seal a letter for himself. Wisely, too, he persisted in taking daily walks about the country; his restless, energetic mind, soon growing weary of an inactive body. He even ventured alone into the fields, and by means of strings extended from point to point, and held in his hand, he managed to steer from place to place, a knot here and there reminding him of any sudden turning, or angle in the path. He was fond of ladies' society, and of pleasant voices; being himself always young and fresh in manner, and ready to converse with any one who fell in his way. "One thing," he used to say in his old age, "I am never able to forget, and that is how to love." He disliked, as most blind people do, to be pitied, or to talk much of his privation; but he never complained, and let the conversation be as varied, sober, or humorous as it might be, he could always hold his own. He was not learned in the ordinary sense of the term, says De Candolle, "but like a skilful diver he had the happy knack of going to the bottom of his subject," whence he came back not without pearls. After the death of his wife, whose loss he felt most deeply, his years fell into a quieter channel, at Lausanne, under the care of an affectionate daughter. But, to the end, his life was

marked by the same cheerful light, content, and industry that adorned its fuller prime. The genial winter of old age found him as brave and serene as in the days when he first courted and won the heart of pretty Marie Lullin. His old habits, his old pursuits and pleasures still charmed him, and not long before his death his old passion for bees again peeped out, when Professor Prevost procured and sent to him a hive of the stingless bees, discovered by Captain Basil Hall at Tampico. It was a kindly, thoughtful act to the old blind naturalist, and as such he received it. His last days and last words were alike peaceful, and he died in December, 1830, at the ripe age of eighty-one, in full possession of all his faculties to the last.

3

CHAPTER X.

JOHN METCALF, THE ROAD-MAKER.

(Commonly called Blind Jack of Knaresborough.)

OHN METCALF of Knaresborough really won

JOHN

year,

and deserved the name of Road-maker; a title to which, one would imagine, a blind man would never aspire. Yet he was totally blind from his fourth from small-pox, and being the son of poor labouring people, had the scantiest advantages in the shape of education. But his parents must have given him what few blind children inherit, activity of body and mind, acuteness, mother-wit, and indomitable perseverance; all of which he possessed to an unusual degree. His life, of wonderful spirit and adventure, has been told by himself, with no great elegance, yet with truth and vigour; many of the facts being corroborated not only by people of his own locality, but by the actual roads which remain as proofs of his genius. Many of the roads over the Peak in Derbyshire were altered under his directions,

* For permission to use this graphic Woodcut we are indebted to the ready courtesy of S. Smiles, Esq.

especially those near Buxton; but his greatest triumph perhaps was in completing the nine miles of the Manchester Road from Blackmoor to Standish Foot, for a considerable way across some deep marshes; and of this work it will be well to add a few particulars when we have glanced at his life.

From his very childhood he must have been a boy of untiring pluck and spirit; nothing daunted him, nothing was suffered to be an obstacle when he had once made up his mind to succeed. Not content with climbing trees, as other boys did, for birds'-nests, he often ventured on a bough which they feared to trust; he robbed orchards, he rode races with his companions at full gallop; and in a year or two could find his way through every part of Knaresborough without a guide. His father kept a horse or two, and Jack, thus able to get a mount, often managed in some way to join the neighbouring hunt of Squire Woodburn, and, as he said, "to see his hare killed." He not only learned to swim in the river Nidd, but would seize on his companions, plunge them below the surface, and in short swim over them; or if one sank to the bottom, Metcalf would dive for him and bring him safe to land. As he grew up, we find him with equal spirit and