JOHN JAMES AUDUBON 53 
structed by Audubon in turn in chalk 
drawing. 
There appear to have been no sacri- 
fices that Mrs. Audubon was not willing 
and ready to make to forward the plans 
of her husband. ‘‘My best friends,’’ he 
says at this time, ‘“‘solemnly regarded 
me as a mad man, and my wife and fam- 
ily alone gave me encouragement. My 
wife determined that my genius should 
prevail, and that my final success as an 
ornithologist should be triumphant.’’ 
She wanted him to go to Europe, and, 
to assist toward that end, she entered 
into an engagement with a Mrs. Percy 
of Bayou Sara, to instruct her children, 
together with her own, and a limited 
number of outside pupils. 
Audubon, in the meantime, with his 
son Victor, and his new artist friend, 
Stein, started off in a wagon, seeking 
whom they might paint, on a journey 
through the southern states. They wan- 
dered as far as New Orleans, but Audu- 
