WILSON, Alexander, ornithologist, born in Paisley, Renfrewshire, Scotland, 6 July, 1766; died in Philadelphia, Pennsylvania, 23 August, 1813. His father, a master weaver, had intended that Alexander should be a minister, but family cares and altered circumstances interfered. He attended the gram-mar-school, and his father imbued his mind with a passion for reading and a love for the beauties of nature, which clung to him for life. In 1779, when thirteen years of age, he was bound apprentice as a weaver to his brother-in-law, and after serving his time he continued working at the loom as a journeyman for four years more. During leisure hours he continued his studious habits, and indulged in solitary rambles, giving utterance to his thoughts in verse. Many of his early effusions appeared in the Glasgow "Advertiser" (now the "Herald"). His brother-in-law, Duncan, finding the weaving-trade inadequate for the support of his family, now resolved to try that of a peddler. He continued this wandering life for about three years, at the end of which he had accumulated as much material in verse as would make a volume. He accordingly returned to Paisley and published it (1790). Taking copies of his book with him, he again set out with his pack, but met with so little success that he resumed weaving. A second edition of his poems appeared in 1791, but its sale was still very limited. In 1792 Wilson's admirable narrative poem, "Watty and Meg," was published anonymously as a penny chapbook, and had an enormous circulation. Its authorship was generally ascribed to Burns. Wilson, however, is greater as an ornithologist than as a poet, but his poems entitle him to a respectable place among the minor bards of Scotland. His verse is mostly descriptive--terse and true, without being of a high or imaginative order. In Paisley, a dispute having arisen between the manufacturers and weavers, Wilson joined in the fray by writing some stinging personal lampoons, for which he was prosecuted and imprisoned. This induced him to leave the country. He walked to Port Patrick, crossed to Belfast, and there embarked in a vessel bound for New Castle, Delaware, sleeping on the deck of the crowded vessel during the voyage. He landed, with his fowling-piece in his hand and only a few shillings in his pocket, on 14 July, 1794, and set out at once to walk to Philadelphia. There he found employment from a copper-plate printer for a few weeks, then took to weaving for about a year, and, having saved a little money, resumed his pack, and so traversed the greater part of New Jersey, successfully disposing of his wares. Then he became a school-master, teaching successively at Frankfort, Pennsylvania, Millstone, Pennsylvania, Bloomfield, New Jersey, and lastly, in 1802, at Kingsessing, near Philadelphia. Here he was welcomed by William Bartram, the botanist, and by Alexander Lawson, the engraver. The former gave him access to his garden and library, and the latter gave him practical instructions in drawing, coloring, and etching. After trying to draw various objects with indifferent success, he began to delineate birds, and in this walk he rapidly attained such a degree of proficiency that he far outstripped his teacher. This marked success seems to have fortified, if it did not suggest, his resolution to make a collection of birds. In October, 1804, accompanied by his nephew and another friend, he set out on a walking expedition to Niagara, which he satisfactorily accomplished. His companions left him, but he persevered, and reached home after an absence of fifty-nine days and a walk of 1,260 miles. He graphically described this journey in a long poem called "The Foresters." On his return he set about making preparations for his great work, and with his own hands etched two plates from his drawings, coloring them from nature. At this time he was employed in editing a new edition of Rees's " Cyclopaedia," by Thomas Bradford, who cordially entered into his scheme and undertook to issue his "American Ornithology," the first volume of which made its appearance in 1808. On its publication Wilson set out with a copy to obtain subscribers, but the cost--$120 for the completed work--was a serious barrier. In 1810 the second volume was published, and Wilson again set out on a journey, this time lasting for six months, both to obtain subscribers and to collect material for succeeding volumes. On his way to New Orleans he had sailed 720 miles down the Ohio alone in a little open skiff, walked long distances, and ridden through wildernesses well-nigh impassable, slept for weeks in the woods, subsisting the while on biscuits and dried beef, and drinking water. His reputation was now spreading over the world. In 1812 he was elected a member of the American philosophical society, and similar honors were conferred on him by other learned bodies. In 1813 the seventh volume of the "Ornithology" was published, and the eighth was also nearly ready, but kept back by the want of proper assistants to color the plates. In this emergency Wilson himself undertook the work of this department, in addition to all his numerous other duties. Intense application and excessive labor weakened his constitution. In 1813 he swam a river with his clothes on, in pursuit of a rare bird, which he succeeded in capturing; but he took cold. Dysentery seized him, and he died after an illness of ten days. He was buried in the cemetery of the Swedish church, Philadelphia, with public honors, and a simple marble monument was placed over his grave. In personal appearance Wilson was tall and handsome, his dark-brown hair hung over his shoulders, his countenance was thoughtful and expressive, his eye full of intelligence and fire, and his conversation remarkable for vividness and originality. The plates for the ninth volume of the "Ornithology" had all been completed under Wilson's own eye, and the letter-press was supplied by Mr. George Ord, who had been Wilson's companion in several expeditions. Ord also furnished a memoir of the deceased naturalist. Three supplementary volumes of the " Ornithology," containing American birds not described by Wilson, were added by Charles Lucien Bonaparte. An edition in three volumes, with illustrative notes, and a life of Wilson by Sir William Jardine, was afterward published (3 vols., London, 1832). Numerous lives of Wilson have appeared, including one by William B. O. Peabody, in Sparks's "American Biography"; an anonymous one prefixed to the Belfast edition of Wilson's poems (1857); those by C. Lucy Brightwell (London, 1860), and Allan Park Paton (1863)" and the memoir prefixed to the latest collected edition of "Wilson's Miscellaneons Prose Works and Poems," by the Reverend Alexander B. Grosart, LL.D. (2 vols., London, 1876).