WATSON, WILLIAM (c. 1559-1603), English conspirator, was a native of the north of England, and was born probably on the 23rd of April 1559. In 1586 he became a Roman Catholic priest in France, and during the concluding years of Elizabeth's reign he paid several visits to England; he was imprisoned and tortured more than once. He became prominent as a champion of the secular priests in their dispute with the Jesuits, and in 1601 some writings by him on this question appeared which were answered by Robert Parsons. When Elizabeth died, Watson hastened to Scotland to assure James I. of the loyalty of his party, and to forestall the Jesuits, who were suspected of intriguing with Spain. The new king did not, however, as was hoped, cease to exact the necessary fines; and the general dissatisfaction felt by the Roman Catholics gave rise to the “Bye plot,” or “Watson's plot,” in which connexion this priest's name is best known, and to its sequel the Main or Cobham's, plot. Watson discussed the grievances of his co-religionists with another priest, William Clark, with Sir Griftin Markham and Anthony Copley, and with a disappointed Protestant courtier, George Brooke; they took another Protestant, Thomas, 15th Lord Grey de Wilton, into their confidence, and following many Scottish precedents it was arranged that James should be surprised and seized; while they talked loudly about capturing the Tower of London, converting the king to Romanism, and making Watson lord keeper. One or two of the conspirators drew back; but Watson and his remaining colleagues arranged to assemble at Greenwich on the 24th of June 1603, and under the pretence of presenting a petition to carry out their object. The plot was a complete failure; Henry Garnet and other Jesuits betrayed it to the authorities, and its principal authors were seized, Watson being captured in August at Hay on the Welsh border. They were tried at Winchester and found guilty; Watson and Clark were executed on the 9th of December 1603, and Brooke suffered the same fate a week later. Grey and Markham were reprieved. Before the executions took place, however, the failure of the Bye plot had led to the discovery of the Main plot. Brooke's share in the earlier scheme caused suspicion to fall upon his brother Henry Brooke, Lord Cobham, the ally and brother-in-law of Sir Robert Cecil, afterwards earl of Salisbury. Cobham appears to have been in communication with Spain about the possibility of killing “the king and his cubs” and of placing Lady Arabella Stuart on the throne. He was seized, tried and condemned to death, but although led out to the scaffold he was not executed. It was on suspicion of being associated with Cobham in this matter that Sir Walter Raleigh was arrested and tried.
See the documents printed by T. G. Law in The Archpriest controversy (1896-1898); the same writer's Jesuits and Seculars (1889), and S. R. Gardiner, History of England, vol. i. (1905).
WATSON, WILLIAM (1858), English poet, was born on the 2nd of August 1858 at Burley-in-Wharfedale, Yorkshire, and was brought up at Liverpool, whither his father moved for business. In 1880 he published his first book The Prince's Quest, a poem showing the influence of Keats and Tennyson, but giving little indication of the author's mature style. It attracted no attention until it was republished in 1893 after Mr Watson had made a name by other work. In 1884 appeared Epigrams of Art, Life and Nature, a remarkable little volume, which already showed the change to Mr Watson's characteristic restraint and concision of manner. But it passed unnoted. Recognition came with the publication of Wordsworth's Grave in 1890; and fame with the publication of the second edition in 1891, and the appearance in the Fortnightly Review, August 1891, of an article by Grant Allen entitled “A New Poet.” Wordsworth's Grave, which marked a reversion from the current Tennysonian and Swinburnian fashion to the meditative note of Matthew Arnold, exhibited in full maturity Mr Watson's poetical qualities; his stately diction, his fastidious taste, his epigrammatic turn, his restrained yet eloquent utterance, his remarkable gift of literary criticism in poetic form. Besides Wordsworth's Grave the volume contained Ver tenebrosum (originally published in the National Review for June 1885), a series of political sonnets indicating a fervour of political conviction which was later to find still more impassioned expression; also a selection with additions from the Epigrams of 1884, and among other miscellaneous pieces his tribute to Arnold, “In Laleham Churchyard.” During the years 1890-1892 he contributed articles to the National Review, Spectator, Illustrated London News, Academy, Bookman and Atalanta, which were collected and republished in 1893 as Excursions in Criticism. In 1893 he also published Lacrymae Musaram, the poem which gave the title to the volume being a fine elegy on the death of Tennyson; and it included the poem on “Shelley's Centenary” (both of these printed privately in 1892), and “The Dream of Man,” the earliest of his philosophical poems. The same year, too, saw the publication of The Eloping Angels, a serio-comic trifle of small merit, dedicated to Grant Allen. During this year Mr Gladstone bestowed on him the Civil List pension of £200 available on the death of Tennyson. In 1894 followed Odes and Other Poems, and in 1895 The Father of the Forest, which contained also the fine “Hymn to the Sea” in English elegiacs (originally contributed to the Yellow Book), “The Tomb of Burns,” and “Apologia,” a piece of candid and just self-criticism. The volume contained also a sonnet “To the Turk in Armenia,” a prelude to the series of sonnets about Armenia contributed to the Westminster Gazette and republished in a brochure called The Purple East in 1896. These sonnets were republished with revision and considerable additions, and a preface by the bishop of Hereford, in The Year of Shame in 1897. Whatever view was taken of the poet's incursion into politics, no one doubted his passionate sincerity, or the excellence of the poetical rhetoric it inspired. In 1898 were published his Collected Poems and a volume of new poetry The Hope of the World, which opened with his three chief philosophical poems, the title piece, “The Unknown God,” and “Ode in May.” In 1902 he printed privately 50 copies of New Poems, and published his “Ode on the Coronation of King Edward VII.,” a favourable specimen of its class; and in 1903 besides a volume of Selected Poems a collection of poems contributed to various periodicals and called For England: Poems Written During Estrangement, a poetical defence of his impugned patriotism during the Boer War. In 1909 appeared an important volume of New Poems.
Mr Watson's poetry falls chiefly into the classes above indicated—critical, philosophical and political—to which may be added a further class of Horatian epistles to his friends. This classification indicates the high character and also the limitations of his poetry. It is contemplative, not dramatic, and only occasionally lyrical in impulse. In spite of the poet's plea in his “Apologia” that there is an ardour and a fire other than that of Eros or Aphrodite, ardour and fire are not conspicuous qualities of his verse. Except in his political verse there is more thought than passion. Bearing trace enough of the influence of the romantic epoch, his poetry recalls the earlier classical period in its epigrammatic phrasing and Latinized diction. By the distinction and clarity of his style and the dignity of his movement William Watson stands in the true classical tradition of great English verse, in a generation rather given over to lawlessness and experiment.
See also section on William Watson in Poets of the Younger Generation, by William Archer (1902); and for bibliography up to Aug. 1903, English Illustrated Magazine, vol. xxix. (N.S.), pp. 542 and 548. (W. P. J.)
WATT, JAMES (1756-1819), Scottish engineer, the inventor of the modern condensing steam-engine, was born at Greenock on the 19th of January 1736. His father was a small merchant there, who lost his trade and fortune by unsuccessful speculation, and James was early thrown on his own resources. Having a taste for mechanics he made his way to London, at the age of nineteen, to learn the business of a philosophical-instrument maker, and became apprenticed to one John Morgan, in whose service he remained for twelve months. From a child he had been extremely delicate, and the hard work and frugal living of his London pupilage taxed his strength so severely that he was forced at the end of a year to seek rest at home, not, however,
