374 AUDUBON, THE NATURALIST 
change in subsequent editions of this printed state- 
ment.” 
Audubon left Edinburgh for London on April 5, 
1827, with locks shorn but energy unabated. He fol- 
lowed a roundabout course, visiting Belford, “Mitford 
Castle,’ Newcastle-upon-Tyne, York, Leeds, Liver- 
pool, and Shrewsbury, at every point extending his ac- 
quaintance, showing his drawings to many, and adding 
appreciably to his growing list of subscribers. Several 
days were spent in hunting and drawing birds with the 
Selbys, at their beautiful country place called “Twizel 
House,” at Belford, in Northumberland, where he was 
soon made to feel as much at home as with his older 
Liverpool friends, the Rathbones, at “Green Bank.” 
P. J. Selby, after whom Audubon named a Flycatcher 
which appeared in his second number, was an amateur 
artist and ornithologist, and at that time was engaged 
upon an extensive publication to which Audubon was 
21The work, as originally announced, was to appear in parts of 5 
plates each, at 2 guineas a part, and in order to distribute the expense 
to purchasers it was expected to issue but 5 parts a year. The plates, 
to be engraved on copper, were of double elephant folio size, and printed 
on paper of the finest quality, all the birds and flowers to be life-size, and 
to be carefully colored by hand, after the originals; any subscriber 
was at liberty to take a part or the whole. It was stated in the 
prospectus of 1829, when 10 parts had been published: “There are 400 
Drawings, and it is proposed that they shall comprise Three Volumes, 
each containing 133 Plates, to which an Index will be given at the 
end of each, to be bound up with the volume. ... It would be advisable 
for the subscriber to procure a Portfolio, to keep the Numbers till 
a volume is completed.” To avoid the expense entailed by copyright 
regulations in England, indices and all other letterpress were eventually 
omitted; the number of parts was extended to 87, or 435 plates, and the 
number of volumes to 4, a necessity imposed by the discovery of many 
new birds, even after the omission of the figures of the eggs, which 
Audubon had reserved for the close, and the undue crowding of many 
of his final plates. The “Prospectus” issued with the first volume of 
the text in 1831 contained a list of the first 100 plates, together with 
extracts of reviews by Cuvier and Swainson, and a list of subscribers 
to the number of 180. For further details, see Bibliography, No. 1, and 
Appendix III, No. 2. 
