24 MEMOIR OF GEORGE WILSON. CHAP. I. 



swimming ; a solan goose near Rothesay ; a hare and short- 

 tailed field-mouse. In the steamboat returning from Inverary, 

 I met an English gentleman, Mr. Smith, and two acquaintances. 

 One of them was very poorly, and had travelled for the last year 

 and a half for the sake of her health ; she was very kind to me, 

 and told me the name of the plants I had at that time in my* 

 box ; she also invited me to come to the place where she was 

 staying in Glasgow, and showed me some plants. Perhaps you 

 are not aware that yon red and white flower Daniel brought 

 from the Calton Hill is Foxglove. 



'P.S. Excuse all faults and the bad writing, as my mind is 

 too full of C .From your affectionate son, G. WILSON/ 



" A remark in a letter addressed to me by my father, in the 

 following year, reminds me that it was on this occasion a friend- 

 ship was begun, memorable in after years to both of us. In 

 passing through Glasgow on our return home, we visited Mr. 

 Hugh Mackay, a generous friend of our deceased aunt, who had 

 taken a lively interest in our orphan cousins, and so become 

 known to us all. His two daughters were nearly of the same 

 age as ourselves; and George whose conversational powers, 

 and singularly frank and engaging manners, were scarcely less 

 remarkable as a boy than they proved to be in riper years 

 soon ingratiated himself thoroughly with the younger of the two 

 daughters. Both fathers looked on, enjoying the sallies of 

 humour, and the graver avowals of youthful confidence and 

 kindly feeling; and the pleasant impressions then produced 

 experienced no diminution on a subsequent visit, which Miss 

 Margaret Mackay paid to our sister Mary. An allusion in a 

 letter to me recalls that, even at this date, George had, with rare - 

 ambition for a boy, set before his mind's eye the goal of an 

 Edinburgh Professor's chair, and announced purposes to be ful- 

 filled on the accomplishment of this desire. In later years, 

 Miss Margaret Mackay became my affianced wife, and letters 

 from George to her, resulting from the friendly relation of the 

 families, illustrate, in reference to those early times, the singu- 

 larly attractive manner which always marked his intercourse 

 with ladies, and the pleasure he manifested, alike in boyhood 



