SKETCH 



OF 



THE AUTHOK'S LIFE. 



Alexander Wilson was born in the town of Paisley, in the west of Scot- 

 land, on the sixth day of July, 1766. His father, who was also named Alex- 

 ander, followed the distilling business; an humble occupation, which neither 

 allowed him much time for the improvement of his mind, nor yielded him 

 much more than the necessaries of life. lie was illiterate and poor; and died 

 on the 5th June, 1816, at the age of eighty-eight. His mother was a native 

 of Jura, one of the Hebrides or Western Islands of Scotland. She is said to 

 have been a woman of delicate health, but of good understanding, and pas- 

 sionately fond of Scotch music, a taste for which she early inculcated on her 

 son, who, in his riper years, cultivated it as one of the principal amusements 

 of his life. She died when Alexander was about ten years old, leaving him, 

 and two sisters, to mourn their irreparable loss; a loss which her aiFectionate 

 son never ceased to deplore, as it deprived him of his best friend ; one who 

 had fostered his infant mind, and who had looked forward, with fond expecta- 

 tion, to that day, 



"When, clad in sable gown, with solemn air, 



" The walls of God's own house should echo back his prayer:" 



for it appears to have been her wish that he should be educated for the 

 ministry. 



At a school in Paisley, Wilson was taught the common rudiments of learn- 

 ing. But what proficiency he made, whether he was distinguished from his 

 schoolmates or not, my memorials of his early life do not inform me. It appears 

 that he was initiated in the elements of the Latin tongue; but having been re- 

 moved from school at the age of twelve or thirteen, the amount of knowledge 

 acquired could not have been great, and I have reason to believe that he never 

 afterwards resumed the study. His early productions show that his English 

 education had not only been greatly circumscribed, but very imperfect. He 

 wrote, as all self-taught authors write, carelessly and incorrectly. His sen- 



