Burns — Alexander Wilson. 79 



ALEXANDER WILSON. 

 VIIL His Early Life and Writings. 



BY FRANK L. BURNS. 



The Wilsons were strict Covenanters, originally from Loch- 

 winnoch, Renfrewshire, but had been driven by persecution 

 to seek refuge in Canipbelltown, Argyleshire. The elder 

 Alexander was born in lT2cS and early returned to the shire 

 from whence his grandfather had fled, settled in Paisley and 

 took up the occupation of weaving, for which the town was 

 famous. He married Mary McNab, who came from the 

 " Row " in Durbartonshire to Paisley during her girlhood. 

 Ord states that she was a native of Jura, one of the Herbrides 

 or Western Islands of Scotland. Alexander, Junior, the fifth 

 of the six children, was born on the Gth of July, 1766, within 

 sound of the Falls of the Cart river, in a little suburb of Pais- 

 ley known as the Seedhills. The house in which he was born 

 has long since disappeared and another of the same height 

 built in its place. It commanded a fine view of the river be- 

 low the falls and overlooked the Hamels — the highest part of 

 a range of craigs over which the stream rushes, forming a 

 beautiful and romantic w^aterfall. To distinguish this house 

 from the others in the row, David Anderson of Perth, in 1841, 

 placed a tablet in the front wall to mark the birthplace of the 

 Paisley poet and American ornithologist. 



History has drawn a most gloomy picture of the life and 

 condition of the common people of Scotland during the eigh- 

 teenth century ; their wretchedness freciuently accentuated by 

 immorality and intemperance. The father of our future or- 

 nithologist, notwithstanding of sober and industrious habits, 

 of strict honesty and superior intelligence, highly respected by 

 all who knew him, as testified by Dr. Hetherington ; neverthe- 

 less interested himself in a small distillery plant hidden in his 

 garden, illicit for at least part of the time and for that reason 

 all the more commendable in the opinion of his good neighbors 

 and patrons. The father outlived his distinguished son, de- 

 parting this life on the r)th of June, 1816, at the ripe old age of 

 eighty-eight years. His mother is said to have been comely. 



