It must be confessed that Wilkie seems to have been ready for any other occupation rather than the laborious studies necessary to have qualified him for the church or bar—the two professions which, his biographer tells us, were at that period most frequently resorted to by those in his circumstances. To the army, likewise, they often betook themselves; and sometimes gained distinction by their courage and perseverance. But though Wilkie, when at Kettle, had seen soldiers, and indeed made an expedition to Kirkaldy, to delight his eyes with a review, the sight of which, it appears, greatly interested him, he was not thereby inspired with that love of arms which makes a youth thirst for military glory. Its chief captivation and advantage to him seems to have been in furnishing a subject for the exercise of his pencil. He sketched the whole scene in a book, which contains about twenty other drawings, long regarded by him with natural complacency; though, it is said, exhibiting little of that wonderful genius which afterwards brought its possessor such well-merited fame. Yet his talents had already been displayed in a manner that filled strangers with surprise, as the following incident, narrated by one who felt it, proves:—

"I once dined," says the narrator, "at the manse at Auchtermuchty, where his uncle, Mr. Lister, was minister, and was much struck with the likenesses of his fine young family, which were arranged on the wall. The minister asked me if I thought them good portraits, and I stated I thought them the best of the kind I had ever seen. Upon this he told me they were done by a youthful nephew of his; and I remarked that he would be heard of with honour at no distant period." Still the artist was a school-boy, whose parents had not the slightest wish to see him embark his young fortunes in a profession where excellence is generally immortality, but mediocrity hardly less than humiliation. It was, therefore, with little prospect of being able to make good the fair promise of his hopeful youth, that he left the grammar-school of Kettle, to be entered at the academy of Cupar, in which seminary he remained about a year, and added considerably to his knowledge.

It is related that the President of the Roman Academy, when conducting Allan Ramsay, the painter, over the School of Art, in order that the latter might examine the drawings of the students therein displayed, hinted, with more pride than prudence, that England could produce nothing to compare with them. Ramsay's spirit rose indignantly at the hazardous insinuation; and he replied, with becoming warmth,— "Well, sir, stop till I send for my pupil, Davie Martin, and I will show you how we draw in England." On the arrival of the latter at Rome, Ramsay arranged the drawings in proper order, and invited the President and scholars to inspect and judge of them. "The Italians," he says, with patriotic pride, "were confounded and overcome, and British skill triumphant."

This "Davie Martin" being the brother of, and living with, a neighbouring clergyman, exercised no inconsiderable influence on Wilkie's ultimate choice of a profession. Indeed he may be said to have changed his ardent wish to be a great painter into a fixed and firm resolution. At all events it is certain, that the latter became dull and restless unless he had a pencil in his hand and an opportunity of using it. Nor was he fastidious about a subject. Any ruined cottage, or ragged mendicant, or aged inhabitant of the place, was sufficient; and, unconsciously to himself perhaps, supplied something towards those charming pictures that were, before many years, to exhibit the manners, customs, and characteristics of his country in such true and life like colours. When he looked at the paintings in the great houses of the district, the residences of provincial magnates, he marvelled how such effects could be produced, but soon perceived that it was entirely by study and perseverance. Forty years later he wrote, no doubt with perfect justice, that "his native district could scarcely supply a work of art by which the eye or the taste could either be excited or depressed;" and that "the single element in all his progressive movements was persevering industry." Therein, doubtless, he was right. This "persevering industry" is the true element of nearly all success in life.

The time had now arrived when Wilkie's aspiring spirit could no longer brook the thought of being confined within the parish of Cults. He panted for new scenes and a larger world, in which to pursue his studies. So, with a book full of sketches from nature, and a heart irrevocably pledged to art, he resolved to trust himself in the northern metropolis, where he was assured, by his friend and adviser Martin, that he would not seek instruction in vain. In was in no adventurous spirit, but with that, firm resolve," of which he often talked, and by which he hoped to work out the objects he believed himself capable of accomplishing, that this greater, or at least, more various and graceful Hogarth, left the scenes he had trod from childhood to betake himself to the ro-mantic city of Edinburgh.

His father, as was natural, looked coldly and doubtfully on his son's choice of a profession, deeming it the height of imprudence to go so far out of his way to seek that respectable position which seemed to be before him, if he would only follow the sage advice of his grandfather, whose earnest wish was to see one of his daughter's sons distinguish himself in a pulpit; but his mother, who better understood the young aspirant, sympathised with his views, and en-couraged him to persevere in his chosen course.

On arriving in Edinburgh, in November 1799, Wilkie, after some difficulty, and with the friendly aid of Lord Leven, was admitted to the Trustees' Academy, where he set himself gravely and earnestly to his task, and by diligence and regularity made such progress, that it has been described as almost marvellous. It is related that he was always the first on the stairs leading to the Academy, and the last to depart, anxious not to lose a moment of the hours allowed for drawing and study. Slow of speech, with a country air, and bashful of manners, he cared little for such trifles as pleased and excited the other students, but resolutely applied himself to his work, and for his pains was pelted by them with small pills of soft bread. At first he showed very little knowledge of the rules of art, but surpassed all Ms companions in the apprehension of the character of the subject upon which he was engaged. After leaving the Academy, he either repaired to his lodgings to continue his studies, or to the fairs and markets frequented by the country people, to make sketches of such characters as might hereafter be worked into brilliant pictures. He was peculiarly sensible of the charms of music, and used to soothe his cares with a tune on the fiddle, whose sounds ever afforded him pleasure, and were often used to put the husbandman, the shepherd, or the old beggarman, into the particular humour in which, he wished them to appear to suit the purposes of his art. During his residence in Edinburgh he allowed no pursuits whatever to distract his attention from that of painting. He slowly, silently, and studiously, stored his mind and memory with images of men and things; and is thought to have had distant, but en chanting and encouraging, visions of that beautiful and interesting series of pictures, which he afterwards produced and displayed to the gaze of an admiring public. At a competition in the Academy, he was unexpectedly unsuccessful with a painting from a subject in "Macbeth;" but endured the disappointment with the characteristic tranquillity which often in later days sustained him in more severe trials.