into his hands, and could detect at a glance its defects, if such
existed. In the early part of 1858, a gentleman who had made errors
in his surveys asked him to look over some of his instruments.
William, on taking one into his hand, said at once, with a smile:
"If you work with this, you will find many errors." "That is why I
asked you," replied the owner. "I have been surveying with it, and
have committed nothing but mistakes." So much were people in the
habit of praising him, that it carried my thoughts back to my Latin
Grammar, and the quotation from Terence:--

Omnes omnia
Bona dicere et laudare fortunas meas,
Qui gnatum haberem tali ingenio praeditum.

For himself, he was perpetually lamenting to me that at school
he had not received more mathematical instruction; that the time
spent in classics exclusively, was, for many, time thrown away. But
I must do his late master the justice of saying, that when he first
received him under his tuition, he showed little fondness for
mathematics in general, although he had a taste for algebra. The
two following letters, to his brother and mother, bearing the same
date, in the spring of 1858, were despatched from the out-station
where he was engaged in a survey.

St. Arnaud, April 10th, 1858.

DEAR CHARLEY,

I do not think you have written a letter to me since we have been
out here. It gave me much pleasure to see yours to the Doctor. I