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means to boot." He was of a social turn, this hero of 

 John's boyhood, and a proud moment it was for the lad 

 when he was graciously allowed to follow the idol of his 

 worship in his search for hares and rabbits, which he only 

 shot for their skins, leaving the carcases to whomsoever 

 cared to pick them up. 



In due course John became owner of an old fowling- 

 piece, and emulated the poaching exploits of his hero, for 

 he calmly tells us in his Autobiography : " I think I have 

 shot every kind of bird and beast of the district here 

 excepting a fox, a badger, and an otter, a kingfisher, and 

 a wild goose, of which in all my rambles I never got 

 a chance." 



Another Thomson, but of a very different sort from 

 the old poacher, had also a remarkable influence over 

 John Younger to wit, James Thomson the poet, a copy 

 of whose " Seasons " fell by accident into the hands of 

 the Scottish lad. The blank verse bothered him at first, 

 " being neither prose nor rhyme," but he mastered the 

 harmony and the meaning after a stiff struggle. Then, 

 to quote his own words, " the whole opened up like a 

 new sun risen on the horizon of my mental vision. And 

 soon the solitary woods around responded to the hymn 

 which crowns ' The Seasons,' as there, when alone, I sang 

 it out in gusts of rapture." 



Perhaps one reason for John Younger's delight in 

 ' The Seasons ' was that he found the author to be as 

 keen an angler as himself. For no one can read the 

 passage on fly-fishing in " Spring " without feeling 

 convinced that "Jemmy" was a master of the art. 

 Nowhere in English literature is there a more graphic 



