WILSON, THE MAN 121 



conscious, a fault common to introspective natures 

 such as his — sometimes a httle of bitterness creeps 

 into his writings ; those who will not listen to his 

 proposals are dubbed narrow fools, while he pours 

 out his wrath on the rich who keep dogs to 

 frighten off the poor peddlers; often there is a 

 biting bit of satire or sarcasm flashing out with 

 unexpected sharpness. How heartless is his des- 

 cription of a "little hunch-backed dominie" who 

 refused to take the book which he had subscribed 

 for, though at his earlier visit he had been ex- 

 ceedingly agreeable to him. He likened him to 

 a walking-stick with a head fixed between two 

 huge eminences, "one jutting out before, the 

 other heaped up behind like a mountain." His 

 eyes, he says, "rolled forever with a kind of jeal- 

 ous pride and self-importance, on all around him." 

 In his later years he could never have brought 

 himself to speak those parting words when he told 

 him that nature was especially unkind in giving 

 to one man so crazy a body with such an insigni- 

 ficant soul; but on the other hand he avows his 

 belief in the goodness of the Duchess of Buc- 

 cleugh, even after that lady gave him so curt an 

 answer at the "Fair of Dalkeith." 



Wilson's sensitiveness is again and again evi- 

 dent; for instance, after the affair with the Duch- 

 ess he relates how with hurt and despondent feel- 

 ings he left his wares to retire to a corner of the 

 room and ponder over his fresh disappointment. 



To his friends and relatives Wilson was unfail- 

 ingly kind, thoughtful, and faithful. Thomas 

 Crichton, David Brodie, William Duncan, his 



