Station

Station, stā′shun, n. the place where a person or thing stands: post assigned: position: office: situation: occupation, business: state: rank: condition in life: the place where railway trains come to a stand in order to take up and set down passengers and goods, the buildings erected at such a place for railway business: a regular stopping-place: a stock farm in Australia: a district or branch police-office: the place in India where the group of English officials or the officers of a garrison reside: a recess in a mine-shaft or passage for a pumping-machine: (pl.) in R.C. usage, applied to certain places of reputed sanctity, appointed to be visited as places of prayer, any one of the fourteen (fifteen, or even eleven) images or pictures ranged round a church, starting from one side of the high altar and ending at the other, representing the several stages of the Passion—the whole series the Way of Calvary.—v.t. to assign a station to: to set: to appoint to a post, place, or office.—adj. Stā′tional.—n. Stā′tionariness.—adj. Stā′tionary, pertaining to a station: standing: fixed: settled: acting from, or in, a fixed position (as an engine): not progressing or retrogressing: not improving.—n. Stā′tioner, one who sells paper and other articles used in writing.—adj. Stā′tionery, belonging to a stationer.—n. the articles sold by a stationer.—ns. Stā′tion-house, a temporary place of arrest; Stā′tion-mas′ter, one who has charge of a station, esp. on a railway.—Stationers' Hall, the hall in London belonging to the Company of the Stationers, who enjoyed until the passing of the Copyright Act in 1842 an absolute monopoly of printing and publishing; Stationery Office, an office in London for providing books, stationery, &c. to the government offices at home and abroad, and for making contracts for the printing of government reports and other public papers. [Fr.,—L. statio—stāre, to stand.]