The Audubon Magazine. 



Vol. II. 



FEBRUARY, 1888. 



No. I. 



AUDUBONIAN SKETCHES. 



SHORTLY after my articles appeared 

 in The Auk, I was favored with a very- 

 kind letter from Mr. John Henry Gurney, 

 pere, of Northrepps, Norwich, England, who 

 presented me with a fine and large photo- 

 graph of Audubon, taken from the famous 

 oil painting which hangs in the palace at 

 St. Petersburg, Russia. This painting was 

 evidently copied from a photograph of 

 Audubon, the original of which latter is now 

 in my possession, it having been presented 

 to me with the utmost generosity by Mr. 

 Henry K. Coale, of Chicago, the President 

 of the Ridgway Ornithological Club of that 

 city. 



The original photograph is now before 

 me, and I should judge from it that Audu- 

 bon at the time it was taken must have been 

 considerably over fifty years of age, as his 

 hair is nearly white, while his side-whiskers 

 are entirely so. He wears a loose, semi- 

 standing shirt collar to that garment, with- 

 out any necktie. His black silk vest is un- 

 buttoned half-way down from the top, and 

 his coat is of the old-fashioned black broad- 

 cloth style, so commonly worn in his day 

 by gentlemen, and especially by savants, 

 advanced in years. He looks grandly out 

 of the picture here, and the fine old face is 

 one we can dwell upon for a long time with- 

 out tiring, and our interest is sure to come 

 back to us, as fresh as ever, when we regard 

 the features. It is my intention at present 



to have an enlarged portrait made from this 

 photograph some day. Mr. Coale tells me 

 that this picture was presented to Dr. J. W. 

 Velie by Mrs. Audubon herself, and Dr. 

 Velie gave it to Mr. Coale. 



I have a copy of the naturalist's life, writ- 

 ten by his widow from his journal, which he 

 kept up with more or less fullness during his 

 rambles and journeys. It seems to me I 

 have read the book through as many as a 

 dozen times, and I am sure I am by no means 

 through with it yet. We all know the little 

 work, and revere it. Sometimes, however, 

 we find little snatches here and there which 

 Mrs. Audubon did not record, as they are 

 the observations of others. Mr. Coale has 

 collected and given me a few of these relics, 

 mostly from periodicals and newspapers. 

 One is a reprint, made by himself, from 

 "Gleason's Pictorial," (Vol. HI., No. 13, 

 p. 196) and a very quaint old account it is, 

 too, being illustrated by a coarse woodcut 

 of Audubon, when I should say he was about 

 thirty-three or thirty-four years of age. 



Another account is published in a Chicago 

 newspaper in August, 1876, by a gentleman 

 living in Henderson, Ky. This writer tells 

 us that, "As near as we can learn, Mr. Au- 

 dubon moved to the Red Banks, or Hen- 

 derson, about the year 1810 or 181 2. He 

 married Miss Louise [Lucy] Bakewell, of 

 Louisville, who bore him two sons. Mrs. 

 Audubon and the two sons accompanied 



