INTRODUCTION. xxi 
the England, commanded by Rosert Waite, Esq., for Liver- 
pool, where, seventeen days after, we were safely landed. 
Here we quickly paid our respects to the RaTupones, the 
CuorLeEys, and other friends, to whom bidding adieu at the 
same time, we proceeded to join my family in London, where, 
on the 7th of August, we once more met all together. 
I found the publication of the ‘‘ Birds of America” in a sa- 
tisfactory state of progression, but received the disagreeable 
intelligence that a great number of my British patrons had 
discontinued their subscriptions, and that most of those who 
still received the numbers as they came out, were desirous of 
seeing the work finished in Eighty Numbers, as I had at first 
anticipated. On this account, | found myself obliged to intro- 
duce, and in some instances to crowd, a number of species 
into one and the same plate, in order to try to meet the wishes 
of those who had by their subscriptions in some measure as- 
sisted me in the publication of that work, This, however, I 
did in such a manner as seemed best to accord with the affi- 
nities of the species. But, Reader, Dr Townsenp meantime 
returned to Philadelphia, after an absence of about four years, 
and with a second collection, containing several rare and new 
birds, which, after meeting with the same difficulties as on the 
former occasion, in consequence of the opposition of various en- 
lightened persons at Philadelphia, although Dr TownsENpD was 
extremely desirous that every thing new or rare belonging to 
our Fauna should be given to me, I received only a few weeks 
before closing the engraving of my plates. A few others did 
not reach me until several days after. What was I to do? 
Why, Reader, to publish them to be sure; for this I should 
have done, to the best of my power, even if every subscriber in 
