dead; a gravestone. Gray.
Should some relenting eye
Glance on the where our cold relics lie.
Pope. 4. (Med.) A calculous concretion, especially one in the kidneys or bladder; the disease arising from a
calculus.
5. One of the testes; a testicle. Shak.
6. (Bot.) The hard endocarp of drupes; as, the stone of a cherry or peach. See Illust. of Endocarp.
7. A weight which legally is fourteen pounds, but in practice varies with the article weighed. [Eng.]
The stone of butchers' meat or fish is reckoned at 8 lbs.; of cheese, 16 lbs.; of hemp, 32 lbs.; of glass, 5
lbs.
8. Fig.: Symbol of hardness and insensibility; torpidness; insensibility; as, a heart of stone.
I have not yet forgot myself to stone.
Pope. 9. (Print.) A stand or table with a smooth, flat top of stone, commonly marble, on which to arrange the
pages of a book, newspaper, etc., before printing; — called also imposing stone.
Stone is used adjectively or in composition with other words to denote made of stone, containing a
stone or stones, employed on stone, or, more generally, of or pertaining to stone or stones; as, stone
fruit, or stone-fruit; stone-hammer, or stone hammer; stone falcon, or stone-falcon. Compounded with
some adjectives it denotes a degree of the quality expressed by the adjective equal to that possessed
by a stone; as, stone-dead, stone-blind, stone-cold, stone-still, etc.
Atlantic stone,
ivory. [Obs.] "Citron tables, or Atlantic stone." Milton. — Bowing stone. Same as
Cromlech. Encyc. Brit. — Meteoric stones, stones which fall from the atmosphere, as after the
explosion of a meteor. — Philosopher's stone. See under Philosopher. — Rocking stone. See
Rocking-stone. — Stone age, a supposed prehistoric age of the world when stone and bone were
habitually used as the materials for weapons and tools; — called also flint age. The bronze age succeeded
to this. — Stone bass (Zoöl.), any one of several species of marine food fishes of the genus Serranus
and allied genera, as Serranus Couchii, and Polyprion cernium of Europe; — called also sea perch. —
Stone biter (Zoöl.), the wolf fish. — Stone boiling, a method of boiling water or milk by dropping
hot stones into it, — in use among savages. Tylor. — Stone borer (Zoöl.), any animal that bores
stones; especially, one of certain bivalve mollusks which burrow in limestone. See Lithodomus, and
Saxicava. — Stone bramble (Bot.), a European trailing species of bramble — Stone- break. [Cf.
G. steinbrech.] (Bot.) Any plant of the genus Saxifraga; saxifrage. — Stone bruise, a sore spot
on the bottom of the foot, from a bruise by a stone. — Stone canal. (Zoöl.) Same as Sand canal,
under Sand. — Stone cat (Zoöl.), any one of several species of small fresh-water North American
catfishes of the genus Noturus. They have sharp pectoral spines with which they inflict painful wounds.
— Stone coal, hard coal; mineral coal; anthracite coal. — Stone coral (Zoöl.), any hard calcareous
coral. — Stone crab. (Zoöl.) (a) A large crab (Menippe mercenaria) found on the southern coast
of the United States and much used as food. (b) A European spider crab (Lithodes maia). Stone
crawfish (Zoöl.), a European crawfish (Astacus torrentium), by many writers considered only a variety