ALEXANDER WILSON 55 



larly. I think I shall take a ride 15 or 20 miles on Saturday. I 

 find riding agrees better with me than any other exercise. I 

 always feel cheerful after it, and can eat confoundedly. Have 

 you made any new discoveries in the Heaven above, or the earth 

 beneath, with your telescope or microscope?" 



At this time his nephew had moved to Ovid, Cayuga county, 

 New York, where they had purchased a tract of land and begun 

 to farm. Other members of his family came hither from Scotland 

 and it seems to have been Wilson's intention to join them though 

 he afterwards abandoned the idea. 



In 1801 Wilson left Milestown and obtained a school at Bloom- 

 field, N. J., where he remained about a year. He seems to have 

 had little trouble in securing positions. School-teachers, were, to 

 be sure, scarce and salaries small, as he complained bitterly with 

 respect to his Bloomfield engagement where the people "paid 

 their minister 250 pounds a year for preaching twice a week and 

 their teacher 40 dollars a quarter for the most spirit-sinking, 

 laborious work, six, I may say twelve times weekly." 



Wilson, however, seems to have possessed the requisites of a 

 teacher in no small degree; he was both a disciplinarian and an 

 instructor and succeeded in his main object, that of imparting 

 knowledge to his pupils. He also seems to have gained the respect 

 and good-will of the people among whom he established himself 

 so that they were loath to have him leave them. In describing 

 his Bloomfield school he writes: "The schoolhouse in which I 

 teach is situated at the extremity of a spacious level plain of sand 

 thinly covered with grass. In the centre of this plain stands a 

 newly erected stone meeting-house, 80 feet by 60, which forms a 

 striking contrast with my sanctum sanctorum, which has been 

 framed of logs some 100 years ago, and looks like an old sentry 

 box. The scholars have been accustomed to great liberties by 

 their former teacher. They used to put stones in his pocket, etc., 

 etc. I was told that the people did not like to have their children 

 punished, but I began with such a system of terror as soon estab- 

 lished my authority most effectually. I succeed in teaching them 

 to read and I care for none of their objections." 



