66 MEMOIR OF GEORGE WILSON. CHAP. II. 



The " prelections were delivered in a pleasant lecture-room 

 in the Gardens, where the foliage of the luxuriant trees, which 

 peeped in at its windows, served as window-blinds, and singing- 

 birds took the place of the College bell." 1 The lectures are 

 given at 8 A.M., and most students, accustomed to late hours of 

 retiring, find an effort required to accomplish the necessary feat 

 of early rising ; but how pleasant are the remembrances of the 

 return of George and a friend, as daily guest Mr. Williamson, 

 a fellow-apprentice and clerk in the Infirmary to a late break- 

 fast, very hungry, and full of fun, with flowers in their hands 

 which had been used as specimens in the course of the lecture. 

 They never could agree as to which of two routes was the 

 shorter way home, and each holding to his own opinion, they 

 parted at one point, and met in time to arrive together. The 

 sight of a magnolia never fails to recall those merry breakfasts, 

 from an image stamped on the memory of a morning when that 

 flower had been used for illustration at lecture. " To an extent 

 unknown elsewhere in Great Britain, least of all, perhaps, in 

 London, the energetic and genial Professor led his students, 

 each summer's Saturday, on a botanizing march in some direc- 

 tion across the country within a few miles of Edinburgh. In 

 the autumn he headed a smaller party on a continuous excur- 

 sion of a week or more, to more distant districts, such as Clova 

 in Forfar, Sutherland, the Welsh Hills, or the Lakes of Kil- 

 larney. The field-botanists who made those campaigns acquired 

 a knowledge of plants, such as the closet study and the finger- 

 ing of herbarium-mummies cannot give. They gained health 

 to the bargain, and enjoyed not a little fun ; whilst now and 

 then, like other campaigners foraging in lands not their own, a 

 ca-sm belli would occur, and the invaders be accused of for- 

 getting that the fields in which they were reaping what they 

 had not sowed, were the property of neutrals, who could forbid 

 their presence if they pleased. The more thoughtless students 

 alone gave occasion to complaints, which were rare. Genial 

 and hearty though the Professor of the day Dr. Graham- was, 

 he could become the stern provost-marshal if occasion de 

 manded. But the hearty welcome shown year after year to the 



1 ' Life of Edward Forbes/ chap. iv. 



