364 LIFE OF AUDUBON. 



which had always been sources of the purest pleasure to him. 

 After this his only amusement consisted in walking and being 

 read to. The following fine though juvenile account of one who 

 ■visited him at that time gives the best picture of the last happy 

 days of the sunset of his life which can be drawn. It appeared 

 in the " New York Leader :" — 



" In my interview with the naturalist, there were several things 

 that stamped themselves indelibly upon my mind. The 

 wonderful simplicity of the man was perhaps the most remark- 

 able. His enthusiasm for facts made him unconsoious of him- 

 self. To make him happy, you had only to give him a new 

 fact in natural history, or introduce him to a rare bird. His 

 self-forgetfulness was very impressive. I felt that I had foimd 

 a man \yho asked homage for God and Nature, and not for 

 himself. 



" The unconscious greatness of the man seemed only equalled 

 by his child-like tenderness. The sweet unity between his wife 

 and himself, as they turned over the original drawings of his birds, 

 and recalled the circumstances of the drawings, some of which had 

 been made when she was with him ; her quickness of percep- 

 tion, and their mutual enthusiasm regarding these works of his 

 heart and hand, and tlie tenderness with which they imcon- 

 sjiously treated each other, all was impressed upon my memory. 

 Ever since, I hare been convinced tliat Audubon owed more 

 to his wife than the world knew, or ever would know. That she 

 was always a reliance, often a help, and ever a sympathising 

 sister-soul to her noble husband, was fully apparent to me. I 

 was deeply impressed with the wonderful character of those 

 original drawings. 



" Their exquisite beauty and life-likeness, and the feeling of 

 life they gave me, I have preserved in my memory ; and the 

 contrast between these impressions and those of the published 

 works of Audubon is very marked. The great work recalls 

 the feelings I then had, but by no means creates such emotions. 

 The difference is as great as the difference between the living 

 Audubon and his admirable picture by Cruikshank. I looked 

 from him to his picture in that interview. It was the naturalist, 

 and yet it was not. There was a venerable maturity in the 

 original that had been gained since the features and the spirit 



