Joan Mun was born April 21, 1838, at Dunbar, Scotland, about twenty-five miles from Edinburgh. He was the third child and the eldest son of Daniel and Anne (gill-ye) Muir. In his Story of M y Boyhood and Youth he has given a vivid account of his childhood there on the shore of the North Sea, — of his school ing and the schoolboy fights which were so common as to seem almost a regular part of the curriculum, of rambles in the woods and along the shore, and deeds of daring lmown as scootchers in which the boys vied with one another in the most reckless performances.