it not improbable that he was a member of the famous Parliament of 1366, and at any rate he wrote about this time a tractate or dialogue in defense of the national policy toward the Pope. In 1374 he was one of the commissioners sent to Bruges to arrange a concordat, and about the same time he received from the king himself (Edward III.) the rectory of Lutterworth in Leicestershire. With Edward's younger son, John of Gaunt, Duke of Lancaster, he was in special favor; but this very favor was probably the proximate cause of the first hostile action of the clergy. Summoned before the Convocation in 1377, he was saved from all danger by the high-handed protection of the Duke of Lancaster and his friends, who made their way into the assembly and rendered all judicial proceeding impossible; and though in the following year a formidable process was instituted against him by direct command of Gregory XI., the papal commissioners were induced by the intercession of the Princess Joanna and the evident sympathy of the citizens to do no more than to forbid him further to disseminate his obnoxious doctrines. But in the course of the following years he grew more and more estranged from the orthodox creed, and his endeavors to propagate his opinions were of wider scope than before.
In 1378 the election first of Urban VI. and then of Clement VIII. produced a schism in the Church; each Pope condemned his rival as antipope, and Wyclif declared that they were both right, and that the papacy was Antichrist. He called in question the doctrine of transubstantiation, and declared that pilgrimages and monastic vows had no authority from Scripture. His views were accepted by numerous disciples, and disseminated by preachers through the length and breadth of the land. The ecclesiastical authorities endeavored to suppress the movement by fair means and foul; but though many of its leaders were silenced, the great originator of the whole continued to the end boldly to bear witness to the truth. Died in 1384.
WYCOMBE, a market town of Buckinghamshire, England; on the Wye; 25 miles E. S. E. of Oxford and 29 W. N. W. of London. Called variously Chipping (or Chepping), Wycombe and High Wycombe, it was the seat of a Saxon fortress, Desborough Castle, some remains of which may be seen, and has a fine cruciform parish church (1273-1522; restored 1874-1888) with a tower 96 feet high, a guildhall (1757-1859), etc. Wycombe was governed by a mayor in Henry III.'s time, but first incorporated by Henry VI.; the municipal boundary was extended in 1880. Pop. about 20,000.
WYE, a river of South Wales, which, rising from Montgomeryshire, near the Severn's source, and flowing generally S. E. between Radnor and Brecon, through Hereford, and between Gloucester and Monmouth, enters the Severn at Chepstow, 123 miles below its head. Rapid and rockbound as far as Hay, the Wye grows gentler as it gathers volume, but throughout is singularly beautiful, making innumerable horseshoe curves between wooded banks, and passing by Maeslough, Clifford, Gooderich, and Chepstow Castles, Hereford Cathedral, and Tintern Abbey.
WYMAN, WALTER an American surgeon; born in St. Louis, Mo., Aug. 17, 1848; was graduated at Amherst College in 1870, and at the St. Louis Medical College in 1873; was made assistant surgeon in the United States Hospital Service in 1876, and became chief medical purveyor of the quarantine division in 1888; was appointed supervising surgeon-general of the United States Marine Hospital Service in 1891. Under his management was one of the finest laboratories in the world, where diseases were constantly being scientifically investigated. He was an earnest advocate for the sanitation of ports not only in the United States but in the West Indies and South America, holding that if this were enforced yellow fever would be entirely eradicated from the Western Hemisphere. He was also interested in purifying water supplies; in the study of leprosy and tuberculosis; etc. On his recommendation the Government set apart a large tract of land in New Mexico for a hospital whence all consumptive patients in the United States marine hospitals could be transferred. He died in 1911.
WYNDHAM, SIR CHARLES, a British actor; born in 1837. He was educated in Germany, at St. Andrew's and in Dublin, studying medicine for some years. After fighting in the American Civil War, he went on the stage, making his first appearance in America with John Wilkes Booth, and in London, in 1865. He acted also in German. In 1876 he became lessee and manager of the Criterion Theater, London, England, and in 1899 built and opened with Mary Moore, Wyndham's Theater, in London. He was knighted in 1902.
WYOMING, a State in the western divisions of the North American Union; bounded by Montana, South Dakota, Nebraska, Colorado, Utah, and Idaho;
