STEUBEN, BARON VON, general in the American War of Independence, born in Magdeburg; originally in the Prussian service under Frederick the Great, and had distinguished himself at the siege of Prague and at Rossbach; emigrating to America at the end of the Seven Years’ War he offered his services, which were readily welcomed, and contributed to organise and discipline the army, to the success of the revolution (1730-1794).

STEVENSON, ROBERT, an eminent Scottish engineer, born at Glasgow, the son of a West India merchant; adopted the profession of his stepfather Thomas Smith, and in 1796 succeeded him as first engineer to the Board of Northern Lighthouses, a position he held for 47 years, during which he planned and erected as many as 23 lighthouses round the coasts of Scotland, his most noted erection being that on the Bell Rock; introduced the catoptric system of illumination and other improvements; was also much employed as a consulting engineer in connection with bridge, harbour, canal, and railway construction (1772-1850).

STEVENSON, ROBERT LOUIS BALFOUR, novelist and essayist, grandson of the preceding, born at Edinburgh, where in 1875 he was called to the bar, after disappointing his father by not following the family vocation of engineering; had already begun to write for the magazines, and soon abandoned law for the profession of letters, in which he rapidly came to the front; in 1878 appeared his first book, “An Inland Voyage,” quickly followed by “Travels with a Donkey,” “Virginibus Puerisque,” “Familiar Studies”; with “Treasure Island” (1883) found a wider public as a writer of adventure and romance, and established himself permanently in the public favour with “Kidnapped” (1886, most popular story), “The Master of Ballantrae,” “Dr. Jekyll and Mr. Hyde,” &c.; his versatility in letters was further revealed in his charming “A Child’s Garden of Verse,” “Ballads,” “Memories and Portraits,” and “A Footnote to History” (on Samoan politics); in 1890 failing health induced him to make his home in the island of Samoa, where he died and is buried; “His too short life,” says Professor Saintsbury, “has left a fairly ample store of work, not always quite equal, seldom quite without a flaw, but charming, stimulating, distinguished as few things in this last quarter of a century have been” (1850-1894).

STEWARD, LORD HIGH, in early times the highest office of state in England, ranking in power next to the sovereign; hereditary during many centuries, the office lapsed in the reign of Henry IV., and since has been revived only on special occasions, e. g. a coronation, a trial of a peer, at the termination of which the office is demitted, the Lord High Steward himself breaking in two his wand of office.

STEWART, BALFOUR, physicist, born in Edinburgh; after finishing his university curriculum went to Australia and engaged for some time in business; returned to England; became director at Kew Observatory, and professor of Natural Philosophy at Owens College, Manchester; made discoveries in radiant heat, and was one of the founders of SPECTRUM ANALYSIS (q. v.); published text-books on physics, in wide repute (1828-1887).