c. 1600. Haughton, Grim the Collier, v. But ne'er hereafter let me take you With wanton love-tricks, lest I make you Example to all stone-priests ever, To deal with other men's loves never.
c. 1600. Merry Devil of Edmonton, iv. 1. The stone priest steals more venison than half the country. Ibid., iv. 2. I would to God my mill were an eunuch, And wanted her stones, so I were hence.
1602. Marston, Ant. and Mellida, ii. 1, 3. My grandfathers great stone-hors, flinging up his head, and jerking out his left leg.
1605. Chapman, Eastward Ho, iv. 1. Farewell, thou horn of destiny, th' ensign of the married man! Farewell, thou horn tree, that bearest nothing but stone-fruit.
1608. Merry Devil of Edmonton [Dodsley, Old Plays, xi. 155]. The villainous vicar is abroad in the chase this dark night: the stone-priest steals more venison than half the county.
1609. Jonson. Silent Woman, v. 1. Damp. Your ladyship sets too high a price on my weakness. Han. Sir, I can distinguish gems from pebbles. Damp. Are you so skilful in stones? [Aside.]
1611. Cotgrave, Dict., s.v. Entier . . . cheval entier, a stone-horse. Ibid., s.v. Couillon, stoned; or that wants not his stones. Ibid., s.v. Couillon, a cod, stone, testicle, cullion.
1622. Marmion, Holland's Leaguer, v. 4. When her husband has followed Strange women, she has turned him into a bezar [goat], And made him bite out his own stones.
1678. Cotton, Virgil Travestie (1770), 68. I hate a base cowardly drone, Worse than a Rigil with one stone.
1704. Brown, Works, i. 60. My spouse, alas! must flaunt in silks no more, Pray heav'n for sustenance she turn not whore; And daughter Betty too, in time, I fear, Will learn to take a stone up in her ear.
Adj. (old).—In combination = quite; wholly: e.g., stone-blind, stone-cold, stone-dead, stone-still, &c.: cf. stock (B. E. and Grose).
c. 1330. Romance of Seven Sages [Weber, Metrical Romances, iii.]. [Oliphant, New Eng., i. 16. Among the adjectives we find blind so ston. Ibid. The substantive qualifies the adjective as stane still (p. 141).]
[?]. Perceval, 841. Ever satt Percyvelle stone-stille, And spakke nothynge.
[?]. Rom. of Partenay [E. E. T. S], 3121. The Geant was by Gaffray don bore, So discomfite, standede, and all cold.
1597. Shakspeare, Richard III., iv. 4, 227. The murderous knife was dull and blunt Till it was whetted on thy stone-hard heart.
1605. Jonson, Volpone, i. 1. He cannot be so stupid, or stone-dead.
1609. Davies, Humour's Heauen on Earth, 47. For the contagion was so violent (The wil of Heau'n ordaining so the same) As often strook stone-ded incontinent.
d. 1618. Sylvester, Du Bartas, v. i. 434. The Remora fixing her feeble horn Into the tempest-beating vessel's stern, Stayes her stone-still.
1647-8. Herrick, Appendix, 451. Loue will part of the way be mett, or sitt stone-still.
1856. Eliot, Mr. Gilfil, xviii. I thought I saw everything, and was stone-blind all the while.
Colloquialisms.—To kill two birds with one stone = to do (or achieve) a double pur-purpose: cf. (Foxe) 'to stop two gaps with one bush'; to leave no stone unturned = to spare no endeavour; to mark with a white stone = to single out as lucky or esteemed; to live in a glass house and yet throw stones = to lay oneself open to blame or attack.
1623. Mabbe, Spanish Rogue (1660). He threw stones on my housetop, but when he found his own [tiles] to be of glass, he left his flinging.
1650-5. Howell, Letters, 91. He who hath glasse windows of his own, should take heed how he throwes stones at those of his neighbours.
1656. Hobbes, Liberty (1841), 117. T. H. thinks to kill two birds with one stone, and satisfy two arguments with one answer.
1697. Dryden, Æneid, ii. 133. New crimes invented, left unturn'd no stone To make my guilt appear, and hide his own.
