on the very brink of ruin. On the night
of the 24th December 1856, he retired to rest sooner than was his usual,
as the physician had prescribed. With redoubled vehemence he had
experienced the distractions of disordered reason; he rose in a frenzy
from his bed, and, having written a short affectionate letter to his
wife, pointed his revolver pistol to his breast. He fired in the region
of the heart, and his death must have been instantaneous. The melancholy
event took place in his residence of Shrub Mount, Portobello, and his
remains now rest in the Grange Cemetery, Edinburgh. As a geologist it is
not our province to pronounce his eulogy; he was one of the most elegant
and powerful prose-writers of the century, and he has some claims, as
the following specimens attest, to a place among the national poets.

SISTER JEANIE, HASTE, WE 'LL GO.[11]

Sister Jeanie, haste, we 'll go
To where the white-starr'd gowans grow,
Wi' the puddock-flower, o' gowden hue,
The snawdrap white, and the bonnie vi'let blue.

Sister Jeanie, haste, we 'll go
To where the blossom'd lilacs grow,
To where the pine-tree, dark an' high,
Is pointing its tap at the cloudless sky.

Jeanie, mony a merry lay
Is sung in the young-leaved woods to-day;
Flits on light wing the dragon-flee,
And hums on the flowerie the big red bee.

Down the burnie wirks its way
Aneath the bending birken spray,
An' wimples roun' the green moss-stane,
An' mourns, I kenna why, wi' a ceaseless mane.

Jeanie, come! thy days o' play
Wi' autumn tide shall pass away;
Sune shall these scenes, in darkness cast,
Be ravaged wild by the wild winter blast.

Though to thee a spring shall rise,
An' scenes as fair salute thine eyes;
An' though, through many a cloudless day,
My winsome Jean shall be heartsome and gay;

He wha grasps thy little hand
Nae langer at thy side shall stand,
Nor o'er the flower-besprinkled brae
Lead thee the lounnest an' the bonniest way.

Dost thou see yon yard sae green,
Speckled wi' mony a mossy stane?
A few short weeks o' pain shall fly,
An' asleep in that bed shall thy puir brother lie.

Then thy mither's tears awhile
May chide thy joy an' damp thy smile;
But soon ilk grief shall wear awa',
And I 'll be forgotten by ane an' by a'.