AN EARLY LETTER TO EDWARD HARRIS, DATED JULY 14, 1824 AT THE BEGINNING OF THEIR LIFE-LONG FRIENDSHIP.
From the Jeanes MSS. Audubon's last letter to Edward Harris, from the same source, is reproduced in [Volume II, page 287].
The Academy of Natural Sciences, founded in 1812, was well established at this time, and its rapidly growing Museum was already the largest and most valuable in the New World; ornithology was a favored subject, and the Academy's roll embraced every American pioneer worker of note in the entire field of the natural sciences. The following account of a meeting of the Academy, held on October 11, 1825, when Ord presided, has been preserved in a letter of the period:[308]
A few evenings since I was associated with a society of gentlemen, members of the Academy of Natural Sciences. There were present fifteen or twenty. Among the number were Le Sueur, Rafinesque, Say, Peale, Pattison, Harlan, and Charles Lucien Bonaparte.
Among this collection life was most strikingly exemplified: Le Sueur, with a countenance weather-beaten and worn, looked on, for the muscles of his ironbound visage seemed as incapable of motion, as those on the medals struck in the age of Julius Cæsar. Rafinesque has a fine black eye, rather bald and black hair, and withal is rather corpulent. I was informed that he was a native of Constantinople; at present he lives in Kentucky. Dr. Harlan is a spruce young man.... Peale is the son of the original proprietor of the Philadelphia Museum, and one who visited the Rocky Mountains with Major Long; he is a young man, and has no remarkable indications of countenance to distinguish him. Say, who was his companion in the same expedition, is an extremely interesting man; to him I am particularly obligated for showing me their Museum and Library. I think he told me that their society had published nine volumes.... Bonaparte is the son of Lucien Bonaparte and nephew to the Emperor Napoleon; he is a little set, black-eyed fellow, quite talkative, and withal interesting and companionable.
Among the working naturalists at Philadelphia Dr. Richard Harlan was possibly one whose friendship was most valuable to Audubon; the artist from whom he received most encouragement was Thomas Sully, the portrait painter, who took him into his studio and gave him lessons in the use of oils. Sully was one of those who saw the good side of Audubon's character, discerned his talent, and predicted for him a great future; at a later day Sully was able to rejoice in finding his prediction amply fulfilled.[309]
Convinced that the advice which Fairman and Bonaparte had given him was sound, Audubon decided to look to Europe for a publisher of his Birds, and with this end in view, set hard to work at his drawings. "I had some pupils offered," he said, "at a dollar per lesson; but I found the citizens unwilling to pay for art, although they affected to patronize it. I exhibited my drawings for a week, but found the show did not pay, and so determined to remove myself." Audubon remained in Philadelphia until August, and while in doubt as to what step he should take next, he was cheered by a visit to "Mill Grove," made in the carriage of his Quaker friend, Reuben Haines. To quote his journal:
As we entered the avenue, which led to the farm, every step brought to my mind the memory of past years, and I was bewildered by the recollections until we reached the door of the house, which had once been the residence of my father as well as of myself. The cordial welcome of Mr. Wetherill, the owner, was extremely agreeable. After resting a few moments, I abruptly took my hat and ran wildly to the woods, to the grotto where I first heard from my wife that she was not indifferent to me. It had been torn down, and some stones carted away; but raising my eyes towards heaven, I repeated the promise we had mutually made. We dined at Mill Grove, and as I entered the parlor I stood motionless for a moment on the spot where my wife and myself were forever joined.
In this dramatic rehearsal the naturalist clearly implies that he was married in the parlor of his own home, but his excellent wife, who was surely in this instance the better authority, explicitly states that their marriage took place in her father's house at "Fatland Ford." Since Audubon was in the habit of sending extracts from his journal to his family, it is clear that errors of this sort were the simple result of an impulsive temperament; the moment his imagination pictured his wedding as having taken place in his old abode, down went the jotting in the journal, which was written at odd moments anywhere, often at late hours, and with no care in revision or thought of future publication.
On August 1, 1824, Audubon recorded in his diary that he had left Philadelphia for New York on the day before, "in good health, free from debt, and free from anxiety about the future." Sully had given him glowing letters of introduction to Gilbert Stuart, Washington Allston and Colonel Trumbull, but then as now midsummer was not a propitious time to find city people at home, and he began to consider the advisability of visiting both Albany and Boston. Alternately elated or depressed by the prospects of the day or the hour, Audubon wrote on August 4 that he had called with a letter of introduction on Dr. Mitchell, who had given him "a kind letter to his friend Dr. Barnes." This hurriedly penciled note from the Nestor of American science of that day has been carefully preserved, and reads as follows:[310]