264 MEMOIR OF GEORGE WILSON. CHAP. X. 



His cousin, Alexander, had lost a boy of five years on 

 the passage out to Australia; he died in sight of land, and 

 the first possession of his parents in the new country was a 

 little grave. His beauty and winning ways had made Harry 

 deeply loved by all who knew him, and his death was 

 regarded as no common loss. On learning his bereavement, 

 George writes to the sorrowing father : " Scarcely am I 

 home from Rothesay before we are all startled by the un- 

 looked-for decease of my young, brave, frank, and skilled 

 colleague, Dr. Richard Mackenzie, who had volunteered to 

 accompany the troops to the East, and perishes of cholera 

 after winning the utmost esteem and gratitude of the High- 

 land soldiers, and risking his life at the battle of the Alma. 

 The shock of that is scarcely past, before we are plunged 

 into new and deeper grief by the death, after a very short 

 illness, of Edward Forbes, in the very height of his glory 

 and usefulness ; and I am in tears for the loss of that 

 beloved friend, when your letter arrives with its afflicting 

 news. ... I have given up making idols ; they are all 

 taken away. Harry I thought of as full of life and energy ; 

 and destined, with that remarkable mechanical genius of 

 his, to become great, and good, and famous, long, long after 

 I had found rest in the grave. He was so beautiful the 

 most beautiful boy I ever saw so loving, so lovable, what 

 had Death to do with him 1 Was I not here, and others, 

 who had digged for death as for hidden treasure, and could 

 even rejoice at the prospect of going to be with Christ, 

 which for us is far better than a dying life here, that he 

 should be summoned, and we left ! I have asked myself 

 the same question regarding the death of Mackenzie, and 

 still more regarding the loss of Edward Forbes, whose death 

 is universally felt to be a public calamity. But I can find 

 no answer, and expect none on this side the grave. I am 



