2 MEMOIR OF JOHN WILSON. 



Mrs. Wilson removed. It is a stately building, with large gardens, 

 and an imposing entrance. The windows to the back command an 

 extensive view of a beautiful undulating country, with the nearer 

 prospect of a woody vale and rich sloping fields, a landscape suffi- 

 ciently attractive to have awakened the love of nature in a child's 

 heart, and to have held dominion there in after days, when memory 

 recalled the home of youth, and those delightful pictures of boy- 

 hood's life which were immortalized in the " Recreations of Chris- 

 topher North." Of Mr. Wilson, senior, I know little more than 

 that he was a wealthy man, having realized his fortune in trade as 

 a gauze manufacturer. The integrity of his character and his mer- 

 cantile successes gave him an important position in society, and he 

 is still remembered in Paisley as having been in his own day one 

 of the richest and most respected of its community ; while his 

 house possessed a great attraction in his admirable and beautiful 

 wife, a lady of rare intellect, wit, humor, wisdom, and grace. Her 

 maiden name was Margaret Sym. Her brother Robert is not 

 unknown to fame, as the " Timothy Tickler" of the Nodes Ambro- 

 siance. Her mother, of the Dunlops of Garnkirk, was lineally 

 descended, by the female side, from the great Marquis of Montrose. 

 Whether this gentle blood had any thing to do with the physical 

 characteristics of the family or not, certain it is that Mrs. Wilson, 

 her sons and daughters, were remarkably distinguished by personal 

 beauty, of a refined and dignified type. An aspect so stately as 

 that of the old lady is not often to be seen. Nor was she less 

 gifted with qualities more durable than beauty; for ere long she 

 was called upon, by the death of her husband, to exercise the 

 wisdom and strength of her character in rearing a large family of 

 sons and daughters. How well she performed that duty Avas best 

 seen in the reverence and love of her children, all of whom, save 

 two sons and a daughter, lived to shed tears over her grave, and 

 to give proof, in their own lives, of that admirable training which 

 had taught them betimes the way that they should go.* 



* It will not be out of place here to give the names of the ten children born to Mr. Wilson and 

 his 'wife : — 



1. Grace Wilson, married George Cashel, Esquire, Ireland; died, 1835. 2. Jane Wilson, died 

 unmarried, 1886. 3. Margaret Wilson, married John Ferrier, Esquire, W. S„ Edinburgh; died, 

 1831. 4. John Wilson, married Miss Jane Penny ; died, 1854. 5. Andrew Wilson, married Miss 

 Aitken, Glasgow; died. 1812. 6. Henrietta Wilson, died young. 7. William Wilson, died in 

 infancy 8. Iiobert Sym Wilson, married Miss Eliza Penny. 9. Elizabeth Wilson, married Si;- 

 John M'Ncill, G. C. B. 10. James Wilson, married Miss Isabella Keith, Edinburgh ; died, 1S56 



