[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 assured; the advantages of the invention were soon put to the proof and established, and by a partnership 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 pronounces 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 assumed the surname of Dunton after his mother; b. 1836.
[Waugh, Edwin], a Lancashire 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.