248 AUDUBON, THE NATURALIST 



Audubon to Spencer Fullerton Baird 



NEW YORK, Nov. 29, 1842. 



MY DEAR YOUNG FRIEND, 



It seems to me as if an age had already elapsed since I 

 have heard from you or your whereabouts. Neither do I know 

 clearly whether in the way of correspondence, you are in my 

 debt, or I am in yours. Nevertheless I now write to you, and 

 request you to read this letter more than once, and think deeply 

 on the purport of its contents that you may be the [more] 

 able to form a true Idea of what I intend to say [to] you, and 

 for yourself to give me a true answer, on which I can depend, 

 no matter whether it is to my liking or not. 



It is now determined that I shall go towards the Rocky 

 Mountains at least to the Yellowstone River, and up the latter 

 Stream four hundred miles, and perhaps go across the Rocky 

 Mountains. I have it in my power to proceed to the Yellow- 

 stone by Steamer from St. Louis on the 1st day of April next ; 

 or to go to the "Mountains of the Wind" in the very heart and 

 bosom of the Rocky Mountains in the company of Sir William 

 Drommond Stewart, Baronet who will leave on the 1st of May 

 next also from St. Louis. 



It has occurred to me that perchance you would like to 

 spare a few months of your life, to visit the great Western 

 Wilderness, and perhaps again prefer going in my Company 

 in preference to that of any other person? Of this of course 

 I cannot Judge without your answer to this. I thought that 

 you would have been in New York long ere this, but not a Word 

 of you has reached any friend of yours here for several months. 

 I have had an abundance of applications from different sec- 

 tions of the country, from Young Gents who proffer much 

 efficiency, etc., but I do not know them as I know you, and if 

 the terms which I am about to propose to you will answer 

 your own views, I wish you to write to me at once so that 

 I may know how to prepare myself for such a Journey, and 

 under such circumstances. 



Would you like to go with me at any rate? By which I 



