d when he was still
a boy under five years of age. Recovering from his fever he resumed his
old tricks, and brought home one day, wrapped in his shirt, a wasp's
nest, which his father took from him and plunged into hot water. Between
four and five he was sent to school, his parents thinking to keep him
out of mischief of this kind. But he had not the least interest in
school knowledge, and constantly played truant; and when he did come to
school he brought with him all kinds of horrid insects, reptiles, and
birds. One morning during prayers a jackdaw began to caw, and as the
bird was traced to the ownership of Thomas Edward, he was dismissed from
the school in great disgrace. His perplexed parents sent him to another
school, the teacher of which used more vigorous measures to cure him of
his propensity, applying to his back an instrument of torture called
"the taws." It was in vain. From this second school he was expelled,
because some horse-leeches, which he had brought to school in a bottle,
escaped, crept up the legs of the other boys, and drew blood from them.

"I would not take him back for twenty pounds!" said the schoolmaster in
horror.

A third time his father put him at school; and now he experienced the
ill consequences of having a bad name. A centipede was found upon
another boy's desk, and he was of course suspected of having brought it
into the school-room. But it so happened that on this one occasion he
was innocent; it was another boy's centipede; and Thomas denied the
charge. The schoolmaster whipped him severely for the supposed
falsehood, and sent him away saying:--

"Go home, and tell your father to get you on board a man-of-war, as that
is the best school for irreclaimables such as you."

He went home and declared he would go to no more schools, but would
rather work. He had now reached the mature age of six years, and had
been turned out of school three times, without having learned to write
his own name. Soon after, he went to work in a tobacco factory on the
river Don, a short distance out of Aberdeen, and there for two happy
years he was free to employ all his leisure time in investigating
animated nature around him. His love of natural history grew with his
growth and strengthened with his strength, so that by the time he had
completed his eighth year he was familiarly acquainted with the animals
of that region, and had the most lively admiration for the more
interesting specimens. He watche