128 The Naturalist of Cumbrae. 



concluded with the record that his eldest son, David, 

 was born in the year 1847, and in 1850 his second 

 son, Thomas, now better known in the artist world as 

 Tom Robertson. In the interval between these two 

 events two little notes were entered in the father's 

 commonplace book which seem to have an indirect 

 bearing on the life history of David Robertson, junior. 

 In the one, his parent remarks that the young of the 

 lower animals utter cries while in pain, desisting when 

 the pain is removed, but that human infants continue 

 their lamentations long after the grievance has ceased. 

 In the other, the question is asked, " Is the boy idle 

 during the first three years of his life ? " To which 

 is returned the answer, " No ! he learns to walk, he 

 learns to speak, he learns the names of numbers of 

 things, and he compares and examines them." This 

 infantine precocity, in the special example on which 

 the remark was no doubt founded, has since developed 

 into a nice turn for mechanical invention. 



