38 AUDUBON, THE NATURALIST 



of this grave decision could have reached the colony. 



At this time Jean Audubon was no doubt regarded 

 as a very rich man, and though he happened to leave 

 Les Cayes at a critical moment, little could he have 

 dreamed of the disaster that awaited him there as well 

 as in his beloved France. His personal affairs during 

 this eventful period, involving as they necessarily do 

 the early life of his distinguished son, have hitherto been 

 shrouded in the dark and sinister history of that ever 

 smiling but ever turbulent island. Now, however, the 

 veil of mist that has settled over the page can be pene- 

 trated at the most important points. In this and sub- 

 sequent chapters we shall follow the life of father and 

 son through the course of events which has been thus 

 briefly summarized. 



To return to the earlier threads of our narrative, 

 at about the close of 1783 Captain Audubon was en- 

 gaged by the Coirond brothers, colonial merchants at 

 Nantes, to take charge of their foreign trade, which 

 centered chiefly at Les Cayes, 2 Santo Domingo, then a 

 most thriving and populous town, as it is today the 

 largest seaport on the southern coast of the Republic 

 of Haiti. Their ships brought sugar, coffee, cotton and 

 other West Indian products to France, and laden with 



2 The proper name of this seaport town, as given by all French cartog- 

 raphers and writers, is Les Cayes, meaning "the cays" or "keys" (small 

 islands, Spanish cayos) ; omitting the article it is often simply written 

 "Cayes." French residents on the island, however, when dating or ad- 

 dressing a letter or receipting a bill would naturally write "aux Cayes," 

 meaning of course "at The Cays," where the document was signed or where 

 the person by whom the letter was addressed resided (see the Sanson bill, 

 and bills of sale of negroes, Appendix I, Documents Nos. 1, 4, 5, and 6). 

 It was thus an easy step for Englishmen, in ignorance or disregard of 

 the French usage, to call the town "Aux Cayes"; even as early as 1797, 

 Bryan Edwards, though giving the name correctly on his map, which doubt- 

 less had a French source, wrote "Aux Cayes" in his text; the corruption 

 has survived, and is occasionally found in standard works, but is too 

 egregious to be tolerated. 



