Page:The New International Encyclopædia 1st ed. v. 20.djvu/798

* WYATT. siderable military talent; and continued in hon- orable service on the Continent till 1550. In 1554, when the marriage between Queen Mary and Philip of Spain was under consideration, Wyatt conspired for the elevation of Lady Jane Grey to the throne, and led the Kentish men to Southwark, after gaining considerable success over the roj'alists. He, however, failed to cap- ture Liulgate, and, becoming separated from the main body of his followers, was taken prisoner, and soon afterwards executed. WYCHERLEY. wieh'er-ll, William (1640?- 1716). An English dramatist, one of the found- ers of the school of 'artificial comedy,' which reached its complete development in the work of Congreve and his associates and, at a later day, of Sheridan. Wycherley was born at Clive, in Shropshire. He was the son of a well-to-do cavalier squire, w'ho sent him at the age of fifteen to be educated in France. After his re- turn to England he was entered at tlie Inner Temple in 1059, but literature proved more at- tractive than the law. His first comedy, Love in a n'ood, or Saint James's Park, was acted with great applause, and published shortly afterward, probably in 1072. The Gentleman Dancing-mas- ter, which appeared in the following j'ear, was somewhat less successful, but his two other comedies. The Country H'i'fe (1675), and The Plain Dealer (1677), which are his strongest works, though in both he is more or less indebted to Moli&re, became exceedingly popular. About 16S0, 'vcherley married a rich young widow, the Countess of Droglieda. Slie did not live long and left him the whole of her fortune; but his succession to the estate was disputed and an expensive lawsuit ensued, the costs of which fairly broke down the unlucky dramatist. He was "committed to the debtors' prison and suf- fered to languish there neglected for seven years. He was partly relieved by the bounty of James II., and upon his father's death he succeeded to the patrimonial estate in Shropshire. This, how- ever, was heavily mortgaged and strictly entailed. He was on bad terms with the heir-at-law, his nephew; and on purpose to injure this relative, he married, at the age of seventy-five, a young girl, on whom he settled a jointure. Eleven days afterward he died. Besides his comedies, Wycher- ley published a volume of wretched Miscellany Poems in 1704, and after his death another vol- ume. The Posthumous Works of Williain Wycher- ley, Es(]., in Prose and Verse, appeared in 1728, His comedies, on which his fame rests, reflect the literary taste, the manners, and the vices of the time in which he lived. They are grossly im- moral, but their dramatic construction is ex- cellent, the language is clear and forcible, the dialogues are often witty and lively, some of the characters are vigorously drawn, and the observa- tions and maxims scattered throughout the differ- ent scenes are shrewd and sensible and are ex- pressed in a terse, sententious style. Consult: Tlie memoir published with the Posthumous Works (1728); Lord Lansdowne. Memoirs of the Life of William Wyeherleu. Ls'/.; uith a Character of His Wrilintis (London, 1718) ; W, C, Ward, ed,, liest Plays of William Wycherley, mth an Intro- duction and yotes (ib„ 1888) : and Hazlitt, 7,cc- tures on the English Comic Writers (ib., 1810), WYCH STREET, A street in London, fa- mous as tile resort of thieves and loose charac- 682 "WYETH. ters during the seventeenth and eighteenth cen- turies. Jack Sheppard's special haunt, the White Lion, has long been demolished. In 1554, Bishop Hooper spent the night before his execu- tion at another of its inns, The Angel. Wych Street leads from the Strand, near Clement's Inn, to Drury Lane, and contains the Olympic Theatre and an entrance to New Inn, WYCKOFF, wi'kof, Walter Augustus (1805 — ), An American teacher and writer, born in Mainpuri, India, where his father was a missionary. He graduated at Princeton in 1888, took a post-graduate course there in 1888- 89, and then studied for a year in Europe. For eighteen months after July' 1891, he worked as a day-laborer, making his way from Connecticut to California, in order to study the character and manner of life of the wage-earning class in America. The results of his studies appeared in three volumes: The Workers — the East (1897) ; The M^orkers — the West { 1898) : and .1 Day uith a Tramp and Other Days (1901); they at- tracted widespread attention and sliow consider- able sympathetic insight and acuteness of ob- servation. Wyckoflf traveled twice around the world as a private tutor, in 1893-94; and in 1894 held a fellow.ship in social science at Prince- ton, where he became a lecturer on sociology' in 1895 and an assistant professor of political economy in 1898. "WYCLIFFE. See Wiclif. WYCOMBE, wlk'iim, High Wycombe, or Chippixg Wycombe. A municipal borough in. Buckinghamshire, England, surroiuuled by beech- clad hills, 28 miles west-northwest of London, on the Wye, a small affluent of the Thames ( Map : England, F 5), It is famous for its Roman and Saxon antiquities. The church of All Saints, in the Xorman and early English style, is a large and handsome edifice,' dating from 1273, There are flour and paper mills, and manufactures of lace and furniture, beechwood chairs being a specialty. Population of municipal borough, in 1891, 13,435; in 1901, 15,532; of parliamentary borough,' in 1891, 42,790; in 1901, 46,490, WYE, wl. A river of Wales and England. It rises on the south slope of Plinlimmon in Wales near the source of the Severn, and flows southeast into Herefordshire, England, then southward, emptying into the estuary of the Severn on the boundarv between IMonmouth and .Gloucester (Map: 'Wales, C 4), It is 1,30 miles long, navigable for large vessels to Chepstow, near its mouth, and for small craft 70 miles to Here- ford, whence a canal connects it with the Severn at Gloucester. At its moulh the tide rises some- times 46 feet, a height exceeded in few places on the globe. The lower eoiirse of the Wye is celebrated for its beaiity. and here on its banks lie the ruins of Tintern Abbey. WY'ETH, John Allan (1845—). An Ameri- can surgeon and writer, born in Marshall County, Ala. He studied for a year at La Grange Military Academy. La Grange, Ala., served as a private in the Confederate .rmy during the Civil War, was captured near Chattanooga, Tenn.. in October. 1803, for fifteen iiiontlis was a pris- oner at Camp Mortnn, Iiidianajiolis, hid., and was exchanged in Mareli, 1805. He grmhiated in medicine at the Ihiiversity of Louisville (Ky,), in 1S(>9. and at the Bellevue Medical College in