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W I G 
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To handle; in an ironical sense .—Base Hungarian wight, 
wilt thou the spigot wield. Shakspeare. 
WIE'LDLESS, adj. Unmanageable. 
That with the weight of his own wee/dlesse might 
He falleth nigh to ground, and scarse recovereth flight. 
Spenser. 
WIE'LDY, adj. Manageable. Dr. Johnson .—Chaucer 
has once used it in the sense of active. 
WIELICZKA, a town of Austrian Poland - , in Galicia, 
circle of Bochnia. It is the seat of a salt and a mine office, 
and is remarkable for its large and productive salt mines. 
They are divided into three parts, and extend not only under 
the whole town, but to a considerable distance on each side, 
viz. 700 yards from north to south, and 2000 from east to 
west. They have ten entrances, and in one of these is a 
winding staircase of 470 steps. On entering the subterranean 
regions, the stranger is struck with the magnitude and beauty 
of the vaulted passages: he sees chapels, with altars, cut out 
of the saline rock, with crucifixes or images, and lamps con¬ 
tinually burning before them. In another part he observes 
vast chambers, which serve as store-houses for the casks of 
salt, or for the forage of the horses which are employed in 
dragging loads of salt from the edges of the mine to the cen¬ 
tre; 7 miles south-east of Cracow. Population 2200. 
WIELONA, a small town of Russian Lithuania, in the 
government of Wilna, on the Niemen; 20 miles south of 
Rosienne. 
WIELUN, a town of Prussian Poland; 65 miles east of 
Breslau. Population 2000. 
WIENER HERBERG, a village of Lower Austria; 2 
miles south-east of Vienna. 
WIENERWALD (Forest of Vienna), a large forest of 
Lower Austria, extending from the Kahlenberg southward, 
to beyond Kaumberg. It separates and gives name to the two 
circles of the Upper and Lower Wienerwald, otherwise called 
the quarters above and below the forest of Vienna. The lat¬ 
ter contains 1730 square miles, and 463,000 inhabitants, 
including Vienna. The circle above the Wienerwald con¬ 
tains 2000 square miles, and about 200,000 inhabitants. 
Its chief town is St. Polten. 
WIEPRZ, a river of Poland, which joins the Vistula, near 
Stericza. 
WIER (John), a physician, was bom in 1515, at Grave 
on the Meuse; and being domesticated with the famous Cor¬ 
nelius Agrippa, adopted his opinions with regard to the oc¬ 
cult sciences. After having studied at Paris and Orleans, 
he took the degree of M.D, about the year 1534. In the 
course of his travels he visited the court of the duke of 
Cleves, and was appointed his physician. He died at Teck- 
lenburg, in Westphalia, in 1586. He was a man of consi¬ 
derable learning; and though participating in a great degree 
the credulity of the age, he incurred the enmity of the 
monks, by ascribing the sorcery, witchcraft, and magical 
practices, which they supported, to the operation of natural 
causes. The turn of his mind is discernible in his book 
“ De Dreinonum Prestigiis et Incantationibus.” In his treatise 
of medical observations he has given an account of the pu¬ 
trid sore throat, under the name of “ Angina pestilentialis.” 
Among his other writings are enumerated “ De Iras Morbo, 
et ejus Curatione Medica et Philosophica ;” “ Tractatus de 
Commentitiis Jejuniis;”“ De TussiEpidemica, Anno 1580;” 
“ De Varenis, Morbo endemio Westphalorum.”— Haller. 
Flop. 
WIERINGEN, a small island of the Netherlands, in the 
Zuyder Zee, opposite to the coast of North Holland ; 6 miles 
long - , and 2 broad. Population about 1500. 
VV1ERUM, a small seaport of the Netherlands, in Fries¬ 
land ; 6 miles north of Dokkum. 
WIERUSZOW, a town of Poland, on the Prosna; 31 
miles south of Kalisch. Population 1000. 
Wl'ERY, adj. Made of wire. It were better written 
wiry. 
Your gown going off, such beauteous state reveals. 
As when through flow’ry meads th’ hill’s shadow steals; 
Off with that wiery coronet, and shew 
The hairy diadem which on your head doth grow. Donne. 
Drawn into wire.—Polymnia shall be drawn with her 
hair hanging loose about her shoulders, resembling wiery 
gold. Peacham. [From paep, a pool.' ] Wet; wearish; 
moist. Obsolete. 
Where but by chance a silver drop hath fall’n, 
Ev’n to that drop ten thousand wiery friends 
Do glew themselves in sociable grief. Shakspeare. 
WIESE, or Laura, a town of the Austrian states, in 
Moravia, on the river Iglau, with 800 inhabitants; 6 miles 
east of Iglau. 
WIESECK, a village of Germany, in Hesse-Darmstadt. 
It has 1000 inhabitants. 
WIESELBURG, or Mqsony, a small county of Hun¬ 
gary, bounded on the north by the Danube, and on the west 
by Lower Austria. Its area is about 740 square miles; its 
population 54,000, a mixture of Germans and Croats. 
WIESELBURG, or Mosony, the chief town of the above 
palatinate, is situated on a branch of the Danube; 21 miles 
south-south-east of Presburg. Lat. 47. 51. 3. N. long. 17. 
15. 10. E. Population 2500. 
W1ESEN, CIRCLE OF THE, a district of the grand 
duchy of Baden, of which it forms the south-west comer, 
being bounded both on the south and west by the Rhine. 
It contains the south part of the Brisgau, and the whole dis¬ 
trict of Sausenburg, and has about 117,000 inhabitants. It 
is divided into 11 bailiwics. 
WIESEN, a small river of Germany, which rises in the 
Black forest, and falls into the Rhine, opposite to Huningen. 
WIESENBRONN, a small town of Germany, in Bava¬ 
rian Franconia. 
WIESENSTEIG, a town of Germany, in Wirtemberg; 
18 miles north-west of Ulm. Population 1200. 
WIESENT, a river of Bavaria, which falls into the Regnitz, 
at Forch-heim. 
WIESENTIIAL, a village of Germany, in Baden; 4 
miles east of Philipsburg. Population 900. 
WIESENTIIAL, Upper, a town of Germany, in Saxony ; 
12 miles south-south-east of Schwarzenburg. Population 
1500.—Lower Wiesenthal is a petty village near it. 
WEISENTHEID, a town of Bavarian Franconia; 19 
miles east of Wurzburg. Population 900. 
WIESLOCH, a town of Germany, in Baden; 8 miles 
south of Heidelberg. Population 1900. 
WIETHEN, ,a village of North America, Lat. 62. 30. N. 
long. 99. 50. W. 
WIETLISBACH, a small town of Switzerland, in the 
canton of Bern ; 6 miles east-north-east of Soleure. 
WIETMARSEN, a large village of Hanover; 4 miles 
north of Northorn. 
WIFE, s. Plural wives, [pip, Sax.; wiff, Dutch; wyf, 
Icel. mulier ; sic dicta a waefwa, texere : Kona kalldest vyf 
af vefnandi, mulier adpeilatur wyf a texendo : Edda. Sere- 
niusj A woman that has a husband. 
There’s no bottom, none 
In my voluptuousness: your wives, your daughters, 
Your matrons, and your maids could not fill up 
The cistern of my lust. Shakspeare. 
It is used for a woman of low employment. 
Strawberry wives lay two or three great strawberries at the 
mouth of their pot, and all the rest are little ones. Bacon. 
WI'FEHOOD, s. State and character of a wife. 
She had neither manners, honesty, behaviour. 
Wifehood, nor womanhood. Beaum. and FI. 
WI'FELESS, adj. Without a wife; unmarried. Protnt. 
Parv. —And sixty yeres a wifeless man was he. Chaucer. 
WI'FELY, adj. Becoming a wife. 
I met you 
With all the tenderness of wifely love. Dryden. 
WIG, s. Wig being a termination in the names of men, 
signifies war, or else a heroe, from piga, a word of that sig¬ 
nification. Gibson. 
WIG, 
