In acknowledgment of his invaluable ser vices it was intimated to Watt a few years before his death, that 'the highest honour usually conferred in England on men of literature and science (knighthood) was open to him, if he expressed a wish to that effect;' but 'While he felt flattered by the intimation, he determined to decline it. He became a member of the Royal Society of Edinburgh in 1784, of that of London in the following year, of the Batavian Society in 1787, and in 1808 a correspondent of the French Institute ; and in 1814 .the 'Academie des Sciences' of the Institute elected him one of its eight foreign associates. Ix 1800, by a spontaneous vote, the university of Glasgow conferred upon him the honorary degree of LL.D. In 1824 a subscription was entered into for a statue, which was sculptured by Chantrey, and is now in Westminster Abbey. Another statue by Chantrey adorns an elegant chapel erected by Watt's only surviving son, at the parish church of Handsworth, near Birming ham, in the chancel of which he was interred. statues have been erected in St. George's Square, Glasgow, and in the university of Glasgow.
Every Exhibition of manufactures owes a debt to James Watt, of which it would be in vain to attempt to determine the value.
WAX. There are several varieties of this substance. Bees' Wax is a secretion from the ventral scales of the bee. With this sub stance the comb is constructed. From the comb the wax is extracted chiefly by pressure and by making it in hot water, in which the impurities subside, after which the wax is poured into moulds. The wax has a yellowish or orange colour, and a peculiar odour. Even in winter it is soft enough to be indented by the nail, and in summer it is much softer. It melts at about 143° to 150° Fehr.
White Wax is obtained by melting yellow wax by means of steam, running it off into a perforated trough called a Cradle, from which it falls into water. By this means the wax is solidified and converted into a kind of ribbon; it is afterwards bleached, re-melted, re • bleached, and refined. Pure wax thus ob
tained is nearly devoid of smell, and is white with a yellowish tint ; it is brittle and insipid ; its melting point is Fehr., and it solidifies at 149°.
Sealing Wax is not properly a wax. It is composed of shellac (4 parts), Venice Turpen tine (1 part), and cinnabar (3 parts). The round sticks of sealing-wax are made by hand on a smooth slab of marble, which is kept at a moderate temperature by a brazier or chafing. dish placed beneath it. A quantity sufficient to make about six sticks is rolled out on the slab into one long stick, which, when of proper diameter, is cut into lengths. The sticks are then rolled on a cold slab beneath a smooth piece of wood or metal, and are afterwards polished by gently fusing the sur face, and devices are stamped upon them. Sticks of a more complicated shape are cast in moulds. For the best black sealing-wax, the finest ivory-black is substituted for the cinnabar. Inferior materials are used for, cheap wax. Soft sealing-wax contains bees'-', wax in the place of the shell-lac.
A peculiar kind of wax is yielded by the Ceroxylon Andicola, or Wax-Palm of South America. Near the Andes this tree grows in all its grandeur, elevating its majestic trunk, coated with a thick incrustation of wax, to the height of 180 feet among the most rugged precipices of the wild region which it inhabits. It does not extend over more than 15 or 20 leagues of country altogether. The trunk is distinctly marked by rings caused by the fall of the leaves, which are from 18 to 20 feet long. The spaces between the rings are pale yellow, and smooth like the stems of a reed, and covered with a thick coating of wax and resin. This substance, melted with a third of fat, makes excellent candles. Vauquelin ascertained that this vegetable matter consists of two-thirds resin, and one-third-wax, which is only a little more brittle than bees'-wax.