Chapter Steadfast to Sterling of S by Brewer's Readers Handbook

The British St. Stephen, St. Alban, the British proto-martyr (died 303).

As soon as the executioner gave the fatal stroke [which beheaded St. Alban],his eyes dropped out of his head. —Bede: Ecclesiastical History (A.D. 734).

Stephen Steelheart, the nickname of Stephen Wetheral. —Sir W. Scott: Ivanhoe (time, Richard I.).

Stephen of Amboise, leader of 5000 foot-soldiers from Blois and Tours in the allied Christian army of Godfrey of Bouillon. Impetuous in attack, but deficient in steady resistance. He was shot by Clorinda with an arrow (bk. xi.). —Tasso: Jerusalem Delivered (1575).

Stephen’s (St.), a poem by lord Lytton, on leading orators (1860).

Stephen’s (See Born At Sea, p. 138.)

Sterling (Mr.), a vulgar, rich City merchant, who wishes to see his two daughters married to titles. Lord Ogleby calls him “a very abstract of ’Change;” and he himself says, “What signifies birth, education, titles, and so forth? Money, I say— money’s the stuff that makes a man great in this country.”

Miss Sterling, whose Christian name is Elizabeth or Betty; a spiteful, jealous, purse-proud damsel, engaged to sir John Melvil. Sir John, seeing small prospect of happiness with such a tartar, proposed marriage to the younger sister, but she was already clandestinely married. Miss Sterling, being left out in the cold, exclaimed, “Oh that some other person, an earl or duke for instance, would propose to me, that I might be revenged on the monsters!”

Miss Fanny Sterling, an amiable, sweet-smiling, soft-speaking beauty, clandestinely married to Lovewell. —Colman and Garrick: The Clandestine Marriage (1766).

A strange blunder was once made by Mrs. Gibbs of Covent Garden in the part of “Miss Sterling.” When speaking of the conduct of Betty, who had locked the door of Miss Fanny s room and walked away with the key, Mrs. Gibbs exclaimed, “She has locked the key, and carried away the door in her pocket.”—W. C. Russell: Representative Actors.