Robert was not without the pleasure of social intercourse either during his stay at Edinburg. Among the letters of introduction which he took with him was one to Robert Bald, the mining engineer, which proved of much service to him. "I remember Mr. Bald very well," he said on one occasion, when recounting his reminiscences of his Edinburg college life. "He introduced me to Dr. Hope, Dr. Murray, and several of the distinguished men of the North. Bald was the Buddle of Scotland. He knew my father from having visited the pits at Killingworth, with the object of describing the system of working them in his article intended for the 'Edinburg Encyclopædia.' A strange adventure befell that article before it appeared in print. Bald was living at Alloa when he wrote it, and when finished he sent it to Edinburg by the hands of young Maxton, his nephew, whom he enjoined to take special care of it, and deliver it safely into the hands of the editor. The young man took passage for New Haven by one of the little steamers which then plied on the Forth; but on the voyage down the Firth she struck upon a rock nearly opposite Queen's Ferry, and soon sank. When the accident happened, Maxton's whole concern was about his uncle's article. He durst not return to Alloa if he lost it, and he must not go on to Edinburg without it. So he desperately clung to the chimney chains with the paper parcel under his arm, while most of the other passengers were washed away and drowned. And there he continued to cling until rescued by some boatmen, parcel and all, after which he made his way to Edinburg, and the article duly appeared."
Returning to the subject of his life in Edinburg, Robert continued: "Besides taking me with him to the meetings of the Royal and other societies, Mr. Bald introduced me to a very agreeable family, relatives of his own, at whose house I spent many pleasant evenings. It was there I met Jeannie M——. She was a bonnie lass, and I, being young and susceptible, fairly fell in love with her. But, like most very early attachments, mine proved evanescent. Years passed, and I had all but forgotten Jeannie, when one day I received a letter from her, from which it appeared that she was in great distress through the ruin of her relatives. I sent her a sum of money, and continued to do so for several years; but the last remittance not being acknowledged, I directed my friend Sanderson to make inquiries. I afterward found that the money had reached her at Portobello just as she was dying, and so, poor thing, she had been unable to acknowledge it."
One of the practical sciences in the study of which Robert Stephenson took special interest while at Edinburg was that of geology. The situation of the city, in the midst of a district of highly interesting geological formation, easily accessible to pedestrians, is indeed most favorable to the pursuit of such a study; and it was the practice of Professor Jameson frequently to head a band of his pupils, armed with hammers, chisels, and clinometers, and take them with him on a long ramble into the country, for the purpose of teaching them habits of observation, and reading to them from the open book of Nature itself. The professor was habitually grave and taciturn, but on such occasions he would relax and even become genial. For his own special science he had an almost engrossing enthusiasm, which on such occasions he did not fail to inspire into his pupils, who thus not only got their knowledge in the pleasantest possible way, but also fresh air and exercise in the midst of glorious scenery and in joyous company.
At the close of this session, the professor took with him a select body of his pupils on an excursion along the Great Glen of the Highlands, in the line of the Caledonian Canal, and Robert formed one of the party. They passed under the shadow of Ben Nevis, examined the famous old sea-margins known as the "parallel roads of Glen Roy," and extended their journey as far as Inverness, the professor teaching the young men, as they traveled, how to observe in a mountain country. Not long before his death, Robert Stephenson spoke in glowing terms of the great pleasure and benefit which he had derived from that interesting excursion. "I have traveled far, and enjoyed much," he said, "but that delightful botanical and geological tour I shall never forget; and I am just about to start in the Titania for a trip round the east coast of Scotland, returning south through the Caledonian Canal, to refresh myself with the recollection of that first and brightest tour of my life."
Toward the end of the summer the young student returned to Killingworth to re-enter upon the active business of life. The six months' study had cost his father £80—a considerable sum to him in those days; but he was amply repaid by the additional scientific culture which his son had acquired, and the evidence of ability and industry which he was enabled to exhibit in a prize for mathematics which he had won at the University.
WEST MOOR PIT, KILLINGWORTH.
We may here add that by this time George Stephenson, after remaining a widower fourteen years, had married, in 1820, his second wife, Elizabeth Hindmarsh, the daughter of a respectable farmer at Black Callerton. She was a woman of excellent character, sensible, and intelligent, and of a kindly and affectionate nature. George's son Robert, whom she loved as if he had been her own, to the last day of his life spoke of her in the highest terms; and it is unquestionable that she contributed in no small degree to the happiness of her husband's home.
The story was for some time current that, while living at Black Callerton in the capacity of engine-man, twenty years before, George had made love to Miss Hindmarsh, and, failing to obtain her hand, in despair he had married Paterson's servant. But the author has been assured by Mr. Thomas Hindmarsh, of Newcastle, the lady's brother, that the story was mere idle gossip, and altogether without foundation.