138 The Wilson Bulletin — No. G4. 



really known l>y him in connection with this romance is proba- 

 bly lost. It is also unfortunate that the late Mrs. Robins did 

 not verify a single statement, apparently, in her resume - of 

 the newspaper amplification. 



Miss Ann ]\I. Bartram, plain Nancy at her Quaker home, 

 the daug-hter of John Bartram, Jr., heir to the Bartram estate 

 and brother of William, the intimate friend of Wilson ; was 

 born on February 15, 1779. " She had brown hair, expressive 

 eyes, was slenderly built, was nearly a blonde, and grew up 

 like a rose in her father's garden," as recorded by the family 

 historian, William Middleton Bartram. "A love of birds and 

 flow^ers and a keen appreciation of the beauties of nature dis- 

 tinguished Ann Bartram, and her face must have won many 

 an admiring glance as she walked by her father's side in their 

 rambles together after the beauties. and mysteries of botany." 



Fortunately we have several pen pictures of Wilson at 

 aboiit this period. Horace Binney, an eminent lawyer of Phil- 

 adelphia, says : " His personal appearance was that of a mod- 

 est, rather retiring man of good countenance, not decidedly 

 Scotch, but still with a cast of it, rather more like a New Eng- 

 land Congregational clergymani in his black dress, than any 

 other description I can give. He was held in great esteem for 

 probity, gentle manners and accomplishments in his special 

 branch of science." ^ Doubtless Charles Robert Leslie's de- 

 scription is a most accurate one ; not merely because he also be- 

 came a celebrated personage, but rather from the aptness 

 of an artistic soul receiving and retaining a correct im- 

 pression of an individual. "He looked like a bird ; his eyes 

 were piercing, dark and luminous, and his nose shaped like a 

 beak. He was of a spare, bony form, very erect in his car- 

 riage, inclining to be tall ; and with a very elastic step, he 

 seemed qualified by nature for his extraordinary pedestrian 



^A Romance of Bartram's Garden. Love's Young Dream Shat- 

 tered by the Action of a Stern Father. Ann Bartram the Heroine. 

 Alexander Wilson Her Choice, but, Against Her Will, She was Com- 

 pelled to Wed Another. Wilson Died of a Broken Heart. — Philadel- 

 phia (Sunday) Press, May 3, 1896, p. 8. 



= Behind the Wedding Veil. Osprey, Vol. III., 1899, p. 97. 

 ' Wilson's Poets and Poetry of Scotland, p. 420. 



