302 AUDUBON, THE NATURALIST 
power and the balance-wheel that were requisite for the 
development of her husband’s genius. Without her 
zeal and self-sacrificing devotion the world would never 
have heard of Audubon. His budding talents event- 
ually would have been smothered in some backwoods 
town of the Middle West or South. For the space of 
nearly twelve years, Mrs. Audubon, now as the head 
of a small private school, now as a governess in some 
friendly family who appreciated her worth, practically 
assumed the responsibility for the support and educa- 
tion of their children in order that her husband’s hands 
might be free, and with her hard-earned savings was 
able to aid him materially in the prosecution of his 
labors. When relatives or friends upbraided him for 
not entering upon some form of lucrative trade, she 
recognized his genius and always came to his support, 
being fully persuaded that he was destined to become 
one of the great workers of the world. Whatever oth- 
ers may have said or done at that time, both Audubon 
and his wife were confident of the ultimate success of 
his mission. In short, the work in which the naturalist 
was engaged became a family interest, in which every 
member was destined sooner or later to bear a part. 
Audubon recalled a somber incident of this time 
which he thought might furnish a lesson to mankind, 
and he shall relate it in his own words: 
After our dismal removal from Henderson to Louisville, 
one morning when all of us were sadly desponding, I took you 
both, Victor and John, from Shippingport to Louisville. I had 
purchased a loaf of bread and some apples; before you reached 
Louisville you were hungry, and by the river side we sat down 
and ate our scanty meal. On that day the world was with me 
as a blank, and my heart was sorely heavy, for scarcely had I 
enough to keep my dear ones alive; and yet through those dark 
