Appendix 395 



justly conceived, lo get a living; and as Andrew was a 

 delicate child, and could not lift and carry much, nor brave 

 the chances of an out-door occupation, it was better that he 

 should be in the shelter of a store. He, however, a youth 

 of sixteen years, fresh from the studies, and dreams, and 

 hopes of the Montgomery Academy, found his first duty lo 

 be the gentle withstanding of his mother's wish; and quite 

 willing to "settle," if he could do it in his own way, joined 

 his brother in the management of the nursery. He had no 

 doubt of his vocation. Since it was clear that he must 

 directly do something, his fine taste and exquisite appreci- 

 ation of natural beauty, his love of natural forms, and the 

 processes and phenomena of natural life, immediately de- 

 termined his choice. Not in vain had his eyes first looked 

 upon the mountains and the river. Those silent compan- 

 ions of his childhood claimed their own in the spirit with 

 which the youth entered upon his profession. To the poet's 

 eye began to be added the philosopher's mind; and the 

 great spectacle of Nature which he had loved as beauty, 

 began to enrich his life as knowledge. Yet I remember, as 

 showing that with all his accurate science he was always a 

 poet, he agreed in many conversations that the highest 

 enjoyment of beauty was quite independent of use; and 

 that while the pleasure of a botanist who could at once 

 determine the family and species of a plant, and detail all 

 the peculiarities and fitness of its structure, was very great 

 and inappreciable, yet that it was upon a lower level than 

 the instinctive delight in the beauty of the same flower. 

 The botanist could not have the highest pleasure in the 

 flower if he were not a poet. The poet would increase the 

 variety of his pleasure, if he were a botanist. It was this 

 constant subjection of science to the sentiment of beauty 

 that made him an artist, and did not leave him an artisan; 

 and his science was always most accurate and profound, 

 because the very depth and delicacy of his feeling for beauty 

 gave him the utmost patience to learn, and the greatest 

 rapidity to adapt, the means of organizing to the eye the 

 ideal image in his mind. 



