Wilson's literary writings 129 



delight. Read his account of the habits of the 

 bhiebird or his chapter en the red-headed wood- 

 pecker, and you cannot but dehght in the fresh, 

 naive manner in which he speaks of his friends of 

 the forest. 



Ah'eady has the "Ornithology" been treated 

 of at so much length, however, that it is now 

 enough simply to refer the reader to the pages of 

 that charming book itself, with the assurance that 

 for the most part it will be found anything else 

 than dull to him who loves nature and her chil- 

 dren. 



Whatever else Wilson wrote in prose is of little 

 interest save to students of his life. An oration 

 which he delivered at Milestown on March 4, 

 1801, on "The Power and Value of National 

 Liberty," indicates that Wilson possessed some 

 oratorical ability. Both this and "The Solitary 

 Philosopher," an essay published in The Bcc, 

 a Scottish magazine, in 1791, were of too ephem- 

 eral a nature to be especially interesting in them- 

 selves. 



The Journal of his travels, and his personal 

 letters, are all important for the gaining of a clear 

 light on the life and character of the man, and to 

 give a valuable insight into Scotch and American 

 life a hundred years ago, but since he wrote them 

 hurriedly during his travels we find in them no 

 literary finish ; they teem with the indications of 

 the scantiness of his early education, which are 

 not common in his more carefully corrected writ- 



ings. 



