WEEK of the state legislature. His tact as a party manager, and his services in 1826 in securing the. election of De Witt Clinton as governor, suggested him as a competent person to oppose the "Albany regency," who had the general management of the democratic party in New York. At the expiration of his second term in the legislature in 1830, he accordingly re- moved to Albany, and assumed the editorship of the "Albany Evening Journal," a news- paper established in the interest of the anti- Jackson party. From 1830 to 1862 he was a political leader, first of the whig and afterward of the republican party. He was prominent in procuring the presidential nominations of Harrison, Taylor, and Scott, acting in each in- stance as an independent adviser of the re- spective conventions. He warmly advocated the election of Fremont in 1856 and of Lin- coln in 1860, although his influence had in each case been exerted in favor of the nomi- nation of Mr. Seward. In November, 1861, lie was sent to Europe by President Lincoln in a semi-diplomatic capacity. He returned home in June, 1862, and shortly afterward withdrew from the editorship of the " Evening Journal." In 1865 he became a resident of New York city, where he edited for a time the "Commercial Advertiser." Since 1868 infirm health has compelled him to withdraw from active labor. He has published "Letters from Europe and the West Indies " (Albany, 1866), and is preparing for the press his au- tobiography and correspondence, portions of which have appeared in various publications. WEEK (Anglo-Sax, weoc), a period of seven days, a division of time adopted by the ancient Egyptians and Hebrews, and in general use among Christians and Mohammedans. Its ori- gin is referred back in one part of the Mosaic account (Exod. xx. 11) to the creation of the world, in another (Deut/v. 15) to the exodus from Egypt. Josephus, Philo Judasus, Cle- ment of Alexandria, and others, speak of the week as not of Hebrew origin, but common to all the oriental nations. It was not in use by the Greeks and Romans, until adopted by the latter at the period of the introduction of Christianity, after the reign of Theodosius. Its adoption was no doubt hastened by the peculiar convenience of such a division of the lunar month into four parts, and by its being so nearly an aliquot part of the solar year of 865 days. The only explanation of the origin of the names given to the days is that by Dion Cassius in his Roman history (1. xxxvii., c. 18, 19). They were founded, he says, upon the names of the seven planets known to the an- cient Egyptian astronomers, which they ar- ranged as follows in the order of their dis- tances from the earth, beginning with the most distant: Saturn, Jupiter, Mars, the sun, Venus, Mercury, and the moon. According to the ancient astrology, each of these planets presided in turn over the successive hours of the day, and each day was named from the WEEVIL 535 planet to which its first hour was dedicated. Beginning with Saturn, on the first hour of the first day, and allotting to each hour a planet in the order named, the first hour of the second day, it is found, would fall to the sun, of the third day to the moon, of the fourth to Mars, of the fifth to Mercury, of the sixth to Jupiter, and of the seventh to Venus. The Lati IK* adopted these designations in their names of the days of the week, as diet Saturni, dies Solis, dies Lunce, &c. ; and modern nations have retained the same terms, those speaking languages of the Teutonic stock substituting in some cases the names of their own divinities for the corresponding ones of Roman mythol- ogy. In the ancient Brahmanical astronomy, the week is also a recognized division of time, and the names of the days are from the same planets and in the same order as those in use by the ancient Egyptians ; but the week began with them with Sukravdra, the day of Venus or Friday. The Egyptian week began, accord- ing to Dion Cassius, on Saturday. This day was also the sabbath of the Jews. Each day being ruled by its particular planet, astrolo- gers assigned to each a particular character; and they may naturally have regarded the day ruled over by Saturn, the most sluggish and gloomy-looking of the planets, as at once a day of rest and a dies infaustus, when all work would be unfortunate. The Chinese and Thi- betans have a week of five days, named after the five elements, iron, wood, water, feathers, and earth. WEENIX, or Weeninx, Jan Baptist, called the Old, a Dutch painter, born in Amsterdam in 1621, died near Utrecht in 1660. He was in- structed by'Abraham Bloomaert and Nicholas Moojaert, spent four years in Italy, and was especially distinguished for his pictures of Italian seaports with architectural accessories, embarkations, &c., but excelled also in history, landscapes, portraits, and animals. His son, JAN the Younger (1644-1719), excelled in dead game and hunting scenes, and painted also landscapes, animals, flowers, and fruit. WEEVIL, a name applied indiscriminately to insects of the moth, fly, and beetle orders, numbering thousands of species. The term is more properly restricted to the larva} of the tetramerous beetles of the tribe rhyncho- phora, in which the front of the head is prolonged into a snout, at the end of which the mouth is placed. These insects are di- urnal, slow, timid, and defenceless, and the larva? are soft, white, and footless, with hard heads, very convex rings, and strong horny jaws ; they live usually in the interior of the stem, fruit, or seeds of plants, to which they are very injurious. The grain weevil of Eu- rope (calandra [sitopMlus] granaria, Linn.) is one of the most mischievous ; it is a slender, red beetle, about an eighth of an inch long; the eggs are deposited in the wheat after it is stored, and the grubs as soon as hatched bur- row in, each occupying a single grain and eat-
