WIRE drawing, the art of drawing out long bars of metal, by pulling it through holes in a plate of steel, or other fit me tallic compound. In order that a wire may be drawn, it is requisite that the metal should have considerable tenacity. Gold, silver, iron, steel, copper, and their compounds, are most commonly used in the arts. The process is of considerable simplicity. A number of holes, progres sively smaller and smaller, are made in a plate of steel, and the pointed end of a bar of metal being passed through, one of them is forcibly drawn by strong pinchers, so as to elongate it by the pres sure arising from the re-action of the greased hole : this is the wire ; and it is again passed in like manner through ano ther hole a little smaller ; and, by conti nuing the process, the wire has its length increased, and its diameter diminished, to a very great degree. The largest wire may be nearly an inch in diameter, and the smallest we have seen was about one thousandth part of an inch ; but we are assured that silver wire has been made one-fifteen-hundredth of an inch in dia. meter. The size of these small wires may be ascertained from the weight of a known measure of length, and the speci fic gravity of the metal, Or, less correct ly, the wire may be wound round a pin, and the number of turns counted which make a given length.
Wires are drawn square, and of other figures in their sector. In particular they are drawn grooved, so that any small part will form the pinion of a clock or watch work.
As the violent action of the drawing plate renders the wires hard and brittle, it is necessary to anneal it several times during the course of drawing. Very small holes are made by hammering up the larger, and the point, in very thin wire, is made by rolling or- crushing the end by a smooth burnishing tool upon a po lished plate.
It is said that soft steel is as good for the wire drawer's plate as that which is hard, or as the compound material which comes from France in wire plates, and is esteemed. This has not been yet chemically examined.
W int of Lapland. The inhabitants of Lapland have a sort of shining slender substance in use among them on several occasions, which is much of the thickness and appearance of our silver wire, and is therefore called, by those who do not ex amine its structure or substance, Lapland wire. It is made of the sinews of the rein-deer, which being carefully separat ed in the eatiag, are by the women, after soaking in water, and beating, spun into a sort of thread, of admirable fineness, and strength, when wrought to the small est filaments ; but when larger, is very strong, and fit for the purposes of strength and force.. Their wire, as it is
called, is made of the finest of these threads, covered with tin. The women du this business, and the way they take is to melt a piece of tin, and placing at the edge of it a horn with a hole through it, they draw these sinewey threads, cover ed with the tin, through the hole, which prevents their coming out too thick co vered. This drawing is performed with their teeth : and there is a small piece of bone placed at the top of the hole, where the wire is made flat, so that we always find it rounded on all sides but one, where it is flat. This wire they use in embroi dering their clothes as we do gold and silver ; they often sell it to strangers, un der the notion of its having certain magi cal virtues.
WIT, a faculty of the mind, consisting, according to Mr. Locke, in the assembling and putting together of those ideas, with quickness and variety, in which any re semblance or congruity can be found, II. order to form pleasant pictures and agreeable visions to the fancy. This fa culty, the same author observes, is just the contrary of judgment, which consists t? in the separating carefully from one ano- I: ther, such ideas wherein can be found the least difference, thereby to avoid being ', misled by similitude and affinity, to take one thing for another. It is the metaphor and allusion, wherein, for the most part, lies the entertainment and pleasantry of wit, which strikes so lively on the fancy, and is therefore so acceptable to all peo ple, because its beauty appears at first sight, and there is required no labour of thought to examine what truth or reason there is in it. The mind without looking any further, rests satisfied with the agreeableness of the picture, and the gaie ty of the imagination ; and it is a kind of affront to go about to examine it by the severe rules of truth or reason. Wit is also an appellation given to the person possessed of this faculty ; and here the true wit must have a quick succession of pertinent ideas, and the ability of arrang. ing and expressing them in a lively and entertaining manner ; he must at the same time have a great deal of energy and de licacy in his sentiments ; his imagination must be sprightly and agreeable, without any thing of parade or vanity in his dis course : but it is not, however, essential to the character of a wit, to be ever hunt., ing after the brilliant, studying sprightly turns, and affecting to say nothing but what may strike and surprise.
WITENA-mot, or WITENA gemot; among our Saxon ancestors, was a term which literally signified the assembly of the wise men, and was applied to the great council of the nation, of latter days called the parliament.