468 MEMOIR OF GEORGE WILSON. CHAP. XI. 



the last course better than the first. His own mind was ever 

 amassing fresh stores of knowledge, and he delighted to make a 

 feast of these for his brethren. Again and again, too, did he 

 come to their aid, on very brief notice, and at considerable 

 personal inconvenience, when a lecturer was unable to fulfil his 

 engagement to them ; and of this they had a most grateful 

 sense. 



After a professional visit to Newcastle in the beginning of 

 March, he tells Dr. Cairns, " Since I came back I have been 

 discoursing to Dr. Candlish's Bible-class, by his request, on a 

 physico- theological subject, and I have promised a word to the 

 Congregational Soiree of Lady Tester's. It is pleasant even to 

 sand the floor, or change the sawdust carpet of the outer vesti- 

 bule of the house of God. Would that I could only give them 

 a word in season ! 



" I am better than I was earlier in the winter, but constantly 

 visited by returns of haemoptysis, and compelled to be very wary 

 and watchful. 



" I ask myself often, whether it is mere languor and stupidity, 

 or anything deserving to be called becoming contentment and 

 composure, that keeps me from complaining and repining. I 

 hope there is a little of sincere gratefulness to the Giver of all 

 good gifts ; but there ought to be, and might be, a great deal 

 more. 



" When are you coming to stir me up ? You owe me a 

 return for staring out of the window of the railway carriage at 

 Berwick, in hope of seeing you." 



Shortly afterwards, though "terribly over- worked, and far 

 from well," he had to visit London professionally, and was un- 

 able on this account to be present at the meeting in Lady 

 Tester's Church to which he alludes. On the journey up, the 

 lamp in the railway carriage went out. While his companions 

 slumbered, or chatted together in the darkness, " I fell to mus- 

 ing," he says, " and then to trying how many verses of the Bible 

 I could recall. I was very sorry to find I knew so few, but glad 

 also to find I knew so many." During the week spent in 

 London, he accomplished what one of his coadjutors asserted 

 would have taken three weeks in any hands but his. " I have 



