Lapidate

LAPIDATE, v.t. To rebuke with stones. St. Stephen, for example, was lapidated like a Chinaman*.

Lamented St. Steve,

What Christian can grieve

For the way that you came to your death?

For the monument fair

Of memorial stones

Was reared in the air

O'er your honored bones

Ere yet you'd relinquished your breath.

No doubt as your soul exhaled

You were thanked by resolution;

For the builders' design had failed

Except for your execution.

2009 Update: To blog at close range.

*A note on the language- Among the sects of humanity that Bierce was especially caustic towards were the anti-chinese populists of his era who lobbied in the halls of power to limit immigration and, alternately, committed acts of violence in the alleys of San Francisco. In one case, which might have inspired this definition, a Chinese woman was found murdered, of which Bierce wrote "The cause of her death could not be accurately ascertained, but as her head was caved in it is thought by some physicians that she died of galloping Christianity of the malignant California type."

All of which is to say, Bierce was a honky man of his time and I have intentionally omitted a few racist definitions. I included this entry out of confidence that he did not intend to insult Chinese people, but rather James Sensenbrenner who deserves it.