PROCEEDINGS-PERTHSHIRE SOCIETY OF NATURAL SCIENCE. XXIX 
ever been attempted in any publication either before or since, he had 
next to raise the thirty or forty thousand pounds necessary to meet 
the cost of the work. The next year, therefore, was spent in travell¬ 
ing throughout England and France for the purpose of obtaining the 
necessary number of subscribers, at two hundred pounds each. This 
being accomplished, he returned to America, and at once plunged 
into the tropical forests and swamps of Florida to obtain more 
material for the succeeding parts of the work. 
The remaining years of the active portion of his life were made 
up alternately of visits to England—generally in the company of his 
wife and sons—for the purpose of superintending the progress of his 
books, and of expeditions to all parts of the great North American 
continent, from the frozen shores of Hudson’s Bay to the warm and 
fertile regions of his native State. The last of these memorable 
wanderings was undertaken in 1843, when, on the morning of nth 
March, the Grand Old Naturalist set out, accompanied by his son 
Victor, to explore the mountains and rivers of the Great West. 
We have now reached the point where my father’s narrative com¬ 
mences. Here, therefore, I shall leave the story of Audubon’s life, 
and shall conclude with a word regarding his character and his work. 
This I shall do by quoting from two writers well qualified to form 
an estimate of his worth. His character has been summed up by 
Robert Buchanan, who described him as “ a man of genius, with the 
courage of a lion and the simplicity of a child.” Regarding his 
work Baron Cuvier wrote that it was “ the most magnificent monu¬ 
ment which has yet been erected to Ornithology.”* 
12th April, 1894. 
Henry Coates, F.R.S.F., President, in the Chair. 
Mr. Sidney Steele, Fairmount, was elected an Ordinary Member. 
The following donations were intimated :— 
Museum — Perthshire Collection. —Golden-crested Wren—from Mr. 
C. L. Wood, Freeland. I?idex Collection —Crocodile (ir feet long), 
from South Africa—from Sir Donald Currie, M.P., K.C.M.G. 
Library. — C£ Life of Audubon”—from Mr. Andrew Coates. 
“Catalogue of Coleoptera”—from Mr. T. M. M‘Gregor. 
Mr. T. M. M‘Gregor exhibited specimens of the Crested Newt. 
The following papers were read :— 
1. “ Perthshire Entomology.” By T. M. M‘Gregor. (See Trans., 
Vol. II., p. 29). 
2. “On the Marine Origin of the Old Red Sandstone of Scot¬ 
land.” By James Reid, Blairgowrie. (See Trans., Vol. II., p. 21). 
* See Audubon, the Naturalist of the New World, by Mrs. Horace St. John, 
New York, 1856 ; Life and Adventures of John James Audubon, edited by Robert 
Buchanan, London, 1868 ; Life of John James Audubon, edited by his Widow, 
New York, 1869; The Story of Audubon, the Naturalist, London, 1886; and 
Report of the Audubon Monument Committee of the New York A cadem v of Sciences, 
New York, 1893 (reprinted from the Transactions of the Academy, Vol. XIII.) 
