PERSEVERING TOIL. 108 
CHAPTER IX. 
NO WITHSTANDING years of toil devoted 
by Audubon to ensure the achievement of 
his cherished plan, disappointments and imped- 
iments continued long to test the strength of 
his resolution and the power of his faith. Yet 
such was the vigour and elevation of his genius 
that vicissitudes seemed only to increase the 
elasticity of his naturally buoyant spirits, and 
impart a more indomitable fervour to his en- 
thusiasm. : 
Irrepressible by trial from without—the chill 
of uncongenial contact or contest with the harsh 
inexorable conditions of expediency, his genius 
possessed. an imperishable spring within itself 
which no opposing external force could destroy. 
Intrinsically it was the source of unequalled 
pleasures and satisfactions—themselves a rich 
reward, a perpetual consolation and assistance. 
From the arguments of interested or sordid 
policy, the coldness of skepticism, the apathy of 
ignorance or selfishness, he took refuge in the 
seclusion of his‘beloved woods. There, in 
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