458 MEMOIR OF JOHN WILSON. 



widowed life had been one of long and faithful mourning ; and the 

 bereavement which his friend, Lord Rutherfurd, was called upon to 

 endure, filled his mind with the most poignant pain, and it was with 

 difficulty he could banish the subject from his thoughts. Other 

 men's sorrows, in the unselfishness of his nature, he made his own. 

 More unbounded sympathy I never knew. Therein lay the feminine 

 delicacy of his nature, the power of winning all, soothing the sad, 

 encouraging the weak, scorning not the humble. With heart and 

 hand alike open, he knew and acted up to the meaning of one sim- 

 ple rule — Do unto others as ye would that they should do unto you. 

 So, through another spring into summer, and once again to the 

 mellowed autumn and winter snows, he lingered on contented, al- 

 most cheerful, but also sometimes very sad. At such times he never 

 spoke. . Can we doubt that these visitations of solemnity had a 

 meaning ? The veil which it had pleased God to draw over the 

 greater power of his mind had not left it without a lesser light. He 

 still knew and loved his friends, and found pleasure in their occa- 

 sional visits. The presence of his children and his grandchildren 

 continued to cheer and interest him almost to the end. That silence, 

 so incomprehensible to common minds, looking too often for conso- 

 lation in the recited words of Scripture, which they convey to curi- 

 ous ears as expressing the last interest and hope of dying hours, 

 was no other than the composing of his spirit with the unseen 

 God. 



There is little more to tell. The last time my father was seen of 

 familiar faces was on the 13th of October, 1853. I drove with him 

 to Mr. Alexander Hill's shop in Princes Street, in order to see a 

 painting of Herrings' then being exhibited there. He did not take 

 so lively an interest in the picture as I had anticipated, but soon 

 grew wearied, and evidently unable to rouse himself from a certain 

 air of iudifierence which, when disappointed, he generally wore. 

 Yet he was not always untouched by the efforts Avhich love made 

 to cheer and please him ; and his moistened eye told more than a 

 thousand words how he felt and followed the little entertainments 

 got up for this end. Young children were at all times attractive to 

 him, and though now unable to do more than stroke their heads or 

 touch their little hands, still he loved to look upon them; smiling a 

 gentle adieu when their prattle became too much for him. One day 

 I thought to amuse him in one of his gloomy moments by intro- 



