364 MEMOIR OF JOHN WILSON. 



a small table, in a middle-sized room, where I sincerely wished you 

 had been also, to witness the flowing gladness of our senses, as from 

 one of us ' Audubon's Ornithological Biography ' was read from 

 your ever valuable Journal. I wished this because I felt assured 

 that your noble heart would have received our most grateful thanks 

 with pleasure, the instant our simple ideas had conveyed to you the 

 grant of happiness we experienced at your hands. You were not 

 with us, alas ! but to make amends the best way we could, all of a 

 common accord drank to the health, prosperity, and long life, 

 of our generous, talented, and ever kind friend, Professor John 

 Wilson, and all those amiable beings who cling around his heart ! 

 May those our sincerest wishes reach you soon, and may they be 

 sealed by Him who granted us existence, and the joys heaped upon 

 the 'American woodsman' and his family, in your hospitable land, 

 and may we deserve all the benefits we have received in your ever 

 dear country, although it may prove impossible to us to do more 

 than to be ever grateful to her worthy sons. 



" Accept our respectful united regards, and offer them to your 

 family, whilst I remain, with highest esteem, your truly thankful 

 friend and most obedient servant, John J. Audubon." 



The next letter is from the Rev. James White :* — 



" Loxley, Stratford-on-Avon, 

 4th November, 1834. 



" My dear Sir :— The last was an admirable ' Noctes,' and in 

 my opinion, makes up for the one for July. After describing the 

 party at Carnegie's, who did you mean by the ass that, after bray- 

 ing loud enough to deafen Christopher, went braying all over the 



* The Eev. J. White, of Bonchurch, Isle of Wight, author of Sir Frizzle Pumpkin, Nights at 

 Mess, &c, and other stories, died March 28, 1862, aged fifty-eight. "Mr. White, says the Edin- 

 burgh Courant, who was a native of this country, where his family still possess considerable 

 property, was born in the year 1804. After studying with success at Glasgow and Oxford, he took 

 orders in the Church of England, and was presented by Lord Brougham to a living in Suffolk, 

 which he afterwards gave up for another in Warwickshire. On ultimately succeeding to a con- 

 siderable patrimony, he retired from the Church and removed with his family to the Isle of Wight, 

 where Mrs. White had inherited from her father, Colonel Hill, of St. Boniface, a portion of his 

 estate, Bonchurch, so celebrated for its beauty and mild climate. His retirement enabled him to 

 devote a considerable share of his time to literary pursuits, which he prosecuted with much suc- 

 cess. The pages of Blackwood were enlivened by many of his contributions of a light kind, too 

 popular and well known to require to be enumerated ; and his later works, including the Eighteen 

 Christian Centuries and the History of France, showed that his industry and accuracy, as well 

 as his good sense and sound judgment, were not inferior to his other and more popular talents."— 

 Gentleman's Magazine. 



