AUDUBON'S LABRADOR TRIP 



three, I have drawn a Colymhus septentriona- 

 lis [red-throated loon] and a young one, and 

 nearly finished a Ptarmigan; this afternoon, 

 however, at half-past five, my fingers could 

 no longer hold my pencil, and I was forced to 

 abandon my work, and go ashore for exercise. 

 The fact is that I am growing old too fast; 

 alas! I feel it ■ — emd yet work I will, and may 

 God grant me life to see the last plate of my 

 mammoth work finished." Later in the Jour- 

 nal, under date of August lo, he says: " I have 

 been drawing so constantly, often seventeen 

 hours a day, that the weariness of my body 

 at night has been unprecedented, by such work 

 at least. At times I felt as if my physical pow- 

 ers would abandon me; my neck, my shoulders, 

 and, more than all, my fingers, were almost 

 useless through actual fatigue at drawing. . . , 

 The young men think my fatigue is added to 

 by the fact that I often work in wet clothes, 

 but I have done that all my life with no ill 

 effects. No! no! it is that I am no longer 

 young." 



Until the publication in 191 7 of the impor- 

 tant work on "Audubon the Naturalist," by 

 Francis Hobart Herrick, there was a mystery 



15 



