WATKINS GLEN 318 WATSON For this service he was knighted. He was intimate with Disraeli, Cobden, and Salisbury, and had been a friend to Dickens. He died in London, April 14, 1901. WATKINS GLEN, a remarkable ravine and pleasure resort near the head of Seneca Lake in the W. central part of New York. It has become famous owing to its attractive scenery, which draws thousands of visitors each year. The rocks consist of Devonian shale, which during the Pleistocene period were here cut into deep narrow gorges by the glacial ice. These gorges contain nu- merous cataracts and have steep, smooth walls. WATLING'S ISLAND, a small island in the Bahama group, West Indies. It is 18 miles long, and has a lake in its center. It is supposed to be the first land in the New World seen by Colum- bus, generally known as San Salvador. WATLING STREET, one of the great Roman highways of Britain, commenc- ing at Dover, passing through Canter- bury and Rochester to London, and thence to Chester and York, and N. in two branches to Carlisle and the Wall in the neighborhood of Newcastle. Traces of the ancient road are still to be found in many parts of its course, and in some it is still an important highway; a street in London retains its name. It was the line of division in the treaty be- tween Alfred and Guthrum the Dane, and it is still the boundary between War- wickshire and Leicestershire. Of the "Waetlings" nothing is now remembered. Perhaps a trace also survives in the name Wattlesborough, a place on Watling street near Wroxeter (Uriconium). WATSON, HENRY BRERETON MARRIOTT, an English novelist, born in Caulfield, Australia, in 1863. He was educated at Canterbury College, New Zealand, and in 1885 removed to Eng- land, where he engaged in journalism. He contributed to many reviews and mag- azines and became best known as a writer of novels of adventure. These include "Lady Faintheart" (1890); "Galloping Dick" (1896); "The Adventurers" (1898); "Hurricane Island" (1904); "The Big Fish" (1912); "The House in the Downs" (1914) ; "The Affair on the Island" (1916); "Mulberry Wharf" (1917); and "The Excelsior" (1918). He also served on the editorial staffs of several magazines. WATSON, JAMES CRAIG, an Ameri- can astronomer; born in Ontario, Can., Jan. 28, 1838; was graduated at the Uni- versity of Michigan at the age of 19, and appointed Professor of Astronomy in that institution at the age of 21; called to the chair of astronomy in the Uni- versity of Wisconsin in 1879. He was the discoverer of 23 asteroids, and re- ceived the Lalande medal of the Paris Academy of Sciences for the discovery of six of them in one year. He was a member of the Eclipse Expeditions to Iowa in 1869 and to Sicily in 1870, and took charge of the Transit of Venus Ex- pedition to Peking, China, in 1874. He was also the discoverer of several comets. He was for many years the actuary of an insurance company, and accumulated a moderate fortune by commercial enter- prises, of which he left $16,000 to the National Academy of Sciences, the in- come of which is partly devoted to a research fund and partly to the bestowal of the "Watson Medal" of the Academy. His most lasting work was the writing of his "Theoretical Astronomy," a stand- ard work on the computation of orbits and the theory of perturbation. He died in Madison, Wis., Nov. 23, 1880. WATSON, JAMES E., a United States Senator from Indiana, born at Winchester, Ind., in 1864. He was edu- cated at the De Pauw UniversitJ^ In 1886 he was admitted to the bar. He re- moved to Rushville, Ind., in 1893, and in 1895 was elected to the 54th Congress. He was elected from the 56th to the 60th Congresses (1899-1909). In 1908 he was the Republican candidate for governor of Indiana. In 1916 he was appointed United States Senator, to fill the unex- pired term of Benjamin F. Shively. He was re-elected in 1920. WATSON, JOHN, pseudonym Ian Maclaren. an English clergyman and author; born in Manningtree, Essex, England, Nov. 3, 1850; was graduated at Edinburgh University (1870) ; studied theology at New College, Edinburgh, and Tiibingen; ordained minister of the Free Church, Logiealmond, Perthshire (1875); called to Free St. Matthew's, Glasgow (1877) ; translated in 1880 to Sefton Park Church, Liverpool, one of the most important congregations of the Presbyterian Church of England; re- ceived Hon. D. D. in 1895 from St. An- drews University, and a similar degree in 1897 from Yale University, where he lectured on preaching (1896). Till 1893 Dr. Watson was known as a popular preacher and able minister; but in that year he acquired additional distinction and wider fame by writing a series of Scotch idylls for the "British Weekly." When collected and published in book form under the title of "Besides the Bonnie Brier Bush," they became widely popular in Great Britain and the United States. "The Days of Auld Lang Syne,"
