Invalidism and Italy

: Then neither heathy wilds, nor scenes as fair
As ever recompensed the peasant’s care,
Can call up life into his faded eye,
That passes all he sees unheeded by;
No wounds like those a wounded spirit feels,
No cure for such, till God who makes them heals.”

—William Cowper.

“A lively curiosity is, in common circumstances, our prevalent feeling when we first approach countries which, however near to our own, may in some sense be termed another earth. A new language shouted by sailors, lisped by children, appearing in every kind of public inscription, with a change in dresses, countenances, vehicles, buildings, and all the variety of lesser objects, produce an impression which perhaps a Hibernian islander might state most forcibly by saying, ‘You can’t land twice for the first time.’” — John Sheppard.

The tour of 1816 was followed by a visit to Paris, when he was intrusted with an important commission. It was the purchase for the University of Edinburgh of the series of ornithological specimens, now known as the Dufresne Collection. On his return he spent much of his time assisting: Professor Jameson in the work of their arrangement, and the acquisition now forms one of the most beautiful and valuable treasures in the College Museum.

A good deal of his leisure was also occupied in another congeiral employment. In 181G, Blackwood s Magazine had commenced its career, and to the first volumes Mr Wilson contributed many articles. The subjects which he usually selected were akin to his own tastes and pursuits as a lover of nature and of poetry, an angler, and an occasional tourist; but it is believed that he had a hand in not a few papers of pleasantry and humour, of which the individual or joint-stock authorship can no longer be ascertained.*

* In the list of Mr Wilson’s publications given at the end of this Tolume, we have enumerated such contributions to Blackwood as we have been able to identify, with the kind assistance of John Blackwood, Esq., and of Mr Wilson’s own family.

In 1819 lie visited Sweden. To the enthusiastic young naturalist no pilgrimage could be more interesting than to the garden and the grave of the immortal Linnaeus, and his historical knowledge would make the region romantic which at every turn called up the memories of Gustavus Vasa and Charles the Twelfth. But of his impressions no record survives. If, as is most likely, he kept notes at the time, the broken health and spirits of the following winter prevented him from making an extended transcript.

For soon after his return, symptoms of pulmonary disease exhibited themselves. With these were combined other depressing influences. Neither health nor inclination allowed him to carry his legal studies any further, and whilst the portion of goods which fell to a younger son made scanty provision for the future, that seductive study which had gradually absorbed all his heart and soul was more likely to diminish than augment the slender patrimony. To this must be added a cause of disquiet, which, although apparently insignificant, was to him very serious. A tendency to swelling in the face was the occasion of frequent pain and much discomfort, and was dwelt upon by a somewhat morbid imagination, until the fear that it might develop into something very dreadful lay on his mind a continual incubus. For these fears it turned out that there was no foundation, but still we think it worth while to record the circumstance. “We fancy that many young persons especially are haunted by nervous apprehensions, which, could they only summon courage to consult the competent authorities, would be instantly dispelled; and in a world where all our strength is needed for the real struggle, it is a pity to have any portion of our energies swallowed up in curable anxieties or chimerical forebodings.

Betwixt invalid depression and the uncertainty of his plans and prosjjects, the interval which followed his twenty-fourth year was one of much inward sadness. He had not yet the blessed hope which afterwards upbore him beneath graver burdens; and though manly pride helped to sustain his infirmity in the presence of others, and the social instinct enabled him occasionally to forget it, the load at his heart was heavy.

As the best preservative from the consumptive tendency detected in his chest, he was advised to spend a winter in Italy. His two unmarried sisters accompanied him, and the change proved to some extent beneficial. But it needed more than the witchery of Italian skies and southern breezes to chase away the evil spirit of melancholy; and the following record will shew that it was a very dull departure: —

“Left Edinburgh on the morning of Tuesday, August 2, 1820, with every degree of disinclination for the journey. From some perversity of mind, all my former feelings in regard to an Italian tour had suffered a complete reversal; and instead of regarding it as the most beautiful region of the world, I now felt as if it contained no one interesting feature. Whatever may be the result of the journey, this want of foretaste of pleasure is a great misfortune. At least, in every other tour winch I have hitherto made, I have found the joys of anticipation fully equal to those which resulted from the journey itself; and as in the present case my bad state of health will prevent my enjoying many pleasures which formerly constituted my greatest happiness, it is very likely that my enjoyment of the tour itself will be greatly diminished. Certain it is that I shall never again be able to produce in myself that state of mind in which the very thought of visiting the ‘divine Italy’ would have been sufficient to make me happy of itself alone. I have found myself grow older in body and more callous in mind within these last six months than I had hoped to be in the natural progress of half a century. I look back upon the joy which I used to receive from the beauties of nature, and from the mere feeling of life, as to trains of sentiment which I had experienced only in sleep; and, when I contrast my past with my present state, I have some difficulty in being convinced of my personal identity.”

However, the mere locomotion soon began to produce a good effect; for at Liverpool we find him indulging a little waggery at the expense of its citizens : — - “Your Liverpool dandies are not the thing. Their cravats are good, so are their coats, their breeches still better, and the creatures have tolerable legs; but still their gait exhibits a sympathetic mingling with the long shanks of the three-legged stool utterly destructive of the true style. A dandy out of London, I verily believe, is like a fish out of the water. He may fly for a few hundred yards with some effect, but ere long he will either exhibit characters incompatible with the dandy state, or sink at once into the blue profound of his native element. Even Edinburgh, with its superb terrace, is all unfit; and then, the science of Schneiderism is there unknown — amidst the total eclipse not a beam of light falls on the needle of one masterly artificer. Besides, an essential dandy has no more to do with time than he has with eternity. The observance of stated periods, or any law of necessity, is destructive to the very existence of the character which he aims at; and being obliged to do any one thing is just the same as being obliged to resign all pretensions to a seat in the court and parliament of dandies. Now, smelling rum or tearing cotton, running at one time to the quay, at another to the custom-house, is to a merchant a work of necessity. The Liverpool men are merchants, and consequently, whatever they may think, not dandies in the genuine sense of the term. Unless a man has it in his power to drive out in his chariot or tilbury every day of the year, and at any hour of the day, the chances are much against his ever becoming an unadulterated dandy.”

When he had passed the Pillars of Hercules, and found himself among the new appearances and influences of the great inland sea, the spirit of the voyager revived.

“Sept. 1. — Since we entered the Straits, we have found the climate quite another thing. When the wind does blow, it comes upon us as if from a sea of warm milk — how different from the easterly gales of Caledonia! The heat is now, indeed, rather too great for anything like comfort in the cabin; but then we have got a spare sail rigged up upon four poles over the quarter-deck, so that we may enjoy the sea breezes under a delightful awning from morn to night. This evening several porpoises rushed past us at a gallop, and most opportunely raised a flock of flying-fish within a few yards of the vessel. They fly in a straightforward arrowy fashion, somewhat in the style of the kingfisher, and their sides glitter like fine silver. I took them at first for a flock of sandpipers flyins; towards the shore.

“Sept. 8. — There have been many of Mother Carey’s chickens in the wake of the vessel all day. Took a shot at one, and brought him down — the first I have handled in a recent state. I observed that the eye is furnished with a nictitating membrane, like an owl’s, which I don’t remember to have seen in the description of the bird-These petrels kept flying astern of the vessel till it was too dark to see; but how they spend the night I can’t say. It cannot be on shore, for we were twenty or thirty miles from land. They seemed never to rest on the water, unless when they discovered the crumbs of cheese and biscuit, or pieces of bacon which we threw for them overboard, and then they settled on the water to enjoy their prize at leisure. They frequently just touched the water like a swallow, which they greatly resemble with their wings hovering in the air and bent back; and they then appeared as if picking up their food from the surface.

“Sept. 14. — Saw four pilot-fish under the bows. They are very beautiful creatures, coloured with alternate bands of transparent bluish green and rich crimson brown, varying in the sun to beryl-green and blood-red. Saw a pale ghost-like fish glide past like a shadow, at a great depth under water. Signer Shark shewed himself to-day for a moment or two, far beneath the surface; so did not think it prudent to trust myself to the bosom of the deep. Towards evening a vast flock of flying-fish rose at a distance of some hundred yards to windward of the vessel. They were immediately pursued with hue and cry by the whole posse of gulls, and these no sooner drove them into the water than they were attacked by the bonitos, who drove them back into the air. leaping after them to the height of several feet. Thus persecuted above, and finding no rest below, they seemed to attempt a middle course, and just flirted over the sea, sometimes in and sometimes out, according as their aerial or aquatic tyrants proved the most relentless. This singular, though most unfair, pursuit seemed to reverse the order of nature; for in their eagerness the gulls frequently darted with their finny prey beneath the waves, whilst with still greater impetuosity the bonitos sprung after them into the atmosphere. A harder lot than that of a flying-fish under such circumstances, I do not know. Its state is a degree worse than that of the animal which ’ dies on the land, and cannot live in the water.’

“Sept 15, Friday. — The wind is fair and the weather fine, and if matters remain as they are now for a couple of clays longer, we shall surely behold Genoa in all its pride of place. There has been another superficial war waging to-day between the gulls, bonitos, and flying-fish. Some albicores also favoured us with their company for several hours, and the beautiful pilot-fish again shewed themselves alongside. During a former voyage, our vessel was attended by eleven albicores for two entire days. They followed her into Genoa, and were every one caught by the natives. I suspect that the reason which both they and the bonitos would assign for following ships, is their greater chance of securing the smaller fish, which are frightened to either side by the advance of the vessel. They thus have a command over more water than if they were pursuing a solitary course.

“Port of Genoa, Sept. 1 9, Tuesday. — ‘Murder will out.’ On the 11th of this month, when at sea, I missed my pocket-book from a little shelf above my berth, where I usually imprudently let it lie. It contained bills and money to a considerable amount, besides letters, &c. I went through the form of searching the trunks of every one on board, not so much in the hope of finding it, as with an intention to lull the fears of the real offender, so that I might secure him with it about his person on some future day. Our search was vain; not a trace of bill or bank-note to be found: the pocket-book had fled for ever, ’ and left me on the eaith disconsolate.’ I then stuck up an advertisement, offering a reward of five guineas to any one who should recover, or lead to the recovery, of the stolen goods; but to no effect. My suspicion was naturally turned upon two of our crew; first, the steward, a mulatto, always in the cabin, and probably aware of my hiding-place; secondly, one of the sailors called Williams, by birth a Dane, who was almost the only one of the sailors ever in the cabin, where he had been regularly employed twice-a-week in scrubbing out the floor. His character seemed that of a careless buffoon, always joking and singing, and seldom making his appearance on deck without exclaiming, ‘Here comes Williams as usual without a halfpenny to bless himself.’ All hands in the cabin suspected the steward, because he had naturally a cloud upon his brow, but I thought I could perceive a deeper shade over the greasy forehead of the ’ royal Dane, As soon as we got

into harbour, Captain H and I determined that our

best plan was to dismiss these two men as suspected persons, with full leave to carry off themselves and baggage when and wheresoever they chose; the chances being that, if they were the offenders, some trace of the theft would be in their possession. In the meantime, upon a preconcerted signal, four gens cVarmes were to be in waiting, and as soon as our friends stepped on shore they were to be arrested, carried to the guard-room close by, and carefully searched. On Monday night, however, when we were at tea, our friend Williams and the cook went off in the long boat without leave asked, and stayed away all night. They came on board again next morning, both intoxicated, but made off for the second and last time while we were at breakfast. My suspicion of Williams now became very strong. I traced him without any delay to an obscure drinking-shop, called the ‘Jolly Sailor,’ and having heard the moment I landed that he had changed several bank-notes, my opinion was confirmed. So off I set in pursuit, with three gens d’armes, and one or two assistant civilians. We discovered the rascals drunk and asleep, and found that Williams was actually the robber, and that he had consigned my property as his own proper yrize-money to the care of the landlord, who immediately delivered the same to me. On the part of the thief, I think I never knew a robbery more daring in its commencement, or more idiotically managed in its conclusion; but, to use the words of the suspected steward, ‘Providence made Williams get drunk, that the character of the innocent might be cleared.’ The pocket-book itself, with several letters and other documents, had very prudently been thrown overboard.”

In 1821, Mr Wilson returned from Italy; but his health was still feeble, and for the next two years he was to all intents an invalid. Even his favourite pursuit ceased to rouse him, and the journeys which he took from time to time were so far a penance as they were part of the doctor’s prescription. However, the summer of 1322 transferred him for change of air to Corstorphine, and in the pretty neighbouring villa of Corstorphine Hiil he found a family whose society did more for his resuscitation than could have been done by the skill of all the faculty. Of that attractive circle the charm soon began to concentrate, and in Miss Isabella Keith the wanderer discovered such a union of engaging attributes as supplied a new mainspring to his own existence, and thenceforward made Corstorphine Hill magnetic. The friendship thus pleasantly commenced was followed up in the correspondence of the following winter, and, even before its inevitable consummation, it exerted the happiest influence on Mr Wilson. Not only had he alighted on a kindred spirit to whose bright and gentle intuition his varying mood of mind, whether grave or gay, lay open (and it is a great comfort to be understood); but amidst the more serious thoughts with which he was now familiar, he had found a guide whose firmer faith and endearing goodness helped him to rise to a higher level. The first of the following letters to his “cousin,” as he chose to misname her, accompanied a collected edition of Wordsworth’s Poems: —

“Christmas-day, 1S22.

“Deae and good Cousin, — As you were so kind as to listen very patiently during the last autumn to a great deal of ill-expressed praise of William Wordsworth, my ‘mind’s father,’ I think it my duty that you should speedily be enabled to judge of his extraordinary merits more fully and at leisure.

“You will perceive that many of these poems, of no striking interest at first or taken singly, will grow upon you and increase in value when you come to view them in connexion with each other, and as belonging to the same system of thought; and if the atheism and impiety of such lads as Shelley and Lord Byron tend — as they certainly must and ought to do — to diminish the pleasure derived even from their better works, so, on the other hand, should the noble faith and the pure practice of such a man as Wordsworth, render our delight the greater in studying even the least important of his. So read them, cousin, at your leisure, without disinclination to be pleased. Judge for yourself, and take no heed of those who sit in the chair of the scorner, combating a phantom of childishness and insipidity, which their own obtuse and imbecile ignorance has created. Should you at any time meet with what you cannot understand, be humble, and attribute such a misfortune to your own weakness rather than to his, and you will find your reward; for he is one of the master spirits, and there is reason in all his thoughts.

“My only fear now is, that I may have written somewhat too much of this, and that you may be disappointed. However, I trust to time and your own reflections. Don’t rely upon first impressions where these are unfavourable, but rather wait: the light will break in by degrees. For I believe that the exercise of the creative faculty is not confined to the works alone of any original genius; he must, in a great degree, create the taste itself, especially where, as in modern poetry, there is much that is false and unstable. At least, the perception and relish of what is good improve in proportion to the supply; ’ as if increase of appetite did grow by what it fed on,’ as was

once observed of the late Dr Ylr, he being then

employed on his fifth plate of turtle-soup.”

“Saturday Night.

“Dear Cousin, — I have just been informed, when it is nearly two hours too late, that I might have gone to Maitland Street to-day to dinner, where I should have enjoyed good mutton, a glass of ale, glorious tea, and the society of your sister Nancy (I have missed out the Miss by mistake). I would have given anything to have gone out, having been in a very strange unsettled humour all day, and unable to do anything but laugh at the robin for trying to swallow the tail of a live mouse, which the dear innocent takes for a worm. Hee! hee! hee! Why don’t you laugh?

“Howze yir toothache? I was very sorry to learn by your last despatch that you were suffering from a renewal of that painful malady. They say it is a worm in the tooth. If you would let cock-robin sleep in your mouth for a single night, he would effect a permanent and radical cure; but then, his charges are high.

“I feel considerable trepidation in alluding to your request to see some scraps of miscellaneous poetry. Your demand, it would seem, is either to be ‘granted generppjjME law in poetry. 95

ously, or refused gently.’ Most alliterative of ill-tempered Tibbies!

‘How high her honour holds her haughty head! ’

(Hopkxns?)

If you but

‘Viewed the vileness of my I’icked verse,’

you would at once admit that there is to the full as much ’ generosity ’ in the refusal as there could be gentleness in the ’ granted, But, to speak as they do in the dog-star, that is siriusly, I will tell you a fact, which you -will

perhaps consider only in the light of a fiction, to wit

but, in the meantime, I must go ben to my tea, for I hear the ‘great Tom: ’ so, please, wait for the fact for five minutes.

“Well, as I was saying, I will tell you a great fact, to wit, the primal and most indispensable law in the composition of poetry is that there must be a preponderance both in mind and body of pleasurable sensation, otherwise the result is necessarily cold, feeble, forced, and valueless. Now, cousin, notwithstanding many sources of pleasure still open to me, and for which I ought to be, and in fact am, very grateful, yet my usual and prevailing feelings are, and, I believe, must ever be, the reverse of pleasureable; from which statement I leave you to draw the inference, that that which a man cannot write, neither can he send.

“To continue. Hem! I begin in fact to change my mind regarding poetry and poetical perception, always excepting the great god Pan, who lives in a cottage in ^Yestmoreland. ‘His soul is like a star, and dwells apart, He is to be worshipped as the Guebres do the sun, his brightness to be gloried in, his spots (for such there are in the most splendid luminaries) to be left unrecorded. There should be no Herschel in poetry. For myself, I eat too much to be sentimental; a pound of beef or mutton daily, and half a pound of fish, potatoes, and other garniture, are too substantial accompaniments to the ethereal essence of poetic inspiration — not to speak of cheese. I do not, however, despise the sweet science. ‘Toute au contraire,’ as they say in the Highlands. ‘I own the soft impeachment; ’ but it is often too sublimated for my stultified understanding, which pants in vain for something like a distinct conception, and loves not for itself alone the ’ unmeaning melody of sweetest sound”

“March 1823.

“Deak Cousin, — I received the libri tre. I hope you did not hurry yourself with them, or read them at any time when you would have preferred something else, merely for the sake of returning them soon. I send tre altri, which you can read at your leisure, and try to find some amusement from them. Some people contrive (like bum-bees on the top of a thistle) to find ’ good in everything.’ I have little doubt you are one of those. By the by, if the assertion were true as given in the first part of the line last cpioted — ‘sermons in stones’ — what a pitiable life must be led by a mineralogist! fur we could scarcely expect that every piece of slate, grauwacke, or whinstone, would turn out a Chalmers or Thomson. Quartz would make a pint of being as dry as Dr Grant [Granite], Hee-hee!

“I rushed over (in a hackney coach) to the Wernerian Society last Saturday, and was so bold, besides transacting my own especial business, as to stay to the meeting. I got a bit of a fright, however; for the first paper read, I found, was an attack upon myself — that is, upon certain duct lines which I had advocated in a paper read to, and published by, the society some years ago: so that I was obliged in my own defence, and in spite of that great degree of modesty which I possess,, and which I hope you have observed, and give me due credit for, to get up and make the following excellent speech from a corner, in a low and plaintive voice: —

“‘Mr President, — Sir.’ But it would be egotistical were I to proceed any further.”

In his paper on the Falconidw Mr Wilson had maintained the specific distinctness of the golden eagle (Aquila

O chrysdetos), and the ring-tailed eagle (Falco fulvus of Buffon). This view was controverted on the occasion above humorously referred to, by P. S. Selby, Esq., of Twizell House, now well known throughout the scientific world as the author of “Illustrations of British Ornithology,” and for thirty years one of Mr Wilson’s most valued friends. Our author, however, did not willingly abandon his theory. The following letter, addressed to Sir William Jardine, Bart., besought the benefit of his information :■ —

“53 Queen Street, Edinburgh,
Uth March 1823.

“Deae Sie, — I ought, perhaps, to apologise for troubling you with this letter; but as I know your attachment to those studies to which it relates, I have little doubt you will excuse me. There was recently read to the Wernerian Society a paper by Mr Selby, the object of which was to prove the identity of the ring-tailed and golden eagles. Mr S. considers the former as the young of the latter. As this opinion is at variance with the one which I had advocated some years ago in a paper on the genus Falco, published in the Wernerian Transactions, and with the sentiments which I still maintain, I drew up an answer to Mr Selby’s communication, and gave at the same time a general account of the different opinions entertained on this disputed point. These opinions are three in number. 1st, The old notion, which maintains that the golden and ring-tailed eagles are distinct. 2dly, That which prevailed pretty generally in France some years ago — namely, that the golden eagle is the young of the ring-tailed eagle. and, Sdly, The opinion of more recent origin, novt strengthened by the concurrence of Mr Selby, that the ring-tail is the young of the golden eagle. The first opinion is the one which I have adopted. The second, 1 have endeavoured to refute chiefly by shewing that if the golden eagle were the young of the ring-tail, it would not only be as common as that species, but much more so; because, if every pair of adult ring-tailed eagles breed once in the year, and produce two young at a brood, and if these young require three years to attain their perfect plumage (as the advocates of this opinion have stated), then it follows that at the lapse of every period of three years, there would be three pair of young golden eagles for every single pair of adult ring-tailed eagles which existed at the commencement of that period — in other words, that the golden eagle would be three times more common than the ring-tailed eagle. The reverse of which, however, is really the case — the ring-tailed eagle being six or eight times more common than the golden eagle.

“The third opinion escapes the objection arising from the disparity in point of numbers, which I think insuperable in regard to the second opinion, but in many other respects it is equally if not more objectionable than that opinion. I endeavoured, first, upon general principles, to shew that the ring-tail was not the young: of the golden eagle, in so far as the plumage of the tail was composed of distinct portions or bands of black and white, a disposition of colour which is characteristic of maturity, or, at least, which is never perceived in the young of any species, in the adult individual of which (like the mature golden eagle) there is on the same part a mingled combination of comparatively obscure and less strongly contrasted colours. This argument I illustrate and enforce at considerable length, though I shall not, at present, trouble you with the details. I also argue against the one being the young of the other from this circumstance among others, that in Low’s ‘Fauna Orcadensis,’ which contains a list of the Orkney birds, the result of a twenty years’ residence in those islands, the ring-tailed eagle is described as pretty frequent, but no mention is made of the golden eagle as an inhabitant of the Orkney Isles. I add, that the same circumstance occurs in the island of Iona, where I have observed the ring-tailed ea<ile as an adult breeding bird, occuyying the least accessible of the eyries, but where I could neither observe nor collect any information regarding the occurrence of the golden eagle. My reason for troubling you with all this is, that I understood you have had in your possession a live golden eagle for some time, and that you procured him while young.

THE EIKEi’s OWK VERDICT. 101

If so, what is his present plumage compared to that which he formerly bore? Did his tail bear the white ring at the base, and has it now disappeared (as Mr Selby asserts it to do)? Is he now a mature golden eagle, corresponding to the descriptions usually given of that bird by authors? Do you, upon the whole, adhere to the original belief of these birds being distinct, or do you rather incline to Mr Selby ’s notion of their being one and the same 1 I shall be at all times happy to procure for you any information in my power which you may be desirous of obtaining from this quarter in furtherance of your ornithological pursuits, and I beg again to apologise for the liberty I have taken. — I remain, etc.,

“James Wilson.”

An appeal to the king of birds himself confirmed the conclusions of the Northumbrian ornithologist;* but the above letter was the renewal of an acquaintance which ripened into a life-long friendship, confirmed by mutual esteem as well as kindred tastes, and nut a little conducive to the happiness both of Sir William and his correspondent, Neither the lordly apartments of the Royal Society, nor the collections of the College Museum and Libra could have furnished a more delightful retreat to a savant

* Sir “William’s eagle sat for its portrait, which now forms Plate2 of Mr Selby’s u Illustrations.”

studiously disposed, than Mr Wilson might have found amongst the inexhaustible books and specimens of Jardine Hall, nor would it have been any drawback that ichthyological illustrations were supplied by Annan Water more recent, if not as rare as the stuffed salmonidce in the endless cabinets. But it was not till late in life that, although frequently invited, he was able to pay a lengthened visit to this hospitable abode. It was in 1854, when preparing materials for the press; and he exceedingly enjoyed its cheerful seclusion, as well as the extensive apparatus so luxuriously at hand in this great repertory of everything pertaining to zoological science.

In the meanwhile, however, notwithstanding such episodes as the eagle controversy, and despite the gaiety of his familiar epistles, his strength was imperfectly restored, and the depression of spirit, with which he never ceased to contend, he could not always conceal. In the autumn of 1823, he visited Ardencaple, the residence of his intelligent and heartily appreciating friend, Lord John Campbell, and spent some time cruising in the yachts of Lord Willoughby de Broke and James Smith, Esq. of Jordanhill. With one or two of the letters then written we conclude this section of his history. Mournful as is the tone of the first extract, we think it better not to withhold it. Perhaps to some “shipwrecked brother” it may prove a footstep in the sand. Few that saw the affluent sunshine of Mr Wilson’s later life could imagine that it once had to struggle up from such a sea of sorrow.

TO MISS ISABELLA KEITH.

“Largs, August 1823. “Every day convinces me of the irremediable imbecility of my own mind, and every attempt to throw it off overthrows myself. It has been with the greatest difficulty for some days past that I have been able to understand the slightest thing Pain, weakness, and

misfortune may distract the mind, and render it insensible to the purest and holiest enjoyments; and of the decree of blame attachable in such cases, God alone can judge, because He alone knows all; and I believe you will find it admitted in some of your own favourite authors, that it may certainly please God to permit a diseased or morbid sensibility of frame, whether corporeal or mental, to mar Christian joy even to the very grave. Why I should be as I am, I cannot say, — because at present we ’ see through a glass darkly; ’ though the time will come when we shall know even as we are known. In the meantime, let us judge each other in charity: ’ faith, hope, charity, these three; but the greatest of these is charity.’

“I have been here since last Thursday, and although everything within doors is just as I would wish it, I have not yet in any way recovered the knack of enjoying myself; but as my hopes were small, my disappointment lias not been great. I have scarcely been out since I came here; I feel unable to read, I can’t write, and I see no use in staring at the ships. The scenery, I have no doubt, is beautiful; I don’t feel it to be so, but I am thankful there are no setting suns. There is but one sight in nature which is still too much for my spirit to bear, and that is the setting sun. At the close of a summer evening, when all around is quiet and hushed, and when the western sky gleams with the lovely hues of departing glory, I look upon the calm magnificence of heaven, and at that moment wish I had never been called into existence. The crimson clouds of an evening sky make my heart sick, and my mind is never more perturbed by ghastly visions than amid the fairy light of a setting sun. Yet I once loved it — not wisely, but too well. Though time has now broken the delusion, still I never can forget what I have felt when a fiery sun slowly sank behind the purple mountains, and seemed to leave the world in a blaze of glory. I saw there a splendid emblem of a great man’s death; for the career of virtue is brightest when about to lead into heaven. I felt a throb that told me not to be ashamed to stand erect in the creation of God, and I could have wept with sublime joy to think that I might widen the sphere of virtue, and in the next world remember something that I had done in this.”

Our next extract is in a sprightlier vein. It is from a letter headed, “Scene — At sea. Time — Nisrht. Motto — ‘My home is on the ocean.’ Air — Very cold.”

“I have a thousand thanks, good cousin, for your letter, which was a great treat in my present sojourn in the land of strangers. It was sent up to me from Inverness. There is, however, in that northern metropolis, another James Wilson, who opened my letter, and, after no doubt reading it through to his infinite edification, closed it again, adding on the outside the gratifying intelligence, ‘Opened by, but not for, James Wilson, Inverness.’ You need not, however, jump at this, and hold up the palms of your hands; for it was Jane’s letter that was examined, as it came one or two days before, and by the time yours arrived, the post-office people were aware of my existence in their neighbourhood.

“You tell me to tell you how I am. I am happy to inform you that I sleep by night and thrive by day. I am, however, shocked to add that I have been severely afflicted by the loss of my customary glass of ale, which does not seem to abound either in the west or the north countries. There is, to be sure, plenty of porter, spruce beer, ginger beer, your common beer, all kinds of wines and spirituous liquors, and, to make use of a Brussels phrase, ’ punches as in England; ’ so that I have no reasonable cause of complaint. But you know the perversity of human nature; for, as your mother used to say, ‘When Isabella was ill, nothing would satisfy her but pickled mussels.’ Well, 1 feel in regard to my ale exactly as you used to do as to your pickled mussels, with this painful distinction, that there is here no maritime Tibby to minister to my wants. I have seen many a magnificent mountain, and many a romantic old castle, ‘holding its dark communion with the clouds, but I agree with Gray in preferring to all of these,

‘The long-resounding ale, and fretted vault.’

It was certainly a very noble idea to suppose the very roof of the cellar adorned with stalactites of petrified foam from the bottles and the barm of many centuries.”

The last of the series is dated Sept, 10, 1823: —” I don’t know at all where I am going to at present. I am now in my old friend Mr Smith’s vessel, the Orion; but as it is a matter of indifference to me which way she turns her prow, I don’t wish to disturb the silence of the scene by asking impertinent questions. It is so calm that we scarcely move. We lie somewhere between America and the Laird of Lamont’s, and have been for this last day or two enjoying the only truly summer weather we have had since I left home.

“Tother night I went to a ball at Brisbane House, chiefly that I might enjoy as much as possible the society of

Billy. He is just the very man I stood in need of.

People wonder what I see about him, but they are asses, and he is an angel. His age is sixty-three. His person, face, and figure are, seriously speaking, not to be distinguished by the nicest eye from that of the late Dr;

indeed, between ourselves, I have reason to believe that it is the Doctor himself. He is, however, not nearly such a fool as he looks like; the late Doctor, that is. He talks of nothing but eatiug and drinking, and is alike powerful in both; and having lately spent a fortune on French cooks and gourmanderie, he now billets himself alternately on one or other of the members of the Yacht Club, and keeps cruising about for an appetite the greater part of the year. I saw by the first glimpse which I got of his beautiful nose, which I almost mistook in the twilight for an aurora borealis, that he was the ’ properest man on earth’ for me, and I soon found my most sanguine hopes realised. As a Dutch pilot once said to me, ‘Wat is zoo zoet als vriendschap? ’ * so I have found in the affection of Billy. I took him with me to Ardencaple, where I completed my conquest by three several acts of kindness, which my influence with the housekeeper enabled me to bestow on him — roamed pork, boiled partridges, and fried

* “What is so sweet as friendship?”

grouse gizzards. F, who arrived the second night,

nearly cut me out by talking of stewed dotterel. If he could have produced them on the table it would have been all over with me; but Billy has seen too much of the world not to know that a bird on the plate is worth a million on the moor, and so I still continued lord of the ascendant. However, his friend’s yacht was obliged, some days ago, to take her departure for the south, and bore my beautiful Billy from my distracted view.

“I was very happy (for me) during my stay at Ardencaple. It is a delightful old place, with ’ gray monastic towers,’ embosomed in wood, built on a peninsula on the banks of a salt-water loch, and backed by fine mountains. They made me feel quite at home, just as I was at Corstorphine Hill, and were truly kind. I must have been but a tiresome inmate, yet I could not get away on my present cruise without promising to come back.

“I sincerely hope you are all enjoying yourselves at the Hill, and that your mother is constantly on the wing between the house and the garden, pulling bird-seed, setting her trap, and rearing her callow young, concerning which you never condescend to give me any detail. Is Bunny minor alive, and Bunny major kicking? Have there been any ants this year on the top of the thistle? How is your aunt, Miss Keith? As I scarcely expect to hear again from any of my own family, let me know at once if Eobin is dead. No particulars, but merely the fact that he is not in 53 Queen Street. Of Shilly I have less fear; he is in better hands; at the same time, if he too should have lost his life as well as his tail, make a clean breast of it: my forgiveness is unbounded where there is no malice ■prepense.

“This morning, soon after sunrise — it was a morning worthy of paradise — I landed for an hour in Brodick Bay, in Arran, and walked up a valley which would do honour to the central glories of Switzerland. The hunters might be up in Arabia, but the few cottages which nature rather than art seemed to have placed in the centre of this magnificent solitude, gave no sign of life. It seemed as if the creative sun, which gladdens all the other valleys of the earth, had never darted his beams over the gigantic battlements of those desert dwellings. The cottages were scarcely distinguishable from the gray crags of granite which lay scattered around them. A few aged sycamores, where ’ ruin greenly dwelt, overshadowed some grassy plots where cattle might have pastured, had death and desolation not reigned supreme. I had finally made my way into the centre of this enormous grave; the morning, as I thought, was growing darker and darker still. I feared ’ total eclipse,’ and was about to retrace my steps toward the narrow pass by which I had entered, at this time entirely concealed by a rocky barrier, when all at once a low sweet voice was heard from the stump of an elder-tree, and the beautiful dark-eyed bird, the soother of many an hour of weary solitude, stood confessed before me. I could scarcely resist the first sudden impulse which had almost driven me towards him. He seemed to bend his radiant eyes upon me, as if he had recognised an ancient friend, and I sat down upon the grass, and listened to his plaintive melody as intently as if nothing else had existed in the world but himself and me. The gray crags and castellated clouds, and that secluded valley, so magnificent in its deathlike solitude, were at once forgotten. I had a confused remembrance of a darkened chamber, and some scattered books, and the same gorgeous breast and lustrous eye, and most melancholy voice, and I could have sat for ever. But at last I rose, and, as I left the valley, the beautiful creature seemed to deepen and yet extend the compass of its voice, as if it knew no end; and the last and only sound which I heard in that sublime region was the eong of that single solitary bird. I then gained the mouth of the valley, and descended to the sea-shore; and I said to myself, ‘If I have elbow-room in the cabin, I shall tell my cousin about this delightful creature:’ and I have done so now.”