WATTS, ALARIC ALEXANDER (1797-1864).—­Poet, b. in London, had an active career as a journalist.  He founded the United Service Gazette, and ed. various newspapers and an annual, the Literary Souvenir.  His poems were coll. as Lyrics of the Heart.  His numerous journalistic ventures finally resulted in bankruptcy.

WATTS, ISAAC (1674-1748).—­Poet and theologian, b. at Southampton, where his f. kept a school, and ed. at a Nonconformist academy at Stoke Newington, became minister of an Independent congregation in Mark Lane; but his health proving insufficient for his pastoral duties, he resigned, and gave himself chiefly to literary work, continuing to preach occasionally.  For the last 36 years of his life he resided at Theobald’s, the house of his friend, Sir Thomas Abney.  Among his writings were various educational treatises, including those on Logic and The Improvement of the Mind, and some works on theological subjects.  But his fame rests on his sacred poems and his hymns, which number over 500, and with much that is prosaic comprised “There is a Land of Pure Delight,” “O God our Help in Ages Past,” and “When I survey the Wondrous Cross,” which has been called “the most majestic hymn in English speech.”  His Horae Lyricae was pub. in 1706, Hymns (1707), Divine Songs (for children) (1715), Metrical Psalms (1719).  Some of his poems, such as his exquisite cradle song, “Hush, my dear, lie still and slumber” have a perfect beauty and tenderness.

WAUGH, EDWIN (1817-1890).—­Poet, s. of a shoemaker, was b. at Rochdale and, after a little schooling, apprenticed to a printer.  He read eagerly, and became assistant sec. to the Lancashire Public School Association.  He first attracted attention by his sketches of Lancashire life and character in the Manchester Examiner.  He wrote also in prose Factory Folk, Besom Ben Stories, and The Chimney Corner.  His best work was, perhaps, his dialect songs, coll. as Poems and Songs (1859), which brought him great local fame.  He was possessed of considerable literary gift, and has been called “the Lancashire Burns.”

WEBBE, WILLIAM (b. 1550).—­Critic and translator.  Almost nothing is known of him except that he was at Camb. and acted as tutor in certain distinguished families, and was a friend of Spenser.  He wrote a Discourse of English Poetrie (1586), in which he discusses metre, rhyme (the use of which he reprehends), and reviews English poetry up to his own day.  He also translated the first two of the Eclogues of Virgil in singularly unmelodious hexameters.

WEBSTER, MRS. AUGUSTA (DAVIES) (1837-1894).—­Poet and translator, dau. of Admiral Davies, m. Mr. Thomas Webster, a solicitor.  She wrote a novel, Lesley’s Guardians, and several books of poetry of distinguished excellence, including Blanche Lisle, Dramatic Studies (1866), Portraits (1870), A Book of Rhyme (1881), and some dramas, including The Auspicious Day (1874), Disguises, and The Sentence (1887).  She also made translations of Prometheus Bound and Medea.