CHAP, xviii. SELF-RELIANCE. 379 



there was something much more than the mere manual 

 labourer in him. His mind had risen above his daily 

 occupation. For he had the soul of a true man. 

 Above all, he loved Nature and Nature's works. 



We need not speak of his stern self-reliance and 

 his indomitable perseverance. These were among the 

 prominent features of his character. Of his courage, 

 it is scarcely necessary to speak. When we think of 

 his nightly wanderings, his trackings of birds for days 

 together, his encounters with badgers and polecats, 

 his climbing of rocks, and his rolling down cliffs in 

 search of sea-birds, we cannot but think that he taxed 

 his courage a great deal too much. 



A great point with him, was his sobriety. For. 

 thirty-six years he never entered a public-house nor 

 a dram shop. He was not a teetotaller. Sobriety 

 was merely his habit. Some of his friends advised 

 him to take " a wee drap whisky " with him on cold 

 nights ; but he never did. He himself believes that 

 had he drunk whisky, he never could have stood the 

 wet, the cold, and the privations to which he was 

 exposed during so many years of his life. When he 

 went out at night, his food consisted for the most part 

 of plain oatmeal cakes ; and his drink was the water 

 from the nearest brook. 



He never lost a moment of time. When his 

 work for the day was over, he went out to the links 

 or the fields with his supper of oatmeal cakes in his 

 hand ; and after the night had passed, he returned 



