AUDUBON’S ANEID 309 
and his companion, having selected their boots, went on 
their way rejoicing. 
Audubon left Natchez on December 31, 1820, on a 
keel boat belonging to his brother-in-law, Nicholas A. 
Berthoud, who accompanied him, and at one o’clock the 
steamer Columbus hauled off from the landing and 
took them in tow. Towards evening, when they were 
looking up their personal belongings, the naturalist 
found to his dismay that a portfolio containing all of 
the drawings that he had made on the voyage down the 
river was missing. Letters were despatched to Natchez 
friends, but it was not until the 16th of March that his 
anxiety was relieved; the missing portfolio had been 
found and left at the office of The Mississippi Repub- 
lican, whence it was forwarded on his order, and reached 
his hand on the 5th of April. ‘So very generous had 
been the finder of it,” he said, “that when I carefully 
examined the drawings in succession, I found them all 
present and uninjured, save one, which had probably 
been kept by way of commission.” 
On New Year’s Day, 1821, they came to at Bayou 
Sara, at the mouth of the inlet of that name, which 
later saw much of Audubon and his family. On the 
following day he made a likeness of the master of their 
craft, Mr. Dickenson, for which he was paid in gold; 
he also outlined two warblers by candle-light in order 
to have time to finish them on the morrow. The captain 
of their steamer in his anxiety to make haste had set 
them adrift at this point, and they were obliged to make 
their way as best they could, by aid of the current and 
oars, to the port of New Orleans, which was finally 
entered on Sunday, January 7, 1821. 
Audubon landed at New Orleans without enough 
money to pay for a night’s lodging, for someone had 
