as still quite a child, he loved to wander by
himself out into the country, along the green banks of the Dee, or
among the tidal islands at the mouth of the river, overgrown by waving
seaweeds, and fringed with great white bunches of blossoming
scurvy-grass. He loved to hunt for crabs and sea-anemones beside the
ebbing channels, or to watch the jelly-fish left high and dry upon the
shore by the retreating water. Already, in his simple way, the little
ragged bare-footed Scotch laddie was at heart a born naturalist.

Very soon, Tam was not content with looking at the "venomous beasts,"
as the neighbours called them, but he must needs begin to bring them
home, and set up a small aquarium and zoological garden on his own
account. All was fish that came to Tam's net: tadpoles, newts, and
stickleback from the ponds, beetles from the dung-heaps, green crabs
from the sea-shore--nay, even in time such larger prizes as hedgehogs,
moles, and nestfuls of birds. Nothing delighted him so much as to be
out in the fields, hunting for and taming these his natural pets.

Unfortunately, Tam's father and mother did not share the boy's passion
for nature, and instead of encouraging him in pursuing his inborn
taste, they scolded him and punished him bitterly for bringing home the
nasty creatures. But nothing could win away Tam from the love of the
beasties; and in the end, he had his own way, and lived all his life,
as he himself afterwards beautifully put it, "a fool to nature." Too
often, unhappily, fathers and mothers thus try to check the best
impulses in their children, under mistaken notions of right, and
especially is this the case in many instances as regards the love of
nature. Children are constantly chidden for taking an interest in the
beautiful works of creation, and so have their first intelligent
inquiries and aspirations chilled at once; when a little care and
sympathy would get rid of the unpleasantness of having white mice or
lizards crawling about the house, without putting a stop to the young
beginner's longing for more knowledge of the wonderful and beautiful
world in whose midst he lives.

When Tam was nearly five years old, he was sent to school, chiefly no
doubt to get him out of the way; but Scotch schools for the children of
the working classes were in those days very rough hard places, where
the taws or leather strap was still regarded as the chief instrument of
education. Little Edward was not a child to