AUDUBON AND MACGILLIVRAY 145 



the many occasions on which he has aided me by his advice and 

 superior knowledge of the world, you would be pleased to find 

 so much disinterestedness in human nature. His professional 

 aid too, valuable as it has proved to us, and productive of much 

 inconvenience to him, has been rendered without reward, for I 

 could never succeed in inducing him to consider us his patients, 

 although for upwards of two years he never passed a day with- 

 out seeing my wife. 



In the spring of 1836 Audubon's two sons made a 

 tour of France and Italy; on the 9th of March he wrote 

 to Harris that they expected to leave England in a week, 

 be gone three and a half months, visit Paris, Rome 

 and Messina, and return by way of Marseilles and Paris. 

 With the passage of 1836 he had completed 70 numbers, 

 of 350 plates, of his larger work, leaving but 85 plates 

 yet to be engraved. Though anxious to see this greatest 

 of his tasks brought to an end, he still looked with long- 

 ing eyes to the Rocky Mountains and the Pacific Coast, 

 and began preparations for his last journey to obtain 

 materials and subscribers in the United States. 



