beef

& a. [From Fr. bœuf = (1) an ox, (2) beef, (3) (of persons) a beef-eater; O. Fr. baf, buef; Sp. buey an ox; Prov. bou; Port. boi beef; Ital. bue an ox: all from Lat, bos, acc us. bovem; Gr. βούς ( bous ), gen it. βοός ( boos ) = an ox. Compare in Sw. biffin, biff stek, and Dut. biefin, bief - stuk = Eng. beef -steak. A word introduced by the Normans. Trench directs attention to the fact that while in English the domestic animals, as long as they are living, are called by Saxon names, their flesh, after they are dead, has, as a rule, some Norman appellation, as if the Saxons had tended them while living, and the Normans eaten them when dead. "Thus," he says, "ox, steer, cow, are Saxon, but beef Norman; sheep is Saxon, but mutton Norman. So it is severally with swine and pork, deer and venison, fowl and pullet. Bacon, the only flesh which perhaps ever came within his (the Saxon's) reach, is the single exception." (Trench: The Study of Words.).] (See also Scott's Ivanhoe.) A. As substantive: 1. An ox, a cow, or a bull, regarded as fit for food. In this sense it has a plural beeves . "Alcinous slew twelve sheep, eight white-tooth'd swine, Two crook-haunched beeves." Chapman. worm. 2. The flesh of the ox or the cow, used either fresh or salted. It is the most nutritious of all kinds of meat, and is well adapted to the most delicate constitutions. It should be well cooked, as it has been proved that underdone beef frequently produces tape Good beef is known by its having a clear uniform fat, a firm texture, a fine open grain, and a rich reddish colour. Meat which feels damp and clammy should be avoided, as it is generally unwholesome. Fresh beef loses in boiling 30 per cent. of its weight; in roasting it loses about 20 per cent. The amount of nitrogenous matter found to be present in one pound of good beef is about four ounces. In the raw state it contains 50 per cent. of water. [Ox.] "The fat of roasted beef falling on birds will baste them. -Swift . B. As adjective: Consisting of the flesh of the ox, cow, or even the bull. "If you are employed in marketing, do not accept of a treat of a beef steak and a pot of ale from the butcher." Swift. IMG:content-1186.png:[blocks in formation] IMG:content-1187.png:[blocks in formation] 2. The name given in New South Wales to the Steno carpus salignus , a tree belonging to the order Proteaceæ, or Proteads. 3. The name given in Queensland to Banksia compar, also a Protead. ( Treas . of Bot .) beef-eat-er, s. [Eng. beef ; eater.] A. Ordinary Language: 1. One who eats beef, a term contemptuously applied to well-fed servants. 2. Plur.: A name applied to the yeomen of the royal guard. "Some better protection than that of the trainbands or beef -eaters."-Macaulay: Hist. Eng . , ch. iii. B. Ornith . ( Pl .): The Buphagineæ, a subfamily of African birds, called also Ox-peckers. They belong to the family of Sturnidæ (Starlings). Buphaga african a , the species called by way of pre-eminence the Beefeater, perches on the back of cattle, picking from tumours on their hide the larvæ of Bot-flies (Estridæ), on which it feeds.