COMPI;e:TION 0]P THE ORNITHOI^OGY II3 



was already in the press, was committed to the 

 care of his friend, George Ord, who had been with 

 Wilson on some of his expeditions. It appeared 

 in January, 18 14, and was followed in May by the 

 last volume, which Ord also edited and to which 

 he appended a life of Wilson. Ord wrote, partly 

 from Wilson's notes, the accompanying text to 

 the ninth volume, but the plates had been colored 

 under Wilson's own superintendence. 



With a touch of the all-pervading sentiment 

 which his somewhat taciturn Scotch nature often 

 restrained him from expressing, Wilson had often 

 given utterance to the wish that his grave might 

 be where the birds would sing above him, and 

 it was a cause of much regret, after this became 

 known to his friends, that in the yard of the Swe- 

 dish Church the wish seemed unfulfilled. Alex- 

 ander B. Grosart, however, tells us that * 'Al- 

 though the Swedish Church is in a business- 

 crowded district, I myself, on paying a pilgrim- 

 visit to the grave, heard an oriole piping softly 

 and sweetly within a few yards of it." Over the 

 tomb of Wilson there is now growing a graceful 

 young willow, and in that far-away part of the city 

 about Water street there is not much noise to dis- 

 turb the quiet peace of the little grave-yard, which 

 lies before the quaint old Swedes' Church. 



Wilson's life had been one of fierce strivings 

 and bitter disappointments, and it ended in the 

 midst of struggle. Not the faintest touch of sor- 

 didness had stained it ; but the forces which most 

 went to shape it were love of science and of his 

 8 



