192 AUDUBON, THE NATURALIST 



were, the rains drenched us to the skin, and our clothing was 

 so saturated that it took many hours to dry. At night when 

 it was clear, we continued our course down the river, but, in 

 bad weather, or when very cloudy and dark, we were obliged 

 to tie up to the shore, frequently to the bank of some wild, 

 uninhabited island, and wait there for daylight ; then we would 

 resume our slow, tedious and seemingly never ending journey. 

 Added to these hardships, our boat was commanded by a most 

 disagreeable and ungentlemanly captain, named Harris; his 

 language, and demeanor marked him as a person of low birth 

 and bad character. 



Among some of the places which were passed en route, I 

 remember the following: Wheeling, Marietta, Market Slough, 

 famous for the conspiracy of Colonel Burr, Belleville, Litards 

 Falls, Point Pleasant, Manchester, Maysville, Cincinnati, and 

 finally our journey's end, Louisville. 



At Louisville the partners were attracted by the 

 country and its prospects, as well as by the hospitable 

 character of the people. Their choice, as they then 

 thought, had been well made, and they decided to make 

 it their future home. "We marked Louisville," said 

 Audubon, "as a spot designed by nature to become a 

 place of great importance, and had we been as wise as 

 we now are, I might never have published The Birds of 

 America; for a few hundred dollars laid out, at that 

 period, in lands or town lots near Louisville, would, if 

 left to grow over with grass to a date ten years past 

 [this being 1835], have become an immense fortune, but 

 young heads are on young shoulders; it was not to be, 

 and who cares." 5 



Rozier did not say when either they or their goods 

 reached the pioneer settlement, but from an item in 



'Maria R. Audubon, Audubon and his Journals (Bibl. No. 86), 

 vol. i, p. 28. 



