VOL. 11.] Andrew Fackson Grayson. 3 35 
peared in print which the present article will strive to correct and 
right. 
Of Grayson as a naturalist, alone this memoir can treat; of the 
Grayson family as pioneers of California, a volume remains for a 
more able pen than mine, and the publisher of his portfolio will re- 
ceive the esteem of the public and honor from ornithologists. 
In the northwestern corner of Louisiana, at the Grayson planta- 
‘tion, on the banks of the picturesque Ouachita River which takes 
its rise in the Ozark Mountains and confluences with the Red 
River just before the latter enters the Mississippi, Andrew J. Gray- 
son was born August 20, 1819. (Audubon was born in the same 
State in 1780.) There were but few habitations in those days upon 
the narrow strip of arable land bordering the Ouachita, hemmed in 
by pine forests and cane brakes. This strip was mostly devoted to 
the cultivation of cotton. The adjoining region was one of bayous, 
stagnant lakes and cypress swamps, the home of the alligator, 
mosquito and fever. There was but little society and no schools 
~ nor churches. 
With such surroundings of nature in her wildest aspect it is not 
strange that the youthful Grayson, being of a contemplative mind, 
should have become one of her ardent devotees. Subject to fre- 
quent attacks of chills and fever, he was permitted by his parents 
to occupy his time pretty much as he pleased. With no congenial 
companions around him, boy-like, he spent most of his time 
rambling in the woods with his gun, or on the banks of the river 
_with his fishing rod. His gun was seldom used except for game, 
his early love for birds was of that remarkably tender nature which 
spared them from ruthless destruction, and in all his after life this 
humane trait was evidenced. 
The region gradually becoming settled and cleared along the 
river banks a log schoolhouse was built, where some twenty chil- 
dren, including young Grayson, attended under an Irish school 
- master; but within six months intemperance caused the teacher’s 
_ dismissal and another one, who proved to have his predecessor’s 
failing, then taught for a few months. 
One of the first turning points in Grayson’s life came . when the 
_ third instructor was engaged; hé was an Irishman, by the name 
of Tobin, of most unprepossessing appearance who boarded at 
the house of Grayson’s father. It was sometime during the first 
