ALEXANDER WILSON 65 



execrable swamps." On the seventeenth day he reached Natchez 

 and from there followed the Mississippi River to New Orleans. 



Here he secured a substantial addition to his subscription list 

 and sailed for Philadelphia, well satisfied with his trip. He 

 skirted but did not touch the peninsula of Florida, a land which 

 had he but known it would have yielded him more novelties than 

 that which he had just traversed. 



During the years 1811 and 1812 Wilson seems to have lived 

 almost continuously at Bartram's, which was always such a con- 

 genial home to him, and meanwhile the publication advanced 

 rapidly. 



After the fifth volume was completed in 1812 he went again to 

 New England to visit his agents and look after his subscribers. 

 Upon his return he devoted himself to the water birds which he 

 had previously somewhat neglected and made a number of excur- 

 sions across the state of New Jersey to Egg Harbor, then a great 

 resort for sea birds of various kinds. Upon these trips he was 

 accompanied by his friend Ord then about thirty years of age, 

 afterwards president of the Academy of Natural Sciences of 

 Philadelphia. 



About this time Wilson began to reap the rewards of his labors, 

 financial reward there was apparently none, since the expense 

 so far had fully equalled the receipts, but his merit was gaining 

 recognition. 



He was elected a member of the American Society of Artists in 

 1812 and of the American Philosophical Society and the recently 

 formed Academy of Natural Sciences in the following year. 



During the summer of 1813 owing to the difficulty of procuring 

 colorists for the plates he attended personally to much of this 

 work and overtaxed himself. His whole energy seems to have 

 been directed toward the finishing of his work. In July he writes, 

 "My eighth volume is now in the press and will be published in 

 November. One more volume will complete the whole." His 

 constitution, however, which had always demanded plenty of out- 

 door exercise could not stand this constant application and when 

 shortly after this he was stricken with an attack of dysentery, he 



