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 , and practised surveying. He next opened a school at Bloomfield, New Jersey, where he remained till early in 1802, when he received an appointment from the trustees of the Union school, close to Gray's Ferry, near Philadelphia. Here he made the acquaintance of William Bartram, the botanist and naturalist, who owned an extensive garden on the west bank of the Schuylkill, where Wilson was able to gratify to the full his love of nature. His friends, becoming anxious for his health, persuaded him to relinquish poetry for drawing, and he took lessons from the engraver, Alexander Lawson. Failing in his attempts at the human figure and at landscape-drawing, he was induced by Bartram to attempt the illustration of birds. In this he succeeded beyond his anticipation, and presently proposed the scheme of illustrating the ornithology of the United States, for which he at once began to collect materials.

In 1804, with two friends, he took a walking tour to Niagara, which inspired the poem of ‘The Foresters,’ published in the ‘Portfolio.’ In February 1806 he made an unsuccessful application to President Jefferson (with whom he had previously had correspondence on ornithological matters) for the post of naturalist to the expedition then fitting out to explore the valley of the Mississippi.

In April of the same year he was engaged at a liberal salary by the publisher, Samuel F. Bradford, to assist in editing the American edition of Rees's ‘Cyclopædia.’ This gave him the opportunity of proceeding with his cherished scheme—the risk of which was taken by Bradford—and in September 1808 the first volume of ‘The American Ornithology’ appeared, the original edition of two hundred copies being augmented to five hundred before a year had elapsed, while the second volume was issued in 1810. In order to carry on this work he made extensive journeys through the States, on one of which he descended the Ohio alone in an open skiff from Pittsburg to near Louisville. The hardships and exposure he had endured on these travels and his anxiety to complete the eighth volume brought on an attack of dysentery, from which he died at Philadelphia, after ten days' illness, on 23 Aug. 1813. He was buried in the cemetery of the old Swedish church in that city. Wilson was unmarried.

Wilson's portrait was painted by J. Craw; another portrait, which is anonymous, is in the National Portrait Gallery, Edinburgh. Engravings by W. H. Lizars are prefixed to Jameson's and to Jardine's editions of Wilson's ‘American Ornithology.’

In March 1812 Wilson was elected a member of the Society of Artists of the United States, and the following year of the American Philosophical Society of Philadelphia. With respect to his great work it has been pointed out that in his specific definitions he was loose and unsystematic, but that passages in his prefaces and descriptions are fine, and at the same time simple and natural. With perspective he was imperfectly acquainted, but his figures were superior to most of his day. Vol. viii. of the ‘American Ornithology’ was completed, and vol. ix. brought out under the editorship of George Ord in 1814. A second edition of vols. vii–ix., the last with a life of the author, was brought out by Ord in 1824–5, while a second American edition in three vols. appeared in 1828–9. Between 1825 and 1833 Prince Charles Lucien Jules Bonaparte published four volumes containing figures and descriptions completing Wilson's work. An edition of their united works in four volumes, edited by [q. v.], was issued in 1831 (8vo, Edinburgh and London), and another edition, with notes by Sir [q. v.], in three volumes, in 1832 (8vo, London). An octavo edition in one volume, edited by T. M. Brewer, was issued at Boston in 1840 and New York in 1852, other issues appearing in 1856 and 1865. The last edition of his ‘Poems’ seems to have been issued in 1816. ‘Watty and Meg’ went through several editions, but the last by the author appeared in the ‘Portfolio’ in 1810. Of his other poems ‘The Foresters’ (Paisley, 1825, 12mo), and ‘Rab and Ringan’ (Paisley, 1827, 16mo), were issued separately; the rest appeared in various journals (see ), and of these the best known is ‘The Solitary Tutor,’ which was published in ‘Brown's Literary Magazine.’



WILSON, ALEXANDER PHILIP (1770?-1851?), physician. [See .]

WILSON, ANDREW (1718–1792), philosophical and medical writer, born in 1718, was the only son of Gabriel Wilson (d. 11 Feb. 1750), parish minister of Maxton in Roxburghshire, by his wife, Rachel Corsan. After studying medicine at the university of Edinburgh, he graduated M.D. on 29 June