His, clearly, was not the temperament which would receive its guiding impulses from the routine work of school or the precepts and instruction of schoolmasters. Such conventional influences would never have led him to Africa. His inspirations were derived from the ballads that were sung and the tales that were told by every country fireside. For him the rushing Yarrow, Newark’s ruined towers, the spreading field, the swelling hillside, and the mountain top were teachers, each with a tale to tell of bold adventure or of deadly strife. The whole country was redolent with the romance of the half-forgotten past, with a hundred memories dear to a patriotic heart. In all around him there was something to throw a glamour over his young eager mind, something to fire his imagination and arouse eager longings to be up and doing deeds undefined, yet ever great and noble. From the stately castle, which now looked down on him in melancholy ruined majesty, brave knights of bygone days had ridden forth to fight for king and country or for love. Their day was past, but might not he in other guise emerge from his lowly cottage, and with other weapons win his golden spurs. In what way all these vague ambitions and this spiritual fermentation was to end there was but small indication. It is given only to the few to realise in after life the romantic dreams of their youth. At first it seems Mungo was destined by his father for the ministry, but he himself preferred medicine, to which choice no objection appears to have been made. To acquire the rudiments of his medical education, when fifteen years of age he was placed, as was the custom of the time, as apprentice to Dr. Thomas Anderson, a surgeon in Selkirk, a gentleman whose descendants still practise the healing art in the same town. For three years he remained with the Doctor, not only acquiring a knowledge of medicine, but still further grounding himself in the classics and other branches of education at the Grammar School. Further than this we know nothing of his life in the Anderson family, though that his time was agreeably spent we may deduce from the fact that, as we shall see later on, he some years after married Dr. Anderson’s eldest daughter. In the year 1789 Park left Selkirk for the University of Edinburgh to complete his medical studies. Three successive sessions seems to have been all that was necessary to qualify in these days. We are told that he was an ardent student, and distinguished among his fellows. Botany was his favourite subject, this fact being doubtless largely due to the inspiring influence of his brother-in-law, Mr. James Dickson, who from being a gardener had raised himself by his own exertions to be no common botanist and the author of some valuable and important works. It was while still a medical student that Park came more directly in contact with Dickson, and with him he went a botanical tour in the Highlands.