46 



WICKLOW-WIELAND. 



The principal manufactures of Wicklow are 

 woollen and cotton goods. Besides the coarse 

 woollens for common use, flannel is manufactured 

 to a great extent. From 5,000 to 7,000 pieces 

 were sold annually before 1808 at the flannel sale 

 at Rathdrum. The cotton manufacture was then 

 carried on with much spirit at Stratford-upon-Sla- 

 ney. The linen manufacture has always been in- 

 considerable. The principal towns, &c. are Wick- 

 low, the county town, Baltinglas, Blessington, and 

 Carysfort, which were formerly burghs. The vil- 

 lages are Rathdrum, Bray, Arklow, Stratford-upon- 

 Slaney. Wicklow is boldly situated on the decli- 

 vity of a lofty mountain. The church, whicli has 

 a high square tower, is pleasantly situated on a 

 lofty eminence. The jail, the court-house, and the 

 market-house, are good modern edifices ; and about 

 a mile to the south-east of the town, are two light- 

 bouses. Population of the county in 1841, 126,143. 



\\ ICQUEFORT, ABRAHAM DE, an eminent 

 publicist of the seventeenth century, was born at 

 Amsterdam, in 1598. The early part of bis life 

 was spent in Germany ; and the elector of Bran- 

 denburg, in 1626, appointed him to take charge of 

 his interests at the court of Paris. In this capacity 

 he continued to reside at the French capital till 

 1658, when a suspicion arising of his having made 

 improper disclosures to the states-general, be was 

 arrested at the instance of cardinal Mazarin, and 

 sent to the Bastile. After a twelvemonth's im- 

 prisonment in this fortress, he obtained liberty to 

 return to Holland. De Wit, then at the head of 

 the Dutch government, gave him the appointment 

 of historiographer to the states, and induced him to 

 undertake the task of writing a history of bis na- 

 tive country, while the duke of Brunswick-Lunen- 

 burg made him bis resident at the Hague. But he 

 was arrested and condemned to perpetual imprison- 

 ment, for conveying intelligence to the enemies of 

 his country. By the courage of one of his daugh- 

 ters, however, he escaped, after a confinement of 

 four years, and fled to Zell, in 1679. Here he oc- 

 cupied himself for two years in unavailing attempts 

 to procure a reversion of his sentence, and is said 

 to have died of chagrin, in 1682. Besides his His- 

 tory of the United Provinces, De Wicquefort was 

 the author of a work on diplomacy, entitled L'Am- 

 bassadeur et ses Fonctions (4to., 2 vols.), and some 

 translations of travels from the Spanish and Ger- 

 man languages into Dutch. 



WIDDIN, OE VIDIN ; a fortified town, and 

 capital of a sangiacat in Rumelia, on the right 

 bank of the Danube, with 25,000 inhabitants. 

 The sultan, Selim III., having formed the design 

 of dissolving the corps of janizaries, and supplying 

 their place by troops organised and disciplined ac- 

 cording to the European military system, proceeded 

 to execute his plan, by successively disbanding the 

 different frontier garrisons. The order to discon- 

 tinue their pay was the signal of insurrection to 

 the garrison of Widdin, commanded by the bold 

 and artful Paswan Oglu. His father had been put 

 to death by the grand vizier, jealous of his power 

 and covetous of his wealth ; and Paswan Oglu had 

 been himself detained as a prisoner. Eager for re- 

 venge, he seized the opportunity which now offered 

 itself, and, at the head of the disbanded janizaries, 

 chased the pacha from the town. The inhabitants, 

 discontented with the new impositions that had 

 been- made, to meet the expenses of the new mili- 

 tary system, readily joined him ; and he now pro- 

 ceeded to levy contributions for the support ot Ws 



authority in the neighbouring districts. He also 

 won over the Greeks by promises of religious free- 

 dom. In the first campaign (1797), he was almost 

 constantly successful ; and the following year be 

 succeeded in compelling the capudan pacha to 

 raise the seige of Widdin, and to retreat, leaving 

 the northern provinces at bis mercy. The Porte 

 was finally compelled to yield to his demands, and, 

 in 1798, conferred upon him the dignity of pacha, 

 with the government of Widdin, which he held till 

 his death in 1807. 



WIDGEON; a species of duck, which in winter 

 frequents our inlets of the sea and fresh-water lakes ; 

 The American widgeon is most abundant in Carolina, 

 where it frequents the rice plantations, and is much 

 complained of by the planters. It is often called bald- 

 pate, from the white on the top of the head. It is a 

 constant attendant on the canvass-back duck, by 

 the aid of whose labours it contrives to make a 

 good subsistence, and with whom it lives in a state 

 of perpetual contention. The front and crown 

 are cream-coloured ; a band of deep glossy green 

 extends from the eye backwards; the throat, chin, 

 and sides of the neck are dull yellowish-white, 

 thickly speckled with black ; the breast and hind 

 part of the neck hoary bay ; immediately below 

 the wing-coverts is a large spot of white. 



WIDMER, SAMUEL, a distinguished mechani- 

 cian and manufacturer, the nephew of Oberkampf, 

 and his successor, was born in 1767, in the Aargau, 

 was instructed by Oberkampf, and studied much 

 himself. He applied Berthollett's chemical process 

 for bleaching linen on a large scale, and, in 1792, 

 invented the mode of printing calico with copper 

 cylinders ; but the revolution prevented him from 

 applying this invention to a considerable extent 

 immediately. The machine was capable of doing 

 as much as twenty-four workmen. He then in- 

 vented a machine for engraving, and, in 1809, the 

 method of heating the water in the dyeing kettles 

 by steam. After this he discovered a dye (le vert 

 solide d'une seule application), for which the royal 

 society in London had offered a prize of 2000. 

 Until then, the vert solide could be used only by a 

 double application of colour, either of indigo upon 

 yellow, or of yellow upon indigo. Widmer did not 

 communicate his invention to the royal society, 

 and, of course, did not receive the prize. He af- 

 terwards visited England, where Sir Joseph Banks 

 received him with much attention. His last inven- 

 tion was a machine for bleaching linen, which is 

 called hydrocydephore, because the water passes 

 in a circular course, and at a boiling heat, into and 

 out of the tin vessels. Louis XVIII. gave him 

 the order of the legion of honour. He died in 

 1824. His private character was that of a charit- 

 able and generous man. 

 WIED. See Neu Wied. 



WIELAND, CHRISTOPHER MARTIN, was born 

 in the town of Biberach, in Suabia, Sept. 5, 1733, 

 where his father, a Protestant minister, gave him 

 an excellent education. The talents of the young 

 Wieland early attracted the attention of his teach- 

 ers. In his twelfth year, he composed Latin and 

 German verses. In his fourteenth year he was 

 j sent to Klosterbergen, near Magdeburg. Here he 

 I penetrated deeply into the spirit of the ancients. 

 j Here, also, he became acquainted with the works 

 | of Steele and Addison, though in very imperfect 

 I translations, and Sbaftesbury made a lasting impres- 

 sion upon him. He also studied Voltaire and 

 ; D'Argens. . In his sixteenth year, he left Kloster- 



