Chambers's Journal of Popular Literature, Science, and Art, No. 683. Various
or bad, here Edward was fixed; and how, in the midst of daily toils and cares, he found time to accumulate a vast store of knowledge concerning animals and plants, is truly wonderful. Some may think he made a mistake in marrying when no more than twenty-three years old. But his wife was a sensible, prudent woman, and gave him a happy home. 'Mutual affection,' as our author observes, 'makes up for much.' Perhaps they occasionally felt the bitterness of poverty, for Edward's earnings did not yet amount to more than about nine shillings and sixpence a week!
With nothing but the most elementary education, without books, without advisers, the young shoemaker made up for everything by immense diligence, by sobriety, and a keen disregard of personal inconvenience. In his assigned hours of labour he worked hard. He never spent a moment idly. He never entered a public-house, nor drank anything stronger than water. In his expenditure he was rigorously economical. All his spare time was devoted to his favourite pursuit, that of acquiring a knowledge of animals by painstaking practical inquiry. When he began these inquiries, he did not even know the correct names of the animals he sought for, because he had no books and nobody to tell him. He was a thoroughly original student of nature. He learned everything by personal observation. Nothing but a degree of enthusiasm amounting to fanaticism could have impelled him to endure cold, wet, hunger, want of sleep, in order to add to his stock of facts. His fellow-shoemakers jeered at him for not joining in their vicious and costly indulgences; but he held on his way. There, we think, was manifested his heroic, his noble struggle – not that he ever esteemed it to be a struggle, for he only followed the bent of a simple self-sacrificing character; but his conduct in this respect was not less worthy of admiration.
Whatever were the sacrifices made by Edward, he was compensated, as an intense lover of Nature. Describing his tastes and pursuits, Mr Smiles says: 'Everything that lived and breathed had charms for him. He loved the fields, the woods, the moors. The living presence of the earth was always about him, and he eagerly drank in its spirit. The babbling brooks, the whispering trees, the aspects of the clouds, the driving wind, were all sources of delight… He felt himself free amidst the liberty of Nature… As his wanderings were almost invariably conducted at night, he had abundant opportunities of seeing not only the ocean, but the heavens in their various aspects. What were these stars so far off in the sky? Were they worlds? Were they but the outposts of the earth, from which other worlds were to be seen, far beyond the ken of the most powerful telescope? To use Edward's own words: "I can never succeed in describing my unbounded admiration of the works of the Almighty; not only the wonderful works which we ourselves see upon earth, but those countless orbs which roll both near and far in the endless immensity of space – the Home of Eternity. Everything that moves or lives, everything that grows, everything created or formed by the hand or will of the Omnipotent, has such a fascinating charm for me, and sends such a thrill of pleasure through my whole frame, that to describe my feelings is utterly impossible."'
Early in the spring of 1838, Edward began to form a collection of specimens in natural history, for which he taught himself to stuff and prepare the animals he was able to secure. In his researches he was aided by an old gun, which he had bought for four-and-sixpence. Sallying out at nine o'clock at night, when his day's work was over, with his gun and some insect boxes and bottles, and putting a piece of oat-cake in his pocket for supper, he scoured the country as long as it was daylight for any living thing that came in his way. 'When it became so dark that he could no longer observe, he dropped down by the side of a bank, or a bush, or a tree, whichever came handiest, and there he dozed or slept until the light returned. Then he got up, and again began his observations, which he continued until the time arrived when he had to return to his daily labour.' On Saturday evenings he returned home by twelve o'clock, so as not to encroach on the weekly day of rest. On Monday mornings he contrived to have a few hours' observation before six o'clock. As he was known to live soberly and honestly, there was no suspicion that he was either a poacher or a burglar, yet these nocturnal ramblings were incomprehensible. People at length gave him up as an oddity. Gamekeepers did not think of molesting him in his explorations. Occasionally, he took up his quarters for the night in a ruined castle, in some disused building, a sand-hole or cavern amidst the rocks by the sea-shore, the shelter of a table-shaped gravestone in a churchyard, or anywhere. This was a most dismal mode of spending the night; for independently of exposure to the weather, he was liable to be visited by polecats, weasels, badgers, or other wild animals sniffing about him. There was, however, always a chance of catching moths and other creatures that flutter or roam about in the dark. Sometimes he was bitten on the hands by weasels and rats during his disturbed sleep, and on one occasion he had a tremendous encounter with a polecat. When morning broke, he had excellent opportunities of studying the habits of the skylark, blackbird, thrush, and other early choristers.
By these assiduous labours he had, by 1845, collected two thousand specimens, consisting of quadrupeds, birds, reptiles, fishes, crustacea, starfish, zoophytes, corals, sponges, and other objects. He assorted the whole in cases made from old tea-boxes, fashioned by his own hands, and which he neatly papered and glazed. With some pride, he made a public exhibition of his collection at a local fair; and by it not only paid his expenses, but had something over for future purposes. This measure of success induced him to exhibit his collection at Aberdeen. Although advertised, and spoken favourably of by the newspapers, the exhibition was a failure. There was no rush of visitors, as Edward fondly expected. In fact, the exhibition did not nearly pay expenses. Dreading the horror of being in debt, he offered the collection for sale; and in desperation accepted an offer of twenty pounds ten shillings for the whole of what had cost him eight years' labour exclusive of outlay. The gentleman who bought this very fine collection unfortunately stored the specimens in a damp room, and the whole went to ruin. So ended this unfortunate enterprise. Aberdeen and Banff shires lost an opportunity of not only helping a most deserving man of genius, but of acquiring a splendid collection illustrative of the natural history of the two counties.
Though terribly crushed, on returning to his home in Banff, he went to work at his usual trade of making the lighter kinds of women's shoes, in which he was reputed to excel. Then, he resumed his researches by the sea-shore, and in a short time began a new collection of specimens. Suddenly he met with a grievous accident. He rolled down a rocky precipice a depth of forty feet, falling on his gun, which was smashed to pieces, and receiving such bodily injuries as confined him for weeks to the house. To support his family during his illness, he was under the necessity of selling a portion of his newly formed collection.
About this time, Edward had the good fortune to attract the attention of the Rev. James Smith, of the parish of Montquhitter, a place a few miles from Banff. This gentleman having a strong love of natural history, and possessing a good collection of books, did an important service in offering hints to Edward, and in lending him books to enable him to define and classify various animals which he caught. So instructed he began to write observations on natural objects, which appeared in the Banffshire Journal. Afterwards, at the suggestion of Mr Smith, he sent papers to the Zoologist, the Naturalist, and the Linnean Journal, through which channels his name and qualities as a writer became known to naturalists generally. The result was a considerable private correspondence, and an enlargement of his knowledge regarding the names and species of animals, but with no improvement in circumstances – rather the reverse, for being ever on the brink of starvation, the expense for paper and postage stamps pressed severely on his resources. Yet, he willingly gave such information as he possessed to all who requested his assistance. Considering Edward's meagre education and his inexperience of literary composition, his papers, of which some extracts are given by Mr Smiles, strike us with surprise. Besides being correctly written, they have all the elegance and graphic force of Audubon. How, by those scientific inquirers, who had the best means of judging of his talents, Edward should have been suffered to drag on existence at a mechanical employment which never seems to have yielded him twenty shillings a week, is not very easily understood. No doubt, he was shy in pushing himself forward. He had none of the saliency of character which through devious adventure leads to fortune; but these palliatives scarcely explain the strange neglect which he experienced.
Nobly, but still obscurely struggling on, a great misfortune befell Edward in the death of Mr Smith in 1854. There, a true friend was gone. As some assuagement of his loss, he found a friend and counsellor in the Rev. Mr Boyd, parish minister of Crimond, whose hospitable manse was always