AUDUBON 



27 



Withal, and fortunately for me, I was not addicted to gambling ; 

 cards I disliked, and I had no other evil practices. I was, be- 

 sides, temperate to an intemperate degree. I lived, until the day of 

 my union with your mother, on milk, fruits, and vegetables, with 

 the addition of game and fish at times, but never had I swallowed 

 a single glass of wine or spirits until the day of my wedding. The 

 result has been my uncommon, indeed iron, constitution. This 

 was my constant mode of life ever since my earliest recollection, 

 and while in France it was extrem 'y annoying to all those round 

 me. Indeed, so much did it inhuence me that I never went to 

 dinners, merely because when so situated my peculiarities in my 

 choice of food occasioned comment, and also bee, 1 use often not a 

 single dish was to my taste or fancy, and I could eat nothing from 

 the sumptuous tables before me. Pies, puddings, eggs, milk, or 

 cream was all I cared for in the way of food, and many a time 

 have I robbed my tenant's wife, Mrs. Thomas, of the cream in- 

 tended to make butter for the Philadelphia market. All this 

 time I was as fair and as rosy as a girl, though as strong, indeed 

 stronger than most young men, and as active as a buck. And 

 why, have I thought a thousand times, should I not have kept to 

 that delicious mode of living? and why should not mankind in 

 general be more abstemious than mankind is? 



Before I sailed for France I had begun a series of drawings of 

 the birds of America, and had also begun a study of their habits. 

 I at first drew my subjects dead, by which I mean to say that, 

 after procuring a specimen, I hung it up either by the head, wing, 

 or foot, and copied it as closely as I possibly could. 



In my drawing of birds only did I interest Mr. Da Costa. He 

 always commended my efforts, nay he even went farther, for one 

 morning, while I was drawing a figure of the Ardea herodias^ he 

 assured me the time might come when I should be a great Amer- 

 ican naturalist. However curious it may seem to the scientific 

 world that these sayings from the lips of such a man should affect 

 me, I assure you they had great weight with me, and I felt a 

 certain degree of pride in these words even then. 



Too young and too useless to be married, your grandfather 

 * Great Blue Heron. 



