Part 723

Swift trouts, diversified with crimson stains.

Pope.

3. Taint of guilt; tarnish; disgrace; reproach.

Nor death itself can wholly wash their stains.

Dryden.

Our opinion . . . is, I trust, without any blemish or stain of heresy.

Hooker.

4. Cause of reproach; shame. Sir P. Sidney.

5. A tincture; a tinge. [R.]

You have some stain of soldier in you.

Shak.

Syn. -- Blot; spot; taint; pollution; blemish; tarnish; color; disgrace; infamy; shame.

Stain"er (?), n. 1. One who stains or tarnishes.

2. A workman who stains; as, a stainer of wood.

Stain"less, a. Free from stain; immaculate. Shak.

The veery care he took to keep his name Stainless, with some was evidence of shame.

Crabbe.

Syn. -- Blameless; spotless; faultless. See Blameless.

Stain"less*ly, adv. In a stainless manner.

Stair (?), n. [OE. steir, steyer, AS. st&?;ger, from &?;igan to ascend, rise. √164. See Sty to ascend.] 1. One step of a series for ascending or descending to a different level; -- commonly applied to those within a building.

2. A series of steps, as for passing from one story of a house to another; -- commonly used in the plural; but originally used in the singular only. "I a winding stair found." Chaucer's Dream.

Below stairs, in the basement or lower part of a house, where the servants are. -- Flight of stairs, the stairs which make the whole ascent of a story. -- Pair of stairs, a set or flight of stairs. -- pair, in this phrase, having its old meaning of a set. See Pair, n., 1. -- Run of stars (Arch.), a single set of stairs, or section of a stairway, from one platform to the next. -- Stair rod, a rod, usually of metal, for holding a stair carpet to its place. -- Up stairs. See Upstairs in the Vocabulary.

Stair"case` (?), n. A flight of stairs with their supporting framework, casing, balusters, etc.

To make a complete staircase is a curious piece of architecture.

Sir H. Wotton.

Staircase shell. (Zoöl.) (a) Any scalaria, or wentletrap. (b) Any species of Solarium, or perspective shell.

Stair"head` (?), n. The head or top of a staircase.

Stair"way` (?), n. A flight of stairs or steps; a staircase. "A rude and narrow stairway." Moore.