Stage"-struck` (?), a. Fascinated by the stage; seized by a passionate
desire to become an actor.
Stag"-e`vil (?), n. (Far.) A kind of palsy affecting the jaw of a
horse. Crabb.
Stag"gard (?), n. [From Stag.] (Zoöl.) The male red deer when four
years old.
Stag"ger (?), v. i. [imp. & p. p. Staggered (?); p. pr. & vb. n.
Staggering.] [OE. stakeren, Icel. stakra to push, to stagger, fr. staka
to punt, push, stagger; cf. OD. staggeren to stagger. Cf. Stake, n.] 1.
To move to one side and the other, as if about to fall, in standing or
walking; not to stand or walk with steadiness; to sway; to reel or
totter.
Deep was the wound; he staggered with the blow.
Dryden.
2. To cease to stand firm; to begin to give way; to fail. "The enemy
staggers." Addison.
3. To begin to doubt and waver in purposes; to become less confident or
determined; to hesitate.
He [Abraham] staggered not at the promise of God through unbelief.
Rom. iv. 20.
Stag"ger, v. t. 1. To cause to reel or totter.
That hand shall burn in never-quenching fire That staggers thus my
person.
Shak.
2. To cause to doubt and waver; to make to hesitate; to make less
steady or confident; to shock.
Whosoever will read the story of this war will find himself much
stagered.
Howell.
Grants to the house of Russell were so enormous, as not only to
outrage economy, but even to stagger credibility.
Burke.
3. To arrange (a series of parts) on each side of a median line
alternately, as the spokes of a wheel or the rivets of a boiler seam.
Stag"ger, n. 1. An unsteady movement of the body in walking or
standing, as if one were about to fall; a reeling motion; vertigo; --
often in the plural; as, the stagger of a drunken man.
2. pl. (Far.) A disease of horses and other animals, attended by
reeling, unsteady gait or sudden falling; as, parasitic staggers;
appopletic or sleepy staggers.