LIFE OF WILSON. clxxiii 
make, as it seems to belong, incidentally, to the subject upon 
which I have been commenting. 
The last edition of Watty and Meg, published under the in- 
spection of the author, and by him corrected, was that given in 
the Port Folio for October, 1810 . 
The poetic effusions of Wilson, after he came to America, 
afford evidence of an improved taste. He acquired a facility of 
versification by practice; as his mind expanded with knowledge, 
his judgment received an accession of strength; and he displays 
a fancy which we look for in vain in his juvenile essays. But 
we must be understood as comparing him only with himself, 
at different periods of his life. Whether or not he ever attain- 
ed to positive excellence in poetry, may be a subject of dispute. 
In his Solitary Tutor,” we are presented with a picture of 
himself, while occupied in teaching a country school. The de- 
scription of his place of residence, his schoolhouse, the adjoin- 
ing forest, where many of his leisure hours were passed, and 
where he first commenced studying the manners of those birds, 
which he subsequently immortalized in his splendid work, is 
animated and graphical. The fabric of these verses reminds 
us of the Minstrel; and that he had this delightful poem in his 
eye, we are convinced by some of the descriptions and senti- 
ments. The stanza beginning, 
“ In these green solitudes, one favourite spot,” 
is accurately descriptive of a place, in Bartram’s woods, whith- 
er he used to retire for the purposes of reading and contempla- 
tion, and where he planned his Ornithology. Of the faults of 
this little poem I will merely remark, that the initial quatrain 
is prosaic; and that the last line betrays an unaccountable defi- 
ciency of taste. 
The lovers of rural scenery will learn with regret, that this 
fine piece of forest, consecrated to the Muses of poetry and na- 
tural history, by Wilson, is fast disappearing beneath the ax of 
the husbandman. Already is the brook, which was “ o’erhung 
with alders and mantling vines,” exposed to the glare of day; 
