AUDUBON IN LONDON 379 



and he is now going to London in order to set this gigantic work 

 in motion. 



Mr Audubon, however, is not very well versed in the details 

 of such matters, & therefore I beg of you to have the goodness 

 to aid him with your advice on the occasion to introduce en- 

 gravers printers & so forth to him, and generally speaking to 

 put him in the way of bringing out his work in an advantageous 

 manner to himself. 



I trust all this will give you no more trouble than you will 

 be willing to take at my earnest solicitation. 

 I remain Ever, My Dear Sir, 

 Most Sincerely Yrs 



BASIL HALL. 

 JOHN MURRAY Esqr 



Audubon carried also a long letter from "Mr. 

 Hay," 2 dated at "16 Athol Crescent, Edinburgh, 15 

 March, 1827," and addressed to the care of his brother, 

 Robert William Hay, of Downing Street, West, in 

 which this curious statement occurs: "Mr. A. is son of 

 the late French Admiral Audubon, but has himself lived 

 from the cradle in the United States, having been born 

 in one of the French colonies." 



The document which was to prove of greatest service 

 to him, however, was addressed to John George Chil- 

 dren, 8 then in charge of the Department of Zoology in 



Probably the same that is referred to in his journals as "Mr. Hays, 

 the antiquarian." 



J. G. Children (1777-1852) was early interested in chemistry, and 

 at Tunbridge built a good laboratory, in which Humphry Davy con- 

 ducted many of his early experiments, and while there was seriously in- 

 jured in October, 1812. In 1824 Children discovered a method of extract- 

 ing silver without the use of mercury. When Mr. Children, Senior, be- 

 came insolvent through the failure of his bank, his son obtained a position 

 at the British Museum; in 1816 he was librarian in the Department of 

 Antiquities, but in 1823 he was transferred to a post in zoology which 

 was eagerly sought by William Swainson; he was secretary of the Royal 

 Society in 1826-27, and again in 1835-37. He resigned his position at the 

 Museum in 1840, when Swainson was again an unsuccessful candidate, and 



