286 AUDUBON, THE NATURALIST 



opossums, with sardonic grin, are making for the ripe, 

 orange fruits of the persimmon, holding to the branch 

 with their rat-like, coiled tails; the swift fox {Vulpes 

 velox) sits on the ground, barking like a dog, with head 

 up-turned, while the better known red fox (No. 18, 

 Plate Ixxxvii) struggles in an old-fashioned steel trap, 

 the toothed jaws of which have gripped a paw above the 

 heel, and you observe that his tail is where, in the cir- 

 cumstances, it is bound to be — between his legs. While 

 many of these plates are of the highest degree of excel- 

 lence, the colors are apt to be too vivid and the execu- 

 tion is far from uniform. 



Thomas M. Brewer, a valued friend and correspon- 

 dent,^^ in response to an urgent request, "ere it be too 

 late," paid a visit to the famous naturalist on the Fourth 

 of July, 1846, of which he has given this record: ^® 



I found him in a retreat well worthy of so true a lover of 

 nature. It was a lovely spot, on a well-wooded point running 

 out in the river. His dwelling was a large old-fashioned wooden 

 house, from the veranda of which was a fine view, looking both 

 up and down the stream, and around the dwelling were grouped 

 several fine old forest trees of beech and oak. The grounds 

 were well stocked with pets of various kinds, both birds and 

 beasts, while his wild feathered favorites, hardly less confiding, 

 had their nests over his very doorway. Through the grounds 

 ran a small rivulet, over which was a picturesque rural bridge. 



The patriarch . . . had greatly changed since I had last 

 seen him. He wore his hair longer, and it now hung in locks of 

 snowy whiteness over his shoulders. His once piercing gray 

 eyes, though still bright, had already begun to fail him. He 

 could no longer paint with his wonted accuracy, and had at 

 last, most reluctantly, been forced to surrender to his sons the 

 task of completing his Quadrupeds of North America. Sur- 



* See Vol. I, p. ISO. *> See Bibliography, No. 79. 



