The usual meaning of this word (castrating females) given in all dictionaries is clearly inapplicable on this occasion (p. 174), where it undoubtedly means killing a stag with a sword, probably derived from the Italian spada. When the velvet was once off the antlers the stag at bay was usually despatched with the bow, for it was then dangerous to approach him close enough to do so with the sword. When achieved by bold hunters, as it occasionally was, it was accounted a feat of skill and courage.
O. F. establie, a garrison, a station. Huntsmen and kennelmen with hounds in leash, whose duty it was to take up a post or stand assigned to them during the chase, were called stables. We have Stabilitiones venationis that are mentioned in Domesday (i. fol. 56b and fol. 252). In Ellis's introduction to Domesday he says: "Stabilitio meant stalling the deer. To drive the Deer and other Game from all quarters to the centre of a gradually contracted circle where they were compelled to stand, was stabilitio." Malmesbury, Scriptores, post Bedam, edit. 1596, p. 44, speaking of the mildness of Edward the Confessor's temper, says, "Dum quadam vice venatum isset, et agrestis quidam Stabulata illa, quibus in casses cervi urgentur, confudisset, ille sua nobili percitus ira, per Deum, inquit, et matrem ejus tantundem tibi nocebo, si potero" (Ellis, i. 112).
We see, however, at a later date from Twici and the "Master of Game" that the watchers or stables they allude to were stationary—and did not drive the game as described in above.
These stations of huntsmen and hounds were placed at intervals round the quarter of the forest to be driven or hunted in with hounds to move the game, so that the hounds could be slipped at any game escaping; sometimes they were to make a noise, and thus blench or head the game back. In French such a chase was called a Chasse à tître (Lav. xxviii.), the word tître meaning net or tape, but in this case used figuratively. Our "Master of Game" evidently placed these stations to keep the game within the boundaries so as to force it to pass the stand of the King. Twici describes these stations of huntsmen, using the word establie. "The bounds are those which are set up of archers, and of greyhounds (lefrers et de establie) and watchers, and on that account I have blown one moot and recheated on the hounds. You hunter, do you wish to follow the chase? Yes, if that beast should be one that is hunted up (enquillee), or chased I will follow it. If so it should happen that the hounds should be gone out of bounds then I wish to blow a moot and stroke after my hounds to have them back" (Twici, p. 6).
It was the duty of certain tenants to attend the King's hunts and act as part of the stable. In Hereford one person went from each house to the stand or station in the wood at the time of the survey (Gen. Introduction Domesday, Ellis, i. 195). From Shrewsbury the principal burgesses who had horses attended the King when he went hunting, and the sheriff sent thirty-six men on foot to the deer-stand while the King remained there.
Stable-stand was the place where these stables were posted or "set," and the word was also used to denote the place where archers were posted to shoot at driven game. Such stands were raised platforms in some drive or on some boundary of the forest, sometimes erected between the branches of a tree, so that the sportsman could be well hidden. A good woodcut of what was probably intended to represent a "stand" is in the first edition of Turbervile's "Arte of Vénerie," representing Queen Elizabeth receiving her huntsman's report.
There is no mention made of raised stands in our text, but with or without such erections the position taken up by the shooters to await the game was called his standing or tryste, and a bower of branches was made, to shelter the occupant from sun and rain, as well as to hide him from the game. Such arbours were called Berceau or Berceil in Old French, from the word berser, to shoot with a bow and arrow; they were also called ramiers and folies, from rames or branches, and folia, leaves, with which they were made or disguised (Noir., iii. p. 354).
Manwood tells us that Stable-stand was one of four "manners in which if a man were found, in the forest, he could be arrested as a poacher or trespasser," and says: "Stable-stand is where one is found at his standing ready to shoot at any Deer, or standing close by a tree with Greyhounds in his leash ready to let slip" (Man., p. 193).
or layes; tanks or pools, large meers. Gaston says: Estancs et autres mares ou marrhés (G. de F., p. 21). Stank house was a moated house. A ditch or moat filled with water was called a tank.
or tecche, Mid. Eng. for a habit, especially a bad habit, vice, freak, caprice, behaviour, from the O. F. tache, a spot, a stain, or blemish; also a disgrace, a blot on a man's good name. In the older use it was applied both to good as well as bad qualities, as in our text.