290 AUDUBON, THE NATURALIST 



he set out again for America in 1815. Sicily, he de- 

 clared in epigram, offered "a fruitful soil, a delightful 

 climate, excellent productions, perfidious men, deceitful 



women." 



This second voyage to the New World began late 

 in July but did not end until 100 days later, when, on 

 the night of November 2, his ship ran on the Race Rocks 

 near New London, at the western end of Long Island 

 Sound, and eventually went down within sight of land 

 with all his possessions. "I had lost everything," he 

 said, "my fortune, my share of the cargo, my collec- 

 tions and labors for twenty years past, my books, my 

 manuscripts, my drawings, even my clothes ... all 

 that I possessed, except some scattered funds, and the 

 insurance ordered in England for one third of the value 

 of my goods." "I have found men," he continued, "vile 

 enough to laugh without shame at my misfortune, in- 

 stead of condoling with me ! But I have met also with 

 friends who deplored my loss, and helped me in need." 

 One of these friends was Dr. Samuel L. Mitchell of 

 New York, who had given a helping hand to Audubon, 4 

 and it was probably through him that Rafinesque ob- 

 tained a position as private tutor in a family living on 

 the Hudson. Traveling up and down the country, col- 

 lecting objects in natural history, writing, with frus- 

 trated attempts at business, occupied a number of the 

 following years; meanwhile he had aided in founding 

 the Lyceum of New York and had become a member of 

 the Literary and Philosophical Society. At Philadel- 

 phia he found another friend in Mr. John O. Clifford, 

 of Lexington, Kentucky, who encouraged him to visit 

 the West, and in the spring of 1818 he descended the 

 Ohio in an "ark" in company with several others who 



4 See Vol. I, pp. 171 and 336. 



