76 MEMOIR OF GEORGE WILSON. CHAP. IV. 



one-page school of correspondence, I would stop here, 

 having written what I took up the paper to tell you about 

 but, if you oblige me to write letters to you, you must read 

 all I write to you. And having discoursed largely on rational 

 matters, like an oracle, I must now have a little room 

 allowed me for some antic gambols. I have had a huge 

 share of misfortunes lately, all of which have concerned 

 my upper works. They have been capital occurrences ; 

 and have come nigh unto affecting of my brain. I am 

 still, however, lucid, and take the opportunity to record 

 'them for your benefit. I think I forgot, some long while 

 ago, to tell you that, when I one evening, ' high as heaven 

 exulting,' clomb Arthur Seat, a breeze, an envious puff, 

 whirled my good hat ( sheer o'er the crystal battlement ' 

 of the lofty pinnacle. I rushed in desperation after it, but 

 the hat, having taken a side chase before it descended (?), 

 was whisked out of sight before I could follow in hot pur- 

 suit. I galloped down to the Hunters' Bog at break-neck 

 speed, but all to no avail (here I want a line from Gray's 

 Elegy, written in anticipation of this event, to the effect, 

 * Nor on the hill nor in the bog was he) ; no hat could I 

 see, and no hat did I find. I strongly fancy that it ascended, 

 and was borne aloft by some ' cross wind ' to the limbo of 

 vanity, which, as according to Milton it contains monks' 

 cowls, could never refuse a place to a good twenty-shillings, 

 stuff hat, not much the worse of wear. If it was refused 

 admittance there, I incline to the idea that it went up among 

 the stars, and forms a new constellation. It would probably 

 settle upon the locks of Berenice, whose tresses have too 

 long 'wantoned in the wind' not to feel glad of such a 

 covering. You remember who taught us about 'Coma 

 Berenices/ I'll speak to the Astronomer-Royal when I'm 

 in London, and set him to point his telescope in that 



