A MEETING OF RIVALS 231 



To return again to the story of Wilson's diary, it 

 is evident that Wilson would never have published his 

 sentiments in the form in which they later appeared. 

 They were perfectly characterized by a just critic of an 

 early day, 26 who said that Wilson's words were without 

 doubt written in a moment of keen depression and disap- 

 pointment and were an exact description of his feelings, 

 though, as we should also add, not of the facts. "A 

 man who has given his heart to the accomplishment of 

 an object, believing that he has no rival, must be some- 

 what more than human, if he be delighted to find that 

 another is engaged in the same purpose, with equal 

 energy and advantages far greater than his own." Bar- 

 ring his usual inaccuracies, it must be admitted that Au- 

 dubon's account bears the thumbmarks of truth. He 

 could not have known the bitter struggles of the proud 

 spirit whose history we have briefly told ; he saw only a 

 stranger, an ardent devotee of nature, it is true, but a 

 man of unbending disposition, who with a little more 

 suavity of address could probably have won his friend- 

 ship, if not his subscription. Of the literary quality of 

 Wilson's w r ork, now so well appreciated, he could have 

 known nothing at all; after turning its pages in his 

 Louisville store for the first time in 1810, he probably 

 did not see it again for over ten years. 



That Wilson was jealous of Audubon as a future 

 rival is probable, but the real "rivalry" between these two 

 pioneers was of later growth. It was fostered in this 

 country chiefly by George Ord and some of his friends, 

 together with others who were interested in the sale of 

 Wilson's work. Ord, who seems to have felt that the 

 mantle of this naturalist had fallen on his own shoul- 



29 In 1840, by W. B. O. Peabody, naturalist; author of a Life of Wilson; 

 see Bibliography, No. 105. 



