4 AUDUBON, THE NATURALIST 



of Florida; then the regions west of the Mississippi, 

 Mexico, and if possible penetrate into California. He 

 also contemplates crossing the Rocky Mountains and 

 pursuing the Columbia River to its mouth, and thinks 

 that he will be absent from us about two years." In 

 November G. W- Featherstonhaugh, the geologist, also 

 made this announcement in his Monthly American Jour- 

 nal of Geology and Natural Science: 



We are authorized to state that information of the progress 

 of Mr. Audubon will be given, from time to time, to the scien- 

 tific world, in the pages of this journal. 



We are gratified in being able to state, that he was received 

 in the most cordial manner, at Washington, and that the dis- 

 tinguished gentlemen in authority there, have given him such 

 letters to the military posts on the frontiers, as will assure 

 him the aid and protection his personal safety may require. 

 We anticipate the most interesting reconnaisances, both geo- 

 logical and zoological, from this enterprising naturalist, who 

 is accompanied by Mr. Lehman, as an assistant draftsman, and 

 by an assistant collector who came with him from Europe. 



The "distinguished gentlemen" at Washington who 

 particularly aided Audubon at this time, besides Colonel 



lieutenant-colonel in charge of that office in 1837; according to Ruthven 

 Deane (see Bibliography, No. 216), he was an organizer of the National 

 Institute of Science, afterwards merged with the Smithsonian Institution 

 at Washington; an ardent friend of Audubon, he assisted him in many 

 ways, and, as Dr. Richard Harlan affirmed, paid dearly for his support 

 by being rejected for membership in the American Philosophical Society 

 at Philadelphia. Harlan wrote to Audubon on January 27, 1832, that 

 out of twenty-five members present on the occasion referred to, five, led 

 by Mr. George Ord, Mr. Isaac Lea, and Dr. Hays, had voted against 

 him: in his opinion no possible grounds could be found for opposing 

 so desirable a member excepting his friendship for Audubon and his 

 support of the snake "Episode" (see Chapter XXVIII). In 1832 Abert's 

 paper on the "Habits of Climbing of the Rattlesnake," which was written 

 in the previous year, had appeared in a Philadelphia journal (see 

 Bibliography, No. 107). To this friend Abert's Squirrel, Sciurus aherti, 

 was later dedicated; see Audubon, The Viviparous Quadrupeds of North 

 America (Bibl. No. 6), plate 153. 



