Page:Poems of Nature and Life.djvu/60

 52 INTRODUCTION

acter, also standing high as a scholar. He died soon after leaving College, March, 1836.

" It has happened to be my lot to have what you may call an intermittent familiarity with Randall all the way from college life to the time of his death. I think this intimacy began in the latter part of college life ; for I remember his inviting me one or more times to his father's in Winter street to tea. We used at that time to take walks to- gether, but my recollection of those times is not so dis- tinct as I wish it was,

" (Dr. Blanchard then spent a year in Maryland, where he heard nothing of Randall. Then he went to Hallowell, Maine, where he spent a year.) There, too, I met Ran- dall, who was nominally studying medicine with Dr. Nourse, a distinguished physician who in former days had been a medical student under Randall's father. In Hal- lowell, we were together almost all the time, except when otherwise employed. Randall had few associates then, and was seemingly lonesome. At that time he was greatly interested in entomology, and I used much of the time to accompany him in search of beetles, leaving no loose bark or decaying trees unturned, and no crumbling rails or fences uninspected, in searching for new species of the object he was in quest of. Great was his enthu- siasm in finding a new or rare shining specimen. He had a very large collection, and I helped, adding many to it. I really got quite interested in beetle-hunting. I should mention that the 'profane vulgar' used to point Randall out as the ' bug-man.'

" Another pursuit in which we indulged largely at the proper season, and which I enjoyed much, was the collec- tion and study of plants.

" Randall appeared to be in good spirits and quite

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