TO EUROPE AND SUCCESS 361 
,cieties of the modern Athens elected Audubon to honor- 
ary membership; Combe, the phrenologist and author of 
The Constitution of Man, examined the naturalist’s head 
and modeled it in plaster, for of course it proved to be a 
perfect exemplification of his system; Syme, the artist, 
did his portrait for Lizars to engrave. Meanwhile the 
press was giving such flattering accounts of the-man 
and his work that Audubon confessed that he was quite 
ashamed to walk the street. At the annual banquet of 
the Royal Institution, held at the Waterloo Hotel and 
presided over by Lord Elgin, Audubon was toasted, 
and it required all his resolution to rise and, for the 
first time in his life, address a large assembly; this, how- 
ever, he managed to do in the following words: “Gen- 
tlemen; my command of words in which to reply to your 
kindness is almost as limited as that of the birds hanging 
on the walls of your Institution. I am truly obliged for 
your favors. Permit me to say; may God bless you 
all, and may this society prosper.” On the 10th of De- 
cember he wrote: “My situation in Edinburgh borders 
on the miraculous,” and he felt that his reception in that 
city was a good augury for the future. But the life 
that he was compelled to lead was extremely fatiguing, 
and he often longed to return to his family and to his 
favorite magnolia woods in Louisiana. “I go to dine,” 
he wrote, “at six, seven, or even eight o’clock in the eve- 
ning, and it is often one or two when the party breaks 
up; then painting all day, with my correspondence, 
which increases daily, makes my head feel like an im- 
mense hornet’s nest, and my body wearied beyond all 
calculation; yet it has to be done; those who have my 
best interests at heart tell me I must not refuse a single 
invitation.” But notwithstanding the tax which society 
always levies upon the lion’s strength, he wrote almost 
