stump
1. The part of a tree or plant remaining in the earth after the stem or trunk is cut off; the stub.
2. The part of a limb or other body remaining after a part is amputated or destroyed; a fixed or rooted remnant; a stub; as, the stump of a leg, a finger, a tooth, or a broom.
3. The legs; as, to stir one’s stumps.
4. One of the three pointed rods stuck in the ground to form a wicket and support the bails.
5. A short, thick roll of leather or paper, cut to a point, or any similar implement, used to rub down the lines of a crayon or pencil drawing, in shading it, or for shading drawings by producing tints and gradations from crayon, etc, in powder.
6. A pin in a tumbler lock which forms an obstruction to throwing the bolt, except when the gates of the tumblers are properly arranged, as by the key; a fence; also, a pin or projection in a lock to form a guide for a movable piece. Leg stump, a term used to describe late german Gothic tracery, in which the molded bar seems to pass through itself in its convolutions, and is then cut off short, so that a section of the molding is seen at the end of each similar stump. To
60c
go on the stump, or To take the stump, to engage in making public addresses for electioneering purposes; a phrase derived from the practice of using a stump for a speaker’s platform in newly-settled districts. Hence also the phrases stump orator, stump speaker, stump speech, stump oratory, etc.
Origin: OE. Stumpe, stompe; akin to D. Stomp, G. Stumpf, Icel. Stumpr, Dan. & Sw. Stump, and perhaps also to E. Stamp.
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