VOYAGES OF DISCOVERY. (See Travels, and North Polar Expeditions.) VOYER. (See Argenson.)

VRIES, Hieronymus van, born at Amsterdam, in 1776, is one of the most eminent living scholars and authors of Holland. His Life of Anaxagoras, and his Eulogy of Hieronymus van Decker, laid the foundation of his reputation, and procured him admission into the Dutch institute. His History of Dutch Poetry (1808, 2 vols.) is a classical work, and gained the prize offered by the society for the promotion of Dutch literature and poetry. Vries has subsequently been one of the most active members of the second class of the institute, which is employed on two numismatical works of the greatest interest for Netherlandish history. One is intended to form a supplement to the works of Van Loon and Mieris, the other to comprise those medals which were struck subsequently to 1723, and could not, therefore, be included in the works of Van Loon and Mieris.

VROON, Henry Cornelius; a Dutch painter, born at Haerlem, in 1566. Being shipwrecked on the coast of Portugal, during a voyage to Spain, he succeeded so well in painting the storm which caused his misfortune, that he dedicated himself entirely to sea pieces, on his return home. About this time, the earl of Nottingham, lord high admiral of England, being desirous of preserving the details of the defeat of the Spanish armada, in which he bore so conspicuous a part, bespoke a suit of tapestry descriptive of each day's engagement. For this tapestry Vroon was employed to furnish designs; and the tapestry has often excited great admiration in the house of lords, where it was placed. The date of the death of this artist is not recorded.

VULCANISTS; those geological theorists who maintain that the earth was at first in a state of igneous fusion, and that it gradually cooled, and became covered only at a subsequent period. According to the Vulcanists, the land was raised up by an internal force; the irregularities which diversify its surface are the effects of volcanic eruptions; and the transported soils have been formed by the disintegrations of the higher grounds. The Neptunists, on the other hand, maintain that the earth was originally in a state of aqueous solution. (See Geology.)

VULCANUS; a god of the ancients, who presided over fire, and was the patron of all artists who worked iron and metals.

He was son of Juno alone, who, in this, wished to imitate Jupiter, who had produced Minerva from his brains. According to Homer, he was son of Jupiter and Juno; and the mother was so disgusted with the deformities of her son, that she threw him into the sea as soon as born, where he remained for nine years. According to the more received opinion, Vulcan was educated in heaven with the rest of the gods, but his father kicked him down from Olympus, when he attempted to deliver his mother, who had been fastened by a golden chain for her insolence. He was nine days in passing from heaven upon earth, and fell in the island of Lemnos. He broke his leg by the fall, and ever after remained lame of one foot. He fixed his residence in Lemnos, where he built himself a palace, and raised forges to work metals. Bacchus intoxicated him, and prevailed upon him to come to Olympus, where he was reconciled to his parents. Vulcan has been celebrated, by the ancient poets, for the ingenious works and automatical figures which he made. It is said, that, at the request of Jupiter, he made the first woman that ever appeared on earth, well known under the name of Pandora. (See Pandora.) The Cyclops of Sicily were his ministers and attendants; and with him they fabricated, not only the thunderbolts of Jupiter, but also arms for the gods and the most celebrated heroes. His forges were supposed to be under mount Etna, in the island of Sicily, as well as in every part of the earth where there were volcanoes. Venus was the wife of Vulcan. Her infidelity is well known. Her amours with Mars were discovered by Phoebus, and exposed to the gods by her own husband. The worship of Vulcan was well established, particularly in Egypt, at Athens, and at Rome. He was represented covered with sweat, blowing, with his nervous arm, the fires of his forges. His breast was hairy, and his forehead was blackened with smoke. Some represent him lame and deformed, holding a hammer, raised in the air, ready to strike; while, with the other hand, he turns with pincers a thunderbolt on his anvil. He appears, on some monuments, with a long beard, dishevelled hair, half naked, and a small round cap on his head, while he holds a hammer and pincers in his hand. The Egyptians represented him under the figure of a monkey. Vulcan received many other names, among which the most common is Mulciber. He was father of Cupid by Venus. Cicero speaks of more

than one deity of the name of Vulcan. One he calls son of Coelus, and father of Apollo by Minerva. The second he mentions as son of the Nile, and called Phthas by the Egyptians. The third was son of Jupiter and Juno, and fixed his residence in Lemnos; and the fourth, who built his forges in the Lipari islands, was son of Menalius.

VULGAR ERA; the common era used by Christians, dating from the birth of Christ. (See Epoch.)

VULGAR FRACTIONS. (See Fractions.) VULGATE; the name of the Latin translation of the Bible, which has, in the Catholic church, official authority, and which the council of Trent, in their fourth session, in May 27, 1546, declared "shall be held as authentic, in all public lectures, disputations, sermons and expositions; and that no one shall presume to reject it, under any pretence whatsoever." Even in the early period of the church, a Latin translation of the Old Testament existed, called Itala, made after the Septuagint. (q. v.) St. Jerome found that this translation was not always accurate, and made a new Latin translation from the Hebrew, which, however, was only partially adopted by the church, about the year 387. In the sequel, the translations were combined, and formed the Vulgate, so called. This grew up between the eighth and sixteenth centuries. Only the Psalms were retained in the ancient form. That its Latin phraseology is impure, if the Latin of the classical Roman authors is taken as the standard, is not, in all cases, an objection. New ideas require new terms; but the Vulgate does not give, in many passages, the sense of the original, and does not correspond to the present advanced state of philology and archæology. Many Catholics have often represented the necessity of a new translation, as much of the old one was made when scriptural philology was in a very low state; and all of them admit that the church does not consider the Vulgate as a perfect translation, but only as the most satisfactory of all the Latin editions. Cardinal Bellarmin maintains that all which the counsel of Trent says, is, that the Vulgate contains no errors which affect points of faith or morals: he does not pretend that it is without fault. The Protestants, however, were of opinion that the Vulgate was to be absolutely rejected, if they desired to rest their faith on the Bible. But what edition of the Vulgate was to be adopted by the Catholics, after the decree mentioned above, became a question, because the editions

were various, and differed essentially. A committtee was appointed to prepare a proper text; but, the pope not liking it, it was abandoned. Pius IV, Pius V and Sixtus V then took the greatest pains to form a correct Vulgate. The latter published his edition in 1590, with anathemas against any who should venture to make changes; but this edition had scarcely appeared, when pope Clement VIII published a new one, in 1592, accompanied by a similar bull. Another improved edition was printed in 1593. The differences in these editions are very considerable. The decree of the council above mentioned gives the list of the canonical books, as given in our article Bible. St. Jerome inserted, it is true, the apocryphal books; but it is clear that he only considered those canonical, which are now regarded as such by Protestants.

VULPINITE. (See Anhydrite.)

VULTURE (vultur). The vultures have been referred, by ornithologists, to the accipitres, or rapacious birds, the same family with the hawks and owls, although they differ in many important points. The feet of the vultures are incapable of grasping and bearing off living prey, although sufficiently powerful to permit them to rest on trees: the mouth is also much smaller, the angle not extending beneath the eyes; the head is disproportionately small, compared with the size of the body, and the neck long and slender; the eyes are even with the surface of the head: in short, their general aspect is widely different from the hawks and owls, and most unexpectedly approaches, in some respects, the gallinacea; which similitude is expressed in many of their common names. The head and neck of the vultures are more or less deprived of feathers, and covered with short and scattering down. The beak is straight, more or less stout, and the superior mandible curved at the extremity. Their wings are very long and pointed, and their flight exceedingly powerful, so much so, that they often soar beyond the reach of sight. They are voracious and cowardly, feeding chiefly on carrion, but sometimes attack young or sickly animals. Their bodies exhale a disgusting odor. They usually live in companies; and many of the larger species do not quit the lofty chains of mountains, where they build in inaccessible places. Their piercing sight enables them to discover carrion at a great distance. The condor, or great vulture of the Andes, is particularly described in a separate article. (See Condor.) The king of vultures, V. papa, is about as large as a small tur

key. It is found throughout the greater part of tropical America. The head and neck are ornamented with brilliant colors. The general color of the plumage is reddish white, with the wings and tail black. This and the preceding species are remarkable for having a comb and fleshy caruncles on the head of the male. Two other small species of vulture are found throughout tropical America, as well as in a great part of the U. States, viz. the turkey buzzard and the carrion crow of the Southern States. The latter is rarely found north of lat. 35°; but the former comes into the Middle States. The plumage of both is black, and they are much

alike. In the towns and villages of the Southern States, they are protected by law as scavengers, and may be seen sunning themselves on the roofs of houses, or sauntering about the streets, as familiarly as domestic poultry. The lammergeyer inhabits only the loftiest mountains of the eastern continent. It approaches, if, indeed, it does not equal, the condor in size. It differs, however, in some points of structure, from the true vultures. There are, besides, several other species of vulture in various parts of the eastern continent.

VYASA. (See Indian Literature.)

W; the twenty-third letter of the English alphabet, representing a sound formed by opening the mouth with a rounding of the lips, and a somewhat strong emission of the breath. It is one of the sounds which the Germans call Blaselaute (breathing sounds). (See F.) The English pronunciation of w is a peculiarity of that language, though some other languages have a sound coming pretty near it, as ou, in the French oui: this, however, is not precisely the same, as the sound of oo is heard in the pronunciation of oui before the sound of our w. In German, w has the sound of our v. Grammarians are not agreed respecting the character of w. Doctor Webster says it is a vowel; others say it is sometimes a vowel, sometimes a consonant, like y. It seems to us that it must be classified with h. The Romans called the h neither a vowel nor a consonant, but simply a breathing: so the w is a breathing, though stronger and somewhat modified. If we consider it, however, as a letter, it is undoubtedly a consonant, as much as h is, and cannot be said to be the same with the Spanish, German and Italian u, though, as stated in the article U, that letter is used to indicate the pronunciation of the English w. The w, being a strong breathing, is nearly related to all aspirated sounds, and through them again to the gutturals, so that we find w and g often interchanged in different languages, as in the words William, Guillaume; Wales, Galles, &c.; and we have heard Spaniards, unable to pro

nounce w, use a g instead of it, and say guee for we. (See G.) W, like other aspirates, often does not belong to the root, but only serves to strengthen the tone; for instance, the Swedish, Danish and Icelandic ord, English word, German wort ; the Icelandic and Swedish andra, German wandern, English wander; the Swedish ila, German weilen (to tarry), the root of the English verb to while; the Gothic ourt, Swedish ört, German wurz, the same which is found in the English compounds liver-wort, &c.; the Swedish önska, in German wünschen, in English to wish, and so on. But w is by no means always to be overlooked by the etymologist: it often belongs to the root of words, and in many cases it is an onomatopoeia, as in wave. It has this character particularly in German, which has numerous onomatopoeias. W is now pronounced by the Germans like our v; but it was not always so pronounced. It had, with the early Germans, a sound composed of u and v, or f, as we may conjecture from a passage of Ottfried, in his preface to the Gospels (he says, Nam interdum tria v u u, ut puto, quærit in sono, priores duo consonantes, ut mihi videtur, tertium vocali sono manente); and also from the former orthography of the German words Frawe, shawen, &c., now written Frau, schauen. This passage of Ottfried is interesting, as respects the English w. In ancient times, anh was also written before the w in German, as hwil, at present welle (wave), hwelcher, at present welcher (Scotch whilk,

who). This was done particularly in Anglo-Saxon. At a later period, the h was put after the w, though the pronunciation remained hw, for when is pronounced hwen. It is a peculiarity of some German vulgar dialects to put m instead of w, and say mir for wir, and Mörsing for Wirsing. W is a letter peculiar to the alphabets of the Teutonic and Sclavonic languages: those of Latin origin have it not, except in proper names of foreign per

sons.

WAADTLAND, or DIE WAADT; German names for the Pays de Vaud. (See Pays de Vaud.)

WAAL; a branch of the Rhine. Rhine.)

(See

WABASH, a river of Indiana, waters the middle and western part of the state, and flows into the Ohio thirty miles above Cumberland river. It is upwards of 500 miles long, and affords good steam-boat navigation, for most of the year, 150 miles, to Vincennes, and for smaller boats 250 miles farther, to Ouiatan. Very small boats ascend to within eight miles of the Maumee. It receives several large rivers, and meanders through a valley of remarkable fertility. The Little Wabash is one of its principal branches, and unites with it only a few miles from the Ohio. This stream may be rendered navigable, for a long distance, by removing a few obstructions. It is eighty yards wide where it joins the Wabash. It rises in Illinois, about forty miles south-east of the Kaskaskia.

WACH, William Charles, professor of historical painting in Berlin, was born in that city, in 1787. In 1813, he entered the army as a volunteer; but as soon as peace was restored, he returned to paint ing. From 1815 to 1817, he studied in Paris, under David and Legros. The plastic character of his pieces, and his large masses of shade, show the influence of the French school; but he has carefully avoided its exaggerations. In 1817, he went to Rome, and, in 1819, returned to his country, after having executed, in Italy, several fine paintings. In 1819, he was made a member of the senate of the academy of fine arts at Berlin. Among his paintings are the resurrection of Christ, for the altar of the Protestant church in Moscow, and a symbolic representation of Christianity; also the Muses, in the ceiling of the Berlin the

atre.

WACHLER, John Frederic Louis, professor of history in the university of Breslau, was born, in 1767, at Gotha,

studied theology, philology and history. In 1788, he was made professor extraordinarius in Brinteln. In 1801, he was made professor of philosophy in Marburg, and, in 1802, professor ordinarius of theology. In 1805, he went, as professor of history, to Breslau. His writings are numerous: they are on theological, philosophical and historical subjects. Some of the last sort have much merit, though the writer may sometimes fall into indistinct generalities. Among his works are Lehrbuch der Geschichte (1816 ; 5th ed., 1828); Philomathie (3 vols., 1819-21); Manual of the History of Literature (4 vols., 1822-24); History_of Historical Inquiry and Art, since the Revival of Letters in Europe (Göttingen, 1812-20); Manual of Literary History (1827); his Theological Annals, and New Theological Annals (completed in 1823).

WAD, OF WADDING, in gunnery; a stopple of paper, hay, straw, old rope-yarn, or tow, rolled up like a ball, or a short cylinder, and forced into a gun, to keep the powder close in the chamber, or put up close to the shot, to keep it from rolling out.

WAD BLACK. (See Manganese.)

WAFER. (See Cements, and SealingWax.) We only add here, that an antiquarian of the eighteenth century, Mr. Spiess, a German, says that the oldest seal with a red wafer, which he had ever found, is on a letter written at Spire, in 1624, to the government at Bayreuth.

See Beckmann's History of Inventions and Discoveries (London, 1797).—The use of sealing-wax is universally considered more polite than that of wafers, because the latter is easier and less formal, hence more appropriate for the business style.

WAGENAAR, John, historiographer to the city of Amsterdam, where he was born in 1709, and died in 1773, is one of the most distinguished scholars of his country, and, in particular, one of the best historians of Holland. His principal work, De Vaderlandsche Historie vervattende de Geschiedenissen der Vereenigde Nederlanden, or History of the United Netherlands until 1751, was published at Amsterdam, in 21 vols. (1749-60). In 1788, a continuation of this work, from 1776 to 1802, appeared, at Amsterdam, under the title of Vervolg van Wagenaar Vaderlandsche Historie (48 vols.), and, in 1789, volumes 22, 23 and 24, containing the history of the period from 1751 to 1774. His other works are a description of the United Provinces (12 vols., 1739),

and a Description of Amsterdam (3 vols., folio, 1760), and some polemical treatises on theological subjects. WAGERING POLICIES. rance.)

(See Insu

WAGES. The cost of an article is made up of that of the materials consumed, and the compensation for the use of the land, buildings and implements employed, and the labor, skill and superintendence requisite in its production, with interest on these outlays until the product is completed and ready for the market. When we inquire respecting the rate of wages, we are first to consider what extent we give to the term; whether we comprehend the compensation given for skill and industry, of all descriptions, employed in the production, distribution, and even use and consumption, of all sorts of commodities; for wages are paid to a servant who waits at a table, or a coachman who drives a pleasure coach, as well as to a miller, teamster, or seaman, though the former are not, like the latter, employed in giving any additional value to any article by producing or transporting it. If we divide the whole annual value produced in a community into three parts, and assign one to pay rent, another to pay for the use of capital, and a third for wages,-taking wages in its most comprehensive sense, as including all that is paid for industry and skill of all descriptions, then the first material consideration is, What is the mass of the products in proportion to the land, capital and labor employed? for the same quantity and quality of land, capital and labor will yield a greater annual product in one community than in another. What is the aggregate mass or fund out of which the dividend is to be made? The aggregate productiveness of England, for instance, will vastly exceed that of Spain in all these particulars; for the lands are made more productive, the labor is more skilfully applied, and the capital is more rapidly carried through the different forms of production, and transported through the different places in its way to that of final consumption; and, consequently, the same capital is more effective, or, in other words, contributes to a greater mass of production in the same time. We institute this inquiry as to the aggregate mass of annual production in comparing the condition of one community with that of another. One community may have twice as great a fund to divide as another, from the same aggregate means of production; and if the distribution is made in

precisely the same proportions among the several interests, the compensation will be twice as great in one case as in the other. This effectiveness of the labor and means of production in a community, is a matter of the most weighty consideration, and goes far in determining the condition of the population. This gives us two modes of comparison, as to the rate of wages in any two communities, the results of which may be very different. If we ask whether labor and skill, taking the whole mass of both, of all descriptions, be better rewarded in England or in Spain, the answer may be, that a greater quantity of corresponding articles goes to compensate the same labor and skill in England, but that a greater proportion of the whole mass of annual products goes to compensate labor and skill in Spain. To make the distinction more plain-a laborer in England may earn a yard of cloth, and one in Spain but half a yard, of the same quality, in a day; so that the English laborer gets absolutely twice as much compensation as the Spanish. But, owing to greater skill and advantages, the English laborer may produce four times as much cloth, or materials for cloth, as the Spanish laborer in the same time. Therefore, though the English laborer gets twice as great a quantity, the Spaniard gets twice as great a proportion of the whole product. The wages of one will accordingly be twice as great as that of the other, and vice versa, according as we make the comparison in one or the other way. The ordinary mode of comparison has reference to the absolute compensation, that is, the quantity of valuable vendible things commanded by the same labor. All laborers want food, clothing and shelter; and he that can command the best for the same labor is the best paid. In making the comparison, we may regard the money that each can earn; but then we must go further, and inquire what the same weight of silver or gold will purchase in each of the two countries. To the man who expends his wages where they are earned, a given amount of silver or gold is valuable only in proportion to the things that he can produce in exchange for it. To all practical purposes, therefore, labor may be higher paid in the U. States at a dollar than in the West Indies at two dollars. It is, therefore, surprising to see economists making comparisons of the money rate of wages in different countries, as if that gave any practical satis