The Nuttall Encyclopaedia Part 450

WATERFORD (21), a town in a county of the same name (98), in Munster, Ireland, at the junction of the Suir and the Barrow; has a splendid harbour formed by the estuary, and carries on an extensive export trade with England, particularly in bacon and b.u.t.ter, the chief industries of the county being cattle-breeding and dairy-farming.

WATERLOO, a village 11 m. S. of Brussels, which gives name to a battle in which the French under Napoleon were defeated by an army under Wellington on June 18, 1815.

WATLING STREET, a great Roman road extending from Dover and terminating by two branches in the extreme N. of England after pa.s.sing through London, the NE. branch, by York, and the NW. by or to Chester.

WATSON, WILLIAM, poet, born in Yorks.h.i.+re; the first poem which procured him recognition was "Wordsworth's Grave," and his subsequent poems have confirmed the impression produced, in especial his "Lachrymae Musarum," one of the finest tributes paid to the memory of Tennyson on the occasion of his death; among his later productions the most important is a volume ent.i.tled "Odes and other Poems," published in 1894; has also written an admirable volume of essays, "Excursions in Criticism"; _b_.

1858.

WATT, JAMES, inventor of the modern steam-engine, born in Greenock, son of a merchant; began life as a mathematical-instrument maker, opened business in Glasgow under university patronage, and early began to experiment on the mechanical capabilities of steam; when in 1703, while engaged in repairing the model of a Newcomen's engine, he hit upon the idea which has immortalised his name. This was the idea of a separate condenser for the steam, and from that moment the power of steam in the civilisation of the world was a.s.sured; the advantages of the invention were soon put to the proof and established, and by a partners.h.i.+p on the part of Watts with MATTHEW BOULTON (q. v.) Watt had the satisfaction of seeing his idea fairly launched and of reaping of the fruits. Prior to Watt's invention the steam-engine was of little other use than for pumping water (1736-1819).

WATTEAU, ANTOINE, celebrated French painter and engraver, born at Valenciennes; his pictures were numerous and the subjects almost limited to pseudo-pastoral rural groups; the tone of the colouring is pleasing, and the design graceful (1684-1721).

WATTS, GEORGE FREDERICK, eminent English painter, born in London; is distinguished as a painter at once of historical subjects, ideal subjects, and portraits; did one of the frescoes in the Poets' Hall of the Houses of Parliament and the cartoon of "Caractacus led in Triumph through the Streets of Rome"; has, as a "poet-painter," by his "Love and Death," "Hope," and "Orpheus and Eurydice," achieved a world-wide fame; he was twice over offered a baronetcy, but on both occasions he declined; _b_. 1817.

WATTS, ISAAC, Nonconformist divine, born at Southampton, son of a schoolmaster; chose the ministry as his profession, was for a time pastor of a church in Mark Lane, but after a succession of attacks of illness he resigned and went on a visit to his friend Sir Thomas Abney, with whom he stayed for 36 years, at which time his friend died, and he resumed pastoral duties as often as his health permitted; he wrote several books, among which was a book on "Logic," long a university text-book, and a great number of hymns, many of them of wide fame and much cherished as helps to devotion (1674-1748).

WATTS, THEODORE, critic, born at St. Ives, bosom friend of Swinburne, who p.r.o.nounces him "the first critic of our time--perhaps the largest-minded and surest-sighted of any age"; his influence is great, and it has been exercised chiefly through contributions to the periodicals of the day; has a.s.sumed the surname of Dunton after his mother; _b_. 1836.

WAUGH, EDWIN, a Lancas.h.i.+re poet, born at Rochdale, bred a bookseller; wrote, among other productions, popular songs, full of original native humour, the first of them "Come Whoam to thy Childer and Me" (1817-1890).

WAYLAND, the smith, a Scandinavian Vulcan, of whom a number of legends were current; figures in Scott's "Kenilworth."

WAZIRIS, a tribe of independent Afghans inhabiting the Suleiman Mountains, on the W. frontier of the Punjab.

WEALTH, defined by Ruskin to be the possession of things in themselves valuable, that is, of things available for the support of life, or inherently possessed of life-giving power.

WEBER, KARL MARIA VON, German composer, born near Lubeck, of a famed musical family; early gave proof of musical talent; studied at Vienna under Abbe Vogler, and at Dresden became founder and director of the German opera; his first great production was "Der Freischutz," which established his fame, and was succeeded by, among others, "Oberon," his masterpiece, first produced in London, where, shortly after the event, he died, broken in health; he wrote a number of pieces for the piano, deservedly popular (1786-1826).

WEBER, WILHELM EDUARD, German physicist, born at Wittenberg; professor at Gottingen; distinguished for his contributions to electricity and magnetism, both scientific and practical (1801-1891).

WEBSTER, DANIEL, American statesman and orator, born at New Hamps.h.i.+re; bred to the bar, and practised in the provincial courts; by-and-by went to Boston, which was ever after his home; entered Congress in 1813, where, by his commanding presence and his animated oratory, he soon made his mark; was secretary for foreign affairs under President Harrison, and negotiated the Ashburton Treaty in settlement of the "boundary-line" question between England and the States; was much admired by Emerson, and was, when he visited England, commended by him to the regard of Carlyle as a man to "hear speak," as "_with a cause_ he could strike a stroke like a smith"; Carlyle did not take to him; he was too political for his taste, though he recognised in him a "man--never have seen," he wrote Emerson, "so much _silent Berserkir-rage_ in any other man" (1782-1852).

WEBSTER, JOHN, English dramatist of the 17th century; did a good deal as a dramatist in collaboration with others, but some four plays are exclusively his own work, the two best the "White Devil" and the "d.u.c.h.ess of Malfi."

WEBSTER, NOAH, lexicographer, born at Hartford, Connecticut, U.S.; bred to law; tried journalism; devoted 20 years to his "Dictionary of the English Language" (1758-1843).

WEDGWOOD, JOSIAH, celebrated English potter, born at Burslem, son of a potter; in 1759 started a pottery on artistic lines in his native place; devoted himself first to the study of the material of his art and then to its ornamentation, in which latter he had at length the good fortune to enlist Flaxman as a designer, and so a ware known by his name became famous for both its substantial and artistic excellence far and wide over the country and beyond; he was a man of varied culture and of princely generosity, having by his art ama.s.sed a large fortune (1730-1793).

WEDNESBURY (69), a town in Staffords.h.i.+re, 8 m. NW. of Birmingham; iron-ware manufacture the chief industry; has an old church on the site of an old temple to Woden, whence the name, it is alleged.

WEDNESDAY, fourth day of the week, Woden's Day, as Thursday is Thor's. It is called Midwoch, i. e. Midweek, by the Germans.

WEEK, division of time of seven days, supposed to have been suggested by the interval between the quarters of the moon.

WEEPING PHILOSOPHER, a sobriquet given to HERAc.l.i.tUS (q. v.) from a melancholy disposition ascribed to him, in contrast with DEMOCRITUS (q. v.), designated the laughing philosopher.

WEI-HAI-WEI, a city in a deep bay on the Shantung promontory, China, 40 m. E. of Chefoo, and nearly opposite Port Arthur, which is situated on the northern side of the entrance to the Gulf of Pechili; was leased to Great Britain in 1898, along with the islands in the bay and a belt of land along the coast; its harbour is well sheltered, and accommodates a large number of vessels.

WEIMAR (24), capital of the grand-duchy of Saxe-Weimar, in a valley on the left bank of the Ilm, 13 m. E. of Erfurt, and famous as for many years the residence of the great Goethe and the ill.u.s.trious literary circle of which he was the centre, an a.s.sociation which const.i.tutes the chief interest of the place.

WEINGARTNER, FELIX, composer and musical conductor, born at Zara, Dalmatia; has composed symphonic poems, operas, and songs; _b_. 1863.

WEISMANN, AUGUST, biologist, born at Frankfort-on-the-Main; studied medicine at Gottingen; devoted himself to the study of zoology, the first-fruit of which was a treatise on the "Development of Diptera," and at length to the variability in organisms on which the theory of descent, with modifications, is based, the fruit of which was a series of papers published in 1882 under the t.i.tle of "Studies on the Theory of Descent"; but it is with the discussions on the question of heredity that his name is most intimately a.s.sociated. The accepted theory on the subject a.s.sumes that characters acquired by the individual are transmitted to offspring, and this a.s.sumption, in his "Essays upon Heredity," he maintains to be wholly groundless, and denies that it has any foundation in fact; heredity, according to him, is due to the continuity of the germ-plasm, or the transmission from generation to generation of a substance of a uniform chemical and molecular composition; _b_. 1834.

WEISS, BERNHARD, German theologian, born at Konigsberg; became professor at Kiel and afterwards at Berlin; has written on the theology of the New Testament, an introduction to it, and a "Leben Jesu," all able works; _b_. 1827.

WEISSENFELS (23), a town of Prussian Saxony, 35 m. SW. of Leipzig, with an old castle of the Duke of Weissenfels and various manufactures.

WEISSNICHTWO (Know-not-where), in Carlyle's "Sartor," an imaginary European city, viewed as the focus, and as exhibiting the operation, of all the influences for good and evil of the time we live in, described in terms which characterised city life in the first quarter of the 19th century; so universal appeared the spiritual forces at work in society at that time that it was impossible to say _where_ they were and _where_ they were _not_, and hence the name of the city, Know-not-where.

WEIZSaCHER, KARL, eminent German theologian; studied at Tubingen and Berlin; succeeded BAUR (q. v.) as professor at Tubingen; was a New Testament critic, and the editor of a theological journal, and distinguished for his learning and lucid style; _b_. 1822.

WELLDON, JAMES EDWARD COWELL, bishop of Calcutta; educated at Eton and Cambridge; has held several appointments, both scholastic and clerical; has translated several of the works of Aristotle, and was Hulsean Lecturer at Cambridge in 1897; _b_. 1854.

WELLER, SAM, Mr. Pickwick's servant, and an impersonation of the ready wit and best quality of London low life.