A MEETING OF RIVALS 203 
This man was Alexander Wilson, who, like Audubon, 
was a pioneer in the study of the birds of his adopted 
land, but who was twenty years his predecessor in point 
of publication. The books which he then carried were 
part of the first edition of his now famous American 
Ornithology, the second volume of which had appeared 
in Philadelphia at the beginning of that year. Though 
not destined to be completed until after his death, this 
work was to become one of the scientific and lit- 
erary treasures of the nation, but it is not likely that 
one in ten thousand had then ever heard of him, whether 
as poet or as ornithologist, or cared anything about his 
work or his mission. 
Wilson at that moment was starting on his last long 
journey through the West and South, in search of new 
birds. He also carried in his pocket a subscription list, 
and therefore belonged to that class of visitor which is 
seldom welcomed with rapture. At Lancaster, Pennsyl- 
vania, Wilson’s first important stopping-place, and at 
that time the capital of the State, Governor Snyder put 
down his name for $120, the price of the completed work. 
This seemed a good omen, but, at Hanover, in the same 
state, an incident occurred which might have discour- 
aged a less determined man; the interview has become 
historical, and we shall give Wilson’s own relation of 
it:* 
Having a letter from Dr. Muhlenburgh to a Clergyman in 
Hanover, I passed on through a well cultivated country, chiefly 
inhabited by Germans, to that place, where a certain Judge 
Hustetter took upon himself to say, that such a book as mine 
ought not to be encouraged; as it was not within the reach of 
1In a letter to Alexander Lawson, written from Pittsburgh, on 
February 22, 1810; see Elliott Coues, “Private Letters of Wilson, Ord, 
and Bonaparte,” Penn Monthly, vol. x, pp. 443-455 (Philadelphia, 1879). 
