8 MEMOIR OF GEORGE WILSON. CHAP. I. 



in a pool of water. One life saved seemed in the child's 

 estimation to atone in part for those taken away; On 

 going to bed, his mother found a scrap of paper under her 

 pillow containing in verse the butterfly's thanks to its pre- 

 server ! " The tender heart which was afterwards to plead 

 so earnestly with medical students against the cruelty of 

 reckless vivisection was here revealed ! " l 



More pleasantly was humanity cultivated by the encourage- 

 ment of pets of all kinds. Hedgehogs reposed in undis- 

 coverable corners in the daytime, and appeared at twilight 

 to be fed. Tortoises made the recesses of the old-fashioned 

 grates their bed-chambers, coming out to be regaled with 

 grapes and dandelion leaves. In short, it was an under- 

 stood fact, that no pet could come amiss to the household, 

 so strongly did a love for animals pervade the family. One 

 favourite, at the time we now speak of, was a large rough 

 bull-terrier of no great beauty. Duff had been intended to 

 act as watch-dog, but he soon came to the conclusion that 

 watching his master's children was the duty nearest his 

 heart, if not his conscience, and he was skilful in evading 

 all other demands on his talents. Jessie, when able to walk 

 alone, liked nothing better than to go to sleep with her 

 little arms round his soft fat neck. One day an alarm was 

 raised that baby was missing. In vain every room was 



i ' ' Macmillan's Magazine," January, 1860. 



In a letter, dated Feb. 22, 1855, the following sentence occurs : 

 ' ' I had the happiness, when a boy, to have a mother who sedulously 

 encouraged her children to be naturalists, and made me when at school 

 the passionate lover of God's works, which in maturer years I have 

 learned still more to be." 



And to Mrs. Day, St. Andrews, he says, in 1850 : " Much of my 

 delight as a child arose out of natural history. It gives food to the 

 imagination, and tempers the fairy books, of which too many cannot 

 be given to children. " 



