October, 19 ro. The Irish Nahwalist, 201 



SAMUKI. AI.EXANDKR STEWART. 



I. His Lifk. 



Ireland for some reason has had few working-men natural- 

 ists. There have been a number of examples in England 

 and Scotland of self-educated men, true lovers of nature, who 

 in spite of great hindrances have made a name for themselves 

 and extended the knowledge of natural science. Samuel 

 Alexander Stewart was the most remarkable, it might almost 

 be said, the only example in Ireland. 



The Stewarts were a family of well-to-do farmers who came 

 from Scotland in the seventeenth century and settled at Bally- 

 nure in Co. Antrim, some twelve miles north of Beh'^ast. The 

 family had its share in the difficulties about the land which 

 arose in that part of the country in the eighteenth century. 



Then came the political troubles of 1798, in which many 

 families living in that district were involved, Stewart's 

 grandfather went to America about that time and settled at 

 Philadelphia. William, his son, married Sarah Funston, a 

 member of a family which had come from England, and a 

 branch of which settled at Castlederg, Co. Tyrone. 



William Stewart owned a large house in North Front Street, 

 Philadelphia, where Samuel was born, 5th February, 1826, and 

 two years later his sister Margaret Ann, now Mrs. Bain, who 

 survives him, and was his companion for a considerable part 

 of his life, as he never married. 



The boy was not robust. He attended a private school in 

 Philadelphia kept by a Mrs. I^owry, but ill health led to little 

 progress being made, and contributed as will be seen to his 

 taking up studies which led him into the open air. Their 

 mother died when the children were j^oung, and a business 

 panic so affected his father's trade that he gave it up and 

 returned to Ireland in June, 1837. 



On his return from America, William Stewart went to live 

 with his brother Samuel, who was unmarried and had a trunk- 

 maker's shop at 56 North Street, Belfast. Circumstances 

 were straitened at this time and hard for the motherless 

 young people. William and his son worked at a rectifying 



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