The Audubon Reader (28 page)

Had I taken a view, I might as well have given you what might be termed a regular account of the form, the height, the tremendous roar of these Falls; might have spoken of people periling their lives by going between the rock and the sheet of water, calculated the density of the atmosphere in that strange position, related wondrous tales of Indians and their canoes having been precipitated the whole depth—might have told of the narrow, rapid and rockbound river that leads the waters of the Erie into those of Ontario, remarking
en passant
the Devil’s Hole and sundry other places or objects—but supposing you had been there, my description would prove useless and quite as puny as my intended view would have been for my family; and should you not have seen them and are fond of contemplating the more magnificent of the Creator’s works, go to Niagara, reader, for all the pictures you may see, all the descriptions you may read of these mighty Falls, can only produce in your mind the faint glimmer of a glowworm compared with the overpowering glory of the meridian sun.

I breakfasted amid a crowd of strangers who gazed and laughed at me, paid my bill, rambled about and admired the Falls for a while, saw several young gentlemen sketching on cards the mighty mass of foaming waters and walked to Buffalo, where I purchased
new apparel and sheared my beard. I then enjoyed civilized life as much as, a month before, I had enjoyed the wildest solitudes and the darkest recesses of mountain and forest.

Beech Woods, West Feliciana Parish, Louisiana

14 April 1825

My dear sir,

Your very polite answer of the 15th ultimo reached me last evening; please to accept my thanks for your civilities. The complaints of Mr. [Charles-Alexandre] Lesueur to me were only such as I deserved, for had I watched your movements whilst in New York, I now think I certainly could have had an opportunity of speaking to you and remitting also to you the papers I had—but I hope these little [illegible] and disappointments will rarely happen again and that time will prove to you that I am sincere and that probably my fault most predominately is too much frankness towards all those who have anything to do with me.

[I am] anxious always to see all articles connected with natural history correct in all their parts. I will here assure you that all the drawings of birds I have made for upwards of twenty years have all been so exactly measured with the compass in all their parts & even feathers … I shall be sorry as long as I live [if] any alterations should have been made to my drawings by such a person as Mr. Lawson whom you will know is by no means my friend. I have often repeated to you that I painted birds and studied their habits for pleasure’s sake. Indeed, before I went to Philadelphia, the idea never entered my head to have anything to do with Publications &c.

I shall feel really highly honored to receive from your hands the
first volume of your work. I am already well aware that as far as science is connected with it nothing will be wanting. I shall look on it as a gift of value and could I return such a compliment in the same manner I believe
now
that I would count myself happy
then
.

I heard through my good & estimable friend Richard Harlan that Mr.
Titian Peale had gone to the Floridas for you; the choice you have made I think could not have been bettered; young, of excellent morals, and attached to natural scientific pursuits as he is, you may and no doubt will expect many new & interesting findings as well as important facts.

The season has been opened here with an unusual degree of brilliancy; Nature is really all alive in our
woods. The 20th of last month the Wood Thrush [returned?], the
Martins had eggs, the
Hirundo rustica
[Barn Swallow] vividly was leaving and the
Falco peregrinus
[Peregrine Falcon] swimming easily through the air. The first of this month young
Black-headed Titmouses were following their parents abroad from the nest and thousands of
Hummingbirds sucked the Florida jasmines. I have drawn much since I saw you for posterity.

Could I convince myself entitled to the honor of presenting one of my efforts at copying birds to your Lady I would beg of you such a favor.

I have, a few minutes since, forwarded to Bayou Sarah Landing two boxes of plants for yourself & Mr.
R. Haines and a barrel for Richard Harlan containing [an] alligator and sundry lizards in spirits …

Thermometer of twelve o’clock at 86.

General Lafayette [then touring the United States in advance of the fiftieth anniversary of the Declaration of Independence] passes Bayou Sarah this day on his way to Natchez—

Bayou Sarah, Louisiana

1 October 1825

My dear sir,

I was as much surprised as pleased at receiving last evening only, your kind letter dated Saratoga July 28th. The routes it followed must have indeed been circuitous; it appears that your letter came by sea to New Orleans, as no other postmarks are affixed to the direction, and as it came from thence to this place. It would be difficult for me to express my thanks to you, as I feel them, for your friendly presentation of the first volume of your work; believe me, my dear sir, I very seldom in my life felt a greater pleasure. I sincerely hope that ere long I shall have it from Dr. DeKay, to whom you say you gave it. If my account of the Wild Turkey has been useful to
you
, I am the more pleased with it: I assure you I never expected you to publish any portion of it, from reports made me of the little influence my work had either with you or the scientific academicians of Philadelphia.

I have indeed many important curious facts yet in store respecting that fine bird and should ever my work be published they will fully appear. It would be strange indeed if a man who spends fully three-fourths of his life in the forests in pursuit of their featherly inhabitants was not apt to see much of their manners, and that so repeatedly as to retain the principal outline of these habits when written on the spot. I have often laughed off the conclusions brought forward by those who knew me still less than they knew themselves when of the expiration of a few weeks’ sight of me tried to dispel the favorable opinion created in the mind of others by saying that Mergansers could never have been fed on corn!! &c. &c.
Mon cher monsieur, la vérité se découvre toujours
[my dear sir, the truth will out], except indeed when the influenced ignorant never leaves the walks of cities where Nature is much more altered and contaminated than the flesh of the Merganser fed on corn.

I am sorry you should have felt so much anxiety about reproducing the
Gracula
either from my drawing or that of any other person
whatever, yet I can vouch the size of birds drawn by me as correct, and that I call
Gracula barita
[Audubon’s Great Crow Blackbird]. Please to recollect what I told you of a larger bird common in the Floridas & plenty in the West Indies known by the name of
Bous de Petun
—whatever you have done or wrote employing my name is received thankfully by me. As soon as I receive your volume I shall write you so.

I have no doubt that your Journey to the Falls of Niagara has been very agreeable, and if you have rambled as I did in the Florida
swamps, your ornithological collection has no doubt been much augmented. I need not say to you that were you to come to this part of Louisiana I should be happy in trying to promulgate your arrival among the French hunters and to procure for you the specimens you might want if in season.

I have … now concluded to leave the U. States sometime in spring for Europe, I shall first land in England and exhibit my drawings there; if not successful in London I shall go to the Continent, pass through Brussels & proceed to that capital where I fervently wish the great Napoleon was still existing, Paris.

You have frequently made me offers of letters of recommendation or introduction; should you on the receipt of this think one still worthy such attentions, please to forward me some. My Work proceeds as fast as it can under the efforts of an humble citizen destitute to a degree of many advantages derived by others better situated, but my courage is not the least abated and every new bird enlarges my collection with the progressive pleasure that cannot fail following a man impelled by natural disposition to study and to try to imitate those beauties of Nature.

I will send you by the first safe conveyance a Drawing for your Lady; her acceptance of it is the highest praise ever bestowed on them. It is probable it shall be accompanied by a few skins of birds for you—in my last excursions to the great lakes I killed seven Snake Birds [Anhinga] but the weather was so hot that I could not bear the odor of their flesh and gave up skinning them—those birds, although passengers here, breed abundantly within ten miles of this. I would have wrote to you sometime since, but having no acknowledgement from you of my letters I became fearful of being importunate …

The weather is now beautiful and cool—

The beautiful
Wood Ducks are assembled in juvenile congregations and the gunners are busily engaged in killing them for the flavorful flesh of the young. [Alexander] Wilson says the birds never go in flocks. I wish that great man was alive and had been with us last week to see hundreds in a flight & again, though Mr. [William] Bartram … says that Wood Ducks go singly, I have seen, and any man can in our lakes at this season, flocks of thousands clearing a lake of its fish by wading along the margins, and so innocent are they that a man might load a horse with them in a few hours …

Liverpool, England

5 August 1826

My dear Madam,

Since I wrote last I have had a letter from John Bakewell dated New Orleans 13th May … He seems to be in good health and spirits.

His letter was brought by Mr. Audubon who arrived with all his drawings about ten days ago. He (Mr. A.) brought a great many letters to persons of the first respectability in this place, and he has already received a great deal of attention on account of the beauty of his collection of birds. I wish you could see them. He leaves here in a few days for London and Paris, but whether he will go to Duffield [where E.G. lived] or not I do not know.

I have heard from Mrs. [Eliza Bakewell] Berthoud [in Shippingport, Kentucky], several times lately. She has had a good deal of trouble within the last few months. Mr. Berthoud in [New] Orleans, she in the family way, the water 4 feet in the house for several days owing to the sudden rise of the Ohio, the departure of her little daughter to school to Pittsburgh which is 400 miles from her, and lastly her youngest son, a sweet child between three and four years old, was seized with an inflammatory fever which deprived him of the use of his limbs so much that he could not walk, but she tells me as he seems to improve daily, she is in hope he will recover the use of it in time. My sister Sarah is at Hopkinsville and my brother Thomas in Cincinnati. My youngest brother, William, is the only member of the family who is near her now …

Since writing the above I have seen Mr. Audubon, who says he wishes to visit you, and I daresay he will be with you soon after the receipt of this. You will find him pleasant in his manners and I hope much improved in character. He is anxious to take some views of the scenery around Matlock for my sister and perhaps he may remain several days in your neighborhood …

Liverpool, England

1 September 1826

My dear Victor,

I have been in England now upward of a month and am quite well. I have been received most kindly and I think that I have much in my favor now towards enabling me to do well with my collection. The letters that I brought from [Henry] Clay, Dewitt Clinton, [Andrew] Jackson, General William Clark, &c., &c., &c., have been all received with a due regard, I assure thee, and I am in miniature in Liverpool what Lafayette was with us [i.e., celebrated on his recent triumphal tour of America] … My drawings are exhibited at the Liverpool
Royal Institution and will continue so this week. The proceeds are far beyond my expectations, and it seems that I am considered unrivaled in the art of drawing even by the most learned of this country. The newspapers have given so many flattering accounts of my productions and of my being a superior ornithologist that I dare no longer look into any of them.

I shall continue to exhibit my works through the three Kingdoms and then proceed to the Continent. I have no doubt that this method will pay well and that it will not prevent me from my publication.

I have not heard from our dear friend, your Mamma, since I left. Pray write to her often and tell her to write to me and do thou also. Direct to the care of Messrs. Rathbone Bros. & Co., Liverpool.

My dear son let me now request you to pay great attention to music, drawing in my style and to read as much as possible—talents are regarded more than wealth and if both are together how happy is the possessor.

You would be surprised to see the marked attentions paid me wherever I go by the first people of Liverpool. My exhibition attracts the
beau monde
altogether and the lords of England look at them with wonder—more so I assure thee than at my flowing
curling locks, that again loosely are about my shoulders. The ladies of England are ladies indeed—beauty, suavity of manners and the most improved education render them desirable objects of admiration.