106 PROFESSOR OF NATURAL HISTORY [ch. v. 
the influence of the kind friend and dutiful teacher 
left an impress on MacGillivray’s mind which time 
never effaced, and which more or less influenced 
for good his after life. 
In the autumn of 1850 he spent a holiday of 
about a month with his son Paul and his eldest 
daughter on a pedestrian excursion to the upper 
part of the valley of the Dee and Braemar, his 
main object, as he explains in his last written book, 
The Natural History of Deeside and Braemar , 
having been to examine the “geological structure 
of Braemar, its Alpine vegetation, and to a certain 
extent its zoology.” 
The manuscript of that work, which had been 
completed by the author as if for publication, was 
after his death acquired from his family by the late 
Queen Victoria, and was printed by Her Majesty’s 
command for private circulation. 
Full details of the excursion and of its results 
are given in that book, which, besides its scientific 
value, is in several respects the most interesting 
and fascinating of his works. There is an unpre¬ 
tending simplicity in its style, while not a page is 
without interest, resulting either from the 
attractiveness of the personality of the narrator, 
as it comes out in connection with every detail, 
however trivial in itself, or from the pleasant 
surprise at the unexpected discovery of some 
Alpine plant, or the observed effect of a mass of 
eruptive rock as bearing on the geological character 
of the district, or from a strikingly picturesque 
