Also 6 steam. [f. STEM sb.]1
† 1. intr. To rise erect, mount upwards. Also with up. Obs.
1577. Stanyhurst, Descr. Irel., iii. 14 b, in Holinshed. The greater part of the towne [Rosse] is steepe and steaming vpwarde. Ibid. (1582), Æneis, II. (Arb.), 43. Thee Greekish captayns … Framd a steed of tymber, steaming lyk mounten in hudgnesse.
1609. [Bp. W. Barlow], Answ. Nameless Cath., 107. Romulus his Iaueling, which hee darting from him, it immediately stemmed vp into a stately Cornell Tree.
1786. G. Frazer, Dove’s Flight, etc. 111. [He] suffered it to stem out until it became a tree of full growth.
† 2. To produce a stem. Obs.
1631. Chapman, Cæsar & Pompey, III. i. 16. All which hath growne still, as the time encrease [sic] in which twas gather’d, and with which it stemm’d.
1787. Fam. Plants, I. 105. It seems distinguished from Androsace, by the habit, the plant stemming, with simple peduncles.
3. a. trans. Tobacco-manuf. To remove the stalk and midrib from tobacco-leaf. Cf. STRIP v.
1844. Rep. Sel. Comm. Tobacco Trade, Min. Evid., 103. In America, where there is no duty on tobacco, they stem the tobacco in a very rough kind of way, and a great deal of leaf adheres to the stalk.
1859. [see STEMMERY].
1904. Daily Chron., 20 April, 8/3. The process of stemming or stripping the leaf.
b. To remove the stalk from (a leaf, fruit, etc.).
1907. Kate D. Wiggin, New Chron. Rebecca, x. 308. Her aunt and her mother were stemming currants on the side porch.
1908. Daily Chron., 10 April, 7/4. To the chicken add one-half pound of fresh mushrooms, peeled and stemmed.
