Mother is anxious to go off to the country with me. We are just looking about for a place. Perhaps Melrose or Lanark, but lodgings in both places are dear. I go at any rate with Archie next month to Fife; to be located probably at Aberdour; where I will be able to prosecute my geological studies, for I hope, if I am spared, to be able to join the Survey.--My dear Willie I will now close. I never forget you nor ever shall. You become all the dearer the further and longer you are away. God grant that we meet again on earth, if not we are always sure of meeting in a far better place.--I am your affect. brother, JAMIE. The gloomy prognostication that his work at the printer’s office would land him in a premature grave was not fulfilled, but the statement helps to explain why he left the work in the same year as that in which the letter was written, having apparently never returned to the office after writing it. In order to leave he broke his apprenticeship, and this was strongly opposed by his employer, who told him that a man who changed his profession would never succeed, a prophecy--in any case somewhat extreme--which was not fulfilled in this case. But after leaving the printing-works there was still another interval of waiting before the boy settled down to his life-work, and found his vocation. He did not finally enter the Survey till October 1861, a few months after his lifelong friend Dr Young. The period of waiting was spent partly at the University, where he attended among other classes Prof. Allman’s natural history course, a subject with which geology was then united. He was also in a lawyer’s office for a time, while waiting for a vacancy on the Geological Survey. To enter this he had to pass what was called a “Qualifying Examination,” which then included what the profane called Civil Service “tots.” These were long sums in compound addition, which had to be done within a limited time and with great accuracy. Though the operation became more or less mechanical to those who practised it assiduously, it presented considerable difficulties to those who were not accustomed to such work, especially when, like James Geikie, the victim had not what are called “business” instincts. The difficulties were, however, overcome, and in October 1861, as already stated, he entered the Geological Survey, forming a member of the small Scottish staff, which consisted of Messrs H. H. Howell, Archibald Geikie, Dr Young, and himself, with the addition, a few months later, of Mr (now Dr) B. N. Peach. Of this band only Sir Archibald Geikie and Dr Peach now survive. With this appointment to the Survey the period of uncertainty and waiting ended, and James Geikie, at the age of twenty-two, entered on his life-work, and henceforth found his way clear before him. CHAPTER II FIRST YEARS ON THE GEOLOGICAL SURVEY 1862-1864