Stout was the steed that, bestridden by Godfrey O'Donnell at the battle of Credan-Kille, withstood the shock of Lord Maurice Fitzgerald's desperate onslaught, and by his steadiness enabled the Tyrconnell chieftain to strike senseless and unhorse his fierce Norman foe.

"Stout be the heart, nor slow The foot to follow the impetuous will, Nor the hand slack upon the loom of deeds.

But the stoutest of its medical advocates was Tobias Whitaker, physician to Charles II., who undertook to prove the possibility of maintaining life, from infancy to old age, without sickness, by the use of wine!

The ditty of the soldier just quoted ends thus: "At last, so stout was her defence, From Metz they moved their guns away; And, with the laugh at their expense, A-tramping went their whole array.

17 Things of the noblest kind our own soil breeds; Stout are our men, and warlike are our steeds; Rome, though her eagle through the world had flown, Could never make this island all her own.