62 INTRODUCTION
such a spirit as this fled into the wilderness ? Even poetry itself, in the cultivation of which the two young enthusi- asts had planned so much, became now so linked in Ran- dall's thought with images of sorrow that the idea of pursuing it alone, bereft of the sympathy which had given to it its chief charm, grew hateful to him. All his youth- ful poems he put away out of sight ; and for many years he sought relief in pursuits which should not torture him with constant reminders of what he had lost.
Besides this one all-absorbing friendship with Ingersoll, which always appeared to me as fine and memorable as any of which we read, there were three other intimacies of Randall's college days which ought not to be wholly unmentioned here. Two of these were rooted in common scientific interests, and associated him closely for a time with older men. Professor Thomas Nuttall and Doctor Thaddeus William Harris, both famous in their day for their services to Randall's favorite sciences.
Nuttall was born in England in 1786, and died there in 1859; but from 1822 to 1828 he was Professor of Natural History and Curator of the Botanical Gardens at Harvard, and afterwards remained in this country till 1 842, pursuing his botanical and ornithological investigations, and publish- ing their results in works which brought him an enduring reputation. The rest of his life he spent on his estate of Nutgrove, near Liverpool, which had been bequeathed to him on condition that he should live on it. Randall be- came well acquainted, during his college course, with this distinguished naturalist, and used to accompany him on long excursions in search of plants, insects, and birds, not only in the neighborhood of Boston, but also in the back- woods and lake regions of New England in general ; and he always retained a high respect for Nuttall as a natural- ist and a man.
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