BIOGRAPHICAL SKETCH 



OF 



JOHN JAMES AUDUBON, ESQ. 



Little is known of this celebrated naturalist 

 and draughtsman, except what appears in the 

 autobiographical memoir prefixed to the des- 

 criptive letterpress of his great work, The 

 Birds of America. We therefore give it nearly 

 at full length. 



" I received life and light," says he, " in the 

 New World. When I had hardly yet learned 

 to walk, and to articulate those first words 

 always so endearing to parents, the productions 

 of Nature that lay spread all around were 

 constantly pointed out to me. They soon 

 became my playmates; and before my ideas 

 were sufficiently formed to enable me to 

 estimate the difference between the azure tints 



