His Character and Last Days
Stuart was physically a small wiry man with a great fondness for strong drink, able to endure privations and possessing a fierce determination which overrode any thought of personal comfort. He has not gregarious; he had some good friends but was happiest away from crowds. He cared little for dress; he had a full dark beard and habitually wore grubby moleskin trousers and an unfashionable long-tailed blue coat with brass buttons and cabbage-tree hat.
His eyesight was failing when he embarked on his sixth expedition but by the time he returned the many days of travelling into the fierce sun had rendered him practically blind, in pain and in such poor health that he spent much of the return journey being carried on a litter between two horses. After preparing his diaries for publication he returned to Britain, where he died and was buried at Kensal Green Cemetery. There is a museum dedicated to him in the house where he once lived, in Dysart, Scotland.
Read more about this topic: John McDouall Stuart
Famous quotes containing the words character and/or days:
“We have good reason to believe that memories of early childhood do not persist in consciousness because of the absence or fragmentary character of language covering this period. Words serve as fixatives for mental images. . . . Even at the end of the second year of life when word tags exist for a number of objects in the child’s life, these words are discrete and do not yet bind together the parts of an experience or organize them in a way that can produce a coherent memory.”
—Selma H. Fraiberg (20th century)
“Water, earth, air, fire, and the other parts of this structure of mine are no more instruments of your life than instruments of your death. Why do you fear your last day? It contributes no more to your death than each of the others. The last step does not cause the fatigue, but reveals it. All days travel toward death, the last one reaches it.”
—Michel de Montaigne (1533–1592)