232 MEMOIR OF JOHN WILSON. 



when I joined his class in 1830. The occasion was of much more 

 interest to me than the usual first sight of an instructor by a pupil. 

 I do not know if there be any thing of the same kind now, but in 

 that day there was a peculiar devotion to Blackwood 's Magazine 

 among young readers in the north. All who were ambitious of 

 looking beyond their class exercises, considered this the fountain- 

 head of originality and spirit in literature. The articles of the last 

 number Avere discussed critically in the debating societies, and 

 knowingly in the supper parties, and the writing of the master- 

 hand was always anxiously traced. To see that master, then, for 

 the first time, was an epoch in one's life. 



" The long-looked for first sight of a great man often proves a 

 disappointment to the votary. It was far otherwise in this in- 

 stance. Much as I had heard of his appearance, it exceeded ex- 

 pectation, and I said to myself that, in the tokens of physical health 

 and strength, intellect, high spirit, and all the elements of mascu- 

 line beauty, I had not seen his equal. There was a curious contrast 

 to all this in the adjuncts of his presence — the limp Geneva gown, 

 and the square, box-shaped desk, over which he seemed like some 

 great bust set on a square plinth — but I question if any robes or 

 chair of state would have added dignity to his appearance. 



" On a very early day in the session — I forget whether it was 

 quite the first — we suddenly came to an acquaintance, on my hav- 

 ing occasion to speak with him at the end of the lecture. When 

 he found that I was an Aberdonian, he asked me if I knew Tar- 

 land, ' a place celebrated for its markets.' To be sure I did ; and 

 Tarland was in those days not a place to be easily forgotten. On 

 the border of the Highlands, it had been a great mart for smuggled 

 whiskey ; and though the reduction of the excise duties had spoiled 

 that trade, custom continued it for a while in a modified shape, and 

 the wild ruffianly habits it had nourished were still in their prime, 

 and not likely to disappear until the generation trained to them 

 had passed away. The Professor had seen and experienced the 

 ways of the place. He hinted, with a sort of half-sarcastic solem- 

 nity, that he was there in the course of the ethical inquiries to 

 which lie had devoted himself; just as the professor of natural his- 

 tory or any other persevering geologist might be found where any 

 unusual geological phenomenon is developed, or the professor of 

 anatomy might conduct his inquiries into some abnormal structure 



