IS CHARACTERISTICS. 181 
beard fell white and wavy down his breast; a 
pair of hawklike eyes gleamed sharply out from 
the frizzy shroud of cap and collar. The lookers 
on drew near, with a thrill of irrepressible cu 
riosity. The moment their eyes beheld the 
noble contour of that Roman face, they felt it 
could be he, and no one else. Audubon it was, 
in this wilderness garb, hale and alert with sixty 
winters on his shoulders, like one of his old 
eagles, “ feathered to the heel.” He looked, as 
they had dreamed, the antiqué Plato, with his 
fine classic head and lofty mean, the valorous 
and venerable sage. 
The travellers, soon on intimate terms with 
their admired companion, were delighted in 
listening to the ever fresh. relation of his ex- 
ploits, discoveries, and experiences, instructive 
from the singular stores of knowledge and pro- 
found accuracy of information the naturalist dis- 
played. Somewhat silent in general, his con- 
versation was impulsive and fragmentary. <A 
mellow Gallic idiom marked his speech. 
When ashore the travellers found he out- 
stripped in walking, with perfect ease, his con- 
siderably younger companions; while the clear- _ 
ness and power of his vision showed how entirely 
the vigour of his constitution was retained. One 
clear, fine morning, when passing through a 
particularly picturesque region, his keen eyes, 
