" Cbrtstopfocr Wortb" 171 



irresistibly reminded of the gloomy epistles indited by 

 Wilkins Micawber, having delivered himself of which 

 that immortal optimist entered with increased zest 

 into the delights of skittles and punch. But there 

 really was a streak of melancholy running through 

 Wilson's character, which grew more morbid and pro- 

 nounced in his later years, till at times it threatened 

 to darken his reason. 



Soon after leaving Oxford he purchased the beautiful 

 cottage of Elleray, on the banks of Windermere, where 

 some of the happiest days of his life were passed. 

 James Hogg, the Ettrick Shepherd, however, thought 

 it a poor place for a Scottish sportsman to dwell in. 

 Twenty years later, when Wilson, after many vicissi- 

 tudes, again took up his abode at Elleray, the 

 " Shepherd " wrote thus to him : 



" MY DEAR AND HONOURED JOHN, I never thought 

 you had been so unconscionable as to desire a sports- 

 man on the nth or even the I3th of August to leave 

 Ettrick Forest for the bare scraggy hills of Westmore- 

 land ! Ettrick Forest, where the black cocks, and white 

 cocks, brown cocks, and grey cocks, ducks, plovers, and 

 pease-weeps, and willy-whaups are as thick as the 

 flocks that cover her mountains, and come to the hills 

 of Westmoreland that can nourish nothing better than 

 a castril or stonechat ! To leave the great yellow fin 

 of Yarrow, or the still larger grey-locher for the de- 

 generate fry of Troutbeck, Esthwaite, or even Wastwater ! 

 No, no, the request will not do ; it is an unreasonable 

 one, and therefore not unlike yourself; for besides, 



