JOHN JAMES AUDUBON. 



ways when seeking their natural food or pleasure. Other nota- 

 ble persons called to see my drawings, and encouraged me 

 with their remarks. The Prince Canino introduced me to 

 the Academy of Arts and Sciences, and pronounced my 

 birds superb and worthy of a pupil of David. I formed the 

 acquaintance of Lesueur, the zoologist and artist, who was 

 greatly delighted with my drawings." Audubon was engaged 

 by Prince Canino to superintend his drawings intended for 

 publication ; but his terms being much dearer than Alexander 

 Wilson's, he was asked to discontinue his work. " I had now," 

 he writes, " determined to go to Europe with my * treasures,' 

 since I was assured nothing so fine in the way of ornithologi- 

 cal representations existed. I worked incessantly to complete 

 my series of drawings. On inquiry, I found Sully and Lesueur 

 made a poor living by their brush. I had some pupils offered 

 at a dollar per lesson; but I found the citizens unwilling to 

 pay for art, although they affected to patronize it. I exhibited 

 my drawings for a week, but found the show did not pay, and 

 so determined to remove myself." 



Thus, notwithstanding the pleasant social aspect of his 

 reception in Philadelphia, he does not appear to have been en- 

 couraged in its material promise ; and he met with a misfortune 

 which would have depressed the spirits of the bravest and 

 most sanguine. His plates, the fruit of years of labour and 

 of almost exclusive preoccupation during the whole time, were 

 destroyed in a single night by rats. He went to work at once, 

 however, to restore his drawings, and did so. Mr. McMurtrie, 

 the conchologist, advised him to take his drawings to Eng- 

 land. Prince Canino advised him to go to France. He pro- 

 ceeded to New York, having left Philadelphia " free from debt 

 and free from anxiety about the future." In New York he 

 visited the museum and " found the specimens of stuffed birds 

 set up in unnatural and constrained attitudes. This appears 

 to be the universal practice, and the world owes to me the 

 adoption of the plan of drawings from animated nature. Wil- 

 son is the only one who has in any tolerable degree adopted 

 my plan." 



The prospect for having his drawings published in New 

 York did not appear very encouraging, although it seemed 

 more hopeful than it had been in Philadelphia. He visited 

 the Lyceum, and his portfolio was examined by the members 



