WRANGEL, Charles Gustavus, count of, Swedish field-marshal, a distinguished military commander of the seventeenth century, was descended from an old and illustrious Swedish family. His father, Herman Wrangel, a Swedish counsellor of state, and field-marshal, was governor of Livonia at the time of his death, in 1644. The son, Charles Gustavus, entered the military service at an early age, and was brought up in the school of the celebrated Gustavus Adolphus. Under that prince he served in Germany; and, on the death of general Baner (q. v.), in 1641, Wrangel, who then had the rank of major-general, was one of those who commanded the Swedish forces, under very difficult circumstances, until the arrival of the new commander-in-chief, Torstenson. (q. v.) Wrangel continued to serve under that general, and accompanied him on his daring march to Holstein (1643), to carry the war into Denmark. (See Thirty Years' War.) After the death of admiral Fleming, the command of the Swedish fleet was confided to Wrangel, who was at first obliged to yield to the numerical superiority of the Danish naval force; but being reinforced by a Dutch squadron, he defeated the enemy off the island of Femern. He then commanded a detached corps in Holstein and Sleswick, until the peace of Brömsebrő (1645). In 1646, Torstenson having resigned the command, Wrangel was associated with Königsmark in that trust, and, having formed a junction with the French forces under Turenne, their combined operations forced the elector of Bavaria to accede to an armistice, at Ulm, in March, 1647. The elector having afterwards disavowed this act, the allied forces defeated the combined Austrian and Bavarian armies at Zusmarshausen, near Augsburg, May 17, 1618; and Wrangel occupied Bavaria until the peace of Westphalia (q. v.), in 1648, put an end to hostilities. After the accession of Charles Gustavus to the throne of Sweden, Wrangel accompanied his sovereign in the expedition against Poland, and was present at the celebrated three days' battle of Warsaw (July 18-20, 1656). In the course of this war, Denmark having entered upon hostilities against Sweden (1657), Wrangel laid siege to the fortress of Kronburg, which was obliged to surrender after twenty-one days (Sept. 6, 1658). He then took command of the Swedish fleet destined to attack Copenhagen; but the expedition proved unsuccessful, on account of the arrival of a Dutch fleet to 23

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the assistance of the Danes. The deatlı of the king of Sweden put an end to the war in 1660. In 1674, Louis XIV having declared war against the German empire, Sweden engaged in the hostile operations on the side of France, and Wrangel commanded an army of 16,000 men, which invaded Brandenburg; but the ill success of this expedition is probably to be imputed to the sickness of the commander. The great elector, Frederic William (q. v.), at the head of 6000 cavalry, attacked the Swedish forces by surprise, and gained a complete victory at Fehrbellin (q. v.), June 18, 1675. The Swedes were obliged to evacuate Brandenburg, and even lost a part of Pomerania. Wrangel, who soon after retired from service on account of his infirmities, died the following year. In 1645, he had been rewarded for his services with the title of count.

WRANGLER, SENIOR, in the university of Cambridge, England; the student who passes the best examination in the senatehouse for the first degree (that of bachelor) in arts. (See Cambridge.) They who follow next in the same division, are respectively termed second, third, fourth, &c., wranglers. In a similar manner, they who compose the second rank of honors are designated as first, second, third, &c., optimi (best); those of the third order, first, second, third, &c., junior optimi (second best); and the remainder are termed of noXXo (the mob).

WRAXALL, Sir Nathaniel William, born in 1751, at Bristol, where his father and grandfather were merchants, was educated in his native city, and, in 1769, was sent to Bombay, in the service of the East India company. He was there employed, in 1771, as judge advocate and paymaster of the forces of that presidency. Next year he returned to England, and then travelled on the continent, visiting almost every country from Lapland to Lisbon. On his return, he sent to the press a Voyage round the Baltic (1775). In 1777, he published the History of the Kings of France, of the House of Valois (2 vols., 8vo.), and History of the Reign and Age of Henry III and IV, Kings of France (3 vols., quarto). In 1780, he was elected member of parliament for the borough of Hindon, in 1784, for Luggershall, and, in 1790, for Wallingford. His Memoirs of the Courts of Berlin, Dresden, Warsaw, and Vienna, were given to the world in 1799. While in parliament, he sometimes opposed Mr. Pitt, and at other times supported him. In 1813, he was raised to the dignity of

a baronet, and, in 1815, published his last work, under the title of Historical Memoirs of His Own Time (2 vols., 8vo.). A story was introduced into this work respecting count Woronzow, the Russian ambassador, the truth of which the count denied; and, deeming the publication to be libellous, he had recourse to a criminal prosecution. It was tried in the court of king's bench, and sir Nathaniel was found guilty, and sentenced to a fine and six months' imprisonment. He died in 1831. WREATH, in heraldry; a roll of fine linen or silk (like that of a Turkish turban), consisting of the colors borne in the escutcheon, placed in an achievement between the helmet and the crest, and immediately supporting the crest.

WRECK, in navigation, is usually understood to mean any ship or goods driven ashore, or found floating at sea in a deserted or unmanageable condition; but, in the legal sense of the word in England, wreck must have come to land: when at sea, it is distinguished by the barbarous appellations of flotsam, jetsam, and ligan. (See Flotsam.) In nothing, perhaps, has the beneficial influence of the advance of society in civilization been more apparent than in the regulations with respect to the persons and property of shipwrecked individuals. In most rude and uncivilized countries, their treatment has been cruel in the extreme. Amongst the early Greeks and Romans, strangers and enemies were regarded in the same point of view. (Hostis apud antiquos, peregrinus dicebatur.-Pomp. Festus ; see also Cicero, De Offic. lib. i. c. 12.) Where such inhospitable sentiments prevailed, the conduct observed towards those that were shipwrecked could not be otherwise than barbarous; and, in fact, they were, in most instances, either put to death or sold as slaves. But, as law and good order grew up, and commerce and navigation were extended, those who escaped from the perils of the sea were treated in a way less repugnant to the dictates of humanity; and at length the Roman law made it a capital offence to destroy persons shipwrecked, or to prevent their saving the ship; and the stealing even of a plank from a vessel shipwrecked, or in distress, made the party liable to answer for the whole ship and cargo. (Pand. 47. 9. 3.) During the gloomy period which followed the subversion of the Roman empire, and the establishment of the northern nations in the southern parts of Europe, the ancient barbarous practices with respect to shipwreck were every where renewed.

Those who survived were, in most countries, reduced to servitude; and their goods were every where confiscated for the use of the lord on whose manor they had been thrown. (Robertson's Charles V, vol. i, note 29.) But nothing, perhaps, can so strongly evince the prevalence and nature of these enormities as the efforts that were made, as soon as governments began to acquire authority, for their suppression. The regulations as to shipwreck, in the laws of Oleron, are, in this respect, most remarkable. The 35th and 38th articles state, that "Pilots, in order to ingratiate themselves with their lords, did, like faithless and treacherous villains, sometimes willingly run the ship upon the rocks, &c.;" for which offence they are held to be accursed and excommunicated, and punished as thieves and robbers. The fate of the lord is still more

severe.

"He is to be apprehended, his goods confiscated and sold, and himself fastened to a post or stake in the midst of his own mansion house, which being fired at the four corners, all shall be burned together, the walls thereof be demolished, the stones pulled down, and the site converted into a market-place, for the sale only of hogs and swine, to all posterity." The 31st article recites, that, when a vessel was lost by running on shore, and the mariners had landed, they often, instead of meeting with help, "were attacked by people more barbarous, cruel and inhuman than mad dogs; who, to gain their moneys, apparel, and other goods, did sometimes murder and destroy these poor distressed seamen. In this case, the lord of the country is to execute justice by punishing them in their persons and their estates, and is commanded to plunge them in the sea till they be half dead, and then to have them drawn forth out of the sea, and stoned to death." Such were the dreadful severities by which it was attempted to put a stop to the crimes against which they were directed. The violence of the remedy shows, better than any thing else, how inveterate the disease had become. The law of England, like that of other modern countries, adjudged wrecks to belong to the king; but the rigor and injustice of this law was modified as early as the reign of Henry I, when it was ruled, that, if any person escaped alive out of the ship, it should be no wreck and, after various modifications, it was decided, in the reign of Henry III, that if goods were cast on shore, having any marks by which they could be identified, they were to revert to the

:

owners, if claimed any time within a year and a day. By the statute 27 Edw. III, c. 13, if a ship be lost, and the goods come to land, they are to be delivered to the merchants, paying only a reasonable_reward or salvage to those who saved or preserved them. But these ancient statutes, owing to the confusion and disorder of the times, were very ill enforced; and the disgraceful practices previously alluded to continued to the middle of the last century. A statute of Anne (12 Ann. st. 2, c. 18), confirmed by the 4 Geo. I, c. 12, in order to put a stop to the atrocities in question, orders all head officers, and others of the towns near the sea, upon application made to them, to summon as many hands as are necessary, and send them to the relief of any ship in distress, on forfeiture of £100; and in case of assistance given, salvage is to be assessed by three justices, and paid by the owners. Persons secreting any goods cast ashore, are to forfeit treble their value; and if they wilfully do any act whereby the ship is lost or destroyed, they are guilty of felony without benefit of clergy. But even this statute seems not to have been sufficient to accomplish the end in view; and, in 1753, a new statute (26 Geo. II, c. 19) was enacted, the preamble of which is as follows:"Whereas, notwithstanding the good and salutary laws now in being against plundering and destroying vessels in distress, and against taking away shipwrecked, lost or stranded goods, many wicked enormities have been committed, to the disgrace of the nation, and the grievous damage of merchants and mariners of our own and other countries, be it, &c. ;" and it is then enacted, that the preventing the escape of any person endeavoring to save his life, or wounding him with intent to destroy him, or putting out false lights in order to bring any vessel into danger, shall be capital felony. By the same statute, the pilfering of any goods cast ashore, is made petty larceny. By statute 1 and 2 Geo. IV, c. 75, it is enacted that any person or persons wilfully cutting away, injuring or concealing any buoy or buoy-rope attached to any anchor or cable belonging to any ship, whether in distress or otherwise, shall be judged guilty of felony, and may, upon conviction, be transported for seven years. The salvage, or the amount to be paid to those who have assisted in saving the wreck, is determined by the court of admiralty, who proportion the allowance to the risk and labor incurred. Sometimes as much as half the value of the property saved has

been allowed. (For salvage in cases of recapture, see prize.)

WREDE, Charles Philip, prince of, a Bavarian field-marshal, and member of the Bavarian council of state, is descended from an ancient family in Baden, and was born at Heidelberg, in 1764. Baron von Wrede, in the wars of Austria against France, had an office in the commissariate from 1793 to 1798. In 1799, he received orders to form a Bavarian corps, to be connected with the army of the archduke Charles. This corps he commanded in the cavalry engagement at Fredericsfelde, on the Neckar, October 14, 1799. The ability which he displayed in 1799 and 1800, procured him, in the latter year, the rank of major-general: he fought as such in the battle of Hohenlinden. In 1804, he was made lieutenantgeneral. In 1805, he was made commander-in-chief of the Bavarian forces in the field, in the place of general Deroy, who was wounded. In the campaign of 1805, he often distinguished himself, and received, in 1806, the grand cross of the legion of honor. In 1807, he commanded the Bavarian forces in Poland, and, in 1809, the second division of the Bavarian army, with which he took part in the battles of Abensberg and Landshut. In the engagement at Neumarkt (the French general Bessières against Hiller), Wrede saved the army, which was already beaten. He took Salzburg, broke into Tyrol, occupied Inspruck, advanced, by forced marches, to Vienna, and contributed much to the victory at Wagram. After the peace, Napoleon made him count of the empire, and give him dotations in the Innvierthel. Having become general of the cavalry, he and Deroy commanded, in 1812, the Bavarian army in Russia. He fought at Polotzk, and took the command after the advance of Witgenstein, when Marmont and Gouvion St. Cyr had been wounded, and Deroy had fallen. He covered the retreat of the flying French army. In 1813, he led the newly-formed Bavarian army to the Inn, where, for a long time, he confronted the Austrians. October 8, he concluded the treaty of Ried, by which Bavaria joined the allies. He then took the command of the united Austrian and Bavarian troops, and led them to the Maine. He took Würzburg, and caused Frankfort to be occupied, when Napoleon, on his retreat from Saxony, arrived at Hanau. The battle of Hanau occurred October 30 and 31. (See Hanau.) On this occasion, he was seriously wounded. Having re

covered, he commanded the fifth corps, took part in the battle of Brienne (February 1, 1814), and captured twenty-three cannons. He then beat Marmont, near Rosny, drove back Oudinot at Donnemarie, decided the victory at Bar-sur-Aube, and contributed much to that at Arcissur-Aube (March 20). In 1814, he was made field-marshal, and, June 9 of the same year, was made prince, and received a grant of Ellingen, a town and castle, with nineteen villages and sixteen hamlets, as a principality under Bavarian sovereignty. At the congress of Vienna, he showed himself a skilful diplomatist. In 1815, he again led the Bavarian army to France. Since 1819, he has taken part in the debates of the upper chamber. October 1, 1822, he was made generalissimo of the Bavarian army. In 1832, he was sent by king Louis into Rhenish Bavaria (q. v.), to quell the disturbances existing there.

WREN (troglodytes); a genus of birds, closely allied to the warblers, distinguished by their small size, slender beak, short and rounded wings, mottled plumage, and the habit of holding the tail elevated. The European wren is, with one exception, the smallest bird on that continent. It is fond of prying about crevices and holes in walls, ruined buildings, &c., and is constantly in motion, searching for insects, which form its accustomed food. It nestles in similar situations, or even under the caves of houses. The winter wren, which visits us in the winter season, and sometimes remains till spring, is considered identical with the European specips. The house wren of the U. States (T. ædon) is distinguished by its longer tail. It is one of our most familiar birds, from Canada to the gulf of Mexico, taking up its abode in the vicinity of dwellings; and its note is well known even in the midst of our most populous cities. The habits of all the wrens are more or less similar. We have some other species in the U. States.

WREN, Sir Christopher, a celebrated English architect, was the son of the rector of East Knoyle, in Wiltshire, where he was born, in 1632. He entered as a student at Wadham college, Oxford, in 1646, previously to which time he had given proofs of his genius, by the invention of astronomical and pneumatic instruments. In 1647, he wrote a treatise on spherical trigonometry, upon a new plan, and, the following year, composed an algebraical tract on the Julian period. In 1653, he was chosen a fellow of the col

lege of All-Souls. He was one of the earliest members of the philosophical society at Oxford, which was the origin of the royal society, after the institution of which, in 1663, he was elected a fellow, and distinguished himself by his activity in promoting the objects of that institution. In 1657, he was appointed professor of astronomy at Gresham college, but, on being nominated to the Savilian professorship of astronomy at Oxford, resigned the former office, and, in 1661, returned to the university. He received a commission, in 1663, to prepare designs for the restoration of St. Paul's cathedral, then one of the most remarkable Gothic edifices in the kingdom. To prepare himself for the execution of this great undertaking, he made a visit to France in 1665, and then finished the designs; but while they were under consideration, the cathedral was destroyed by the fire. of 1666, and the plan of repairing it was relinquished. Wren had now an opportunity for signalizing his talents by the erection of an entirely new structure. The contemporaneous destruction of fifty parochial churches and many public buildings, also furnished an ample field for his genius; and he would have had the honor of founding, as it were, a new city, if the design which he laid before the king and parliament could have been adopted; but private interests prevented its acceptance. On the death of sir John Denham, in 1667, he succeeded to the office of surveyor of the works. He resigned his Savilian professorship in 1673. In 1674, he received the honor of knighthood; and, in the following year, the foundation of the new cathedral was laid. In 1680, he was chosen president of the royal society. In 1683, he was appointed architect, and one of the commissioners of Chelsea college; and, the following year, controller of the works at Windsor castle. He was elected member of parliament for the borough of Plympton, in 1685. To his other public trusts were added, in 1698, those of surveyor-general and commissioner for the repair of Westminster abbey, and, in 1699, that of architect of Greenwich hospital. In 1700, he represented in parliament the boroughs of Weymouth and Melcombe Regis. In 1708, he was made one of the commissioners for the erection of fifty new churches, in and near the city of London. After having long been the highest ornament of his profession, he was, in 1718, deprived of the surveyorship of the royal works, from political