He persuaded Bradford, a Philadelphia publisher, who had employed him in 1806, in editing the American edition of Rees’s Cyclopedia, to furnish funds for an American ornithology on an adequate scale. The first volume of this work appeared in September, 1808, but it was too expensive to be very successful. The seventh volume appeared in 1813.
The interval had been passed in exploring different parts of the country for the purpose of extending his observations, collecting specimens and watching the habits of birds in their native haunts.
In January, 1810, the second volume appeared, but before the next was prepared Wilson sailed down the Ohio River in a small boat as far as Louisville, he set out on horseback from Nashville for New Orleans in May, 1811, and arrived June 6. Sailing from there he arrived back in Philadelphia in August, and began the third volume.
In September, 1812, he started on another tour of the eastern States. He completed the publication of seven volumes.
In 1813 the literary materials for the eighth volume of the “Ornithology” were ready, but its progress was greatly retarded for want of proper assistants to color the plates. Wilson was therefore obliged to undertake the whole of this department himself in addition to his other duties. He employed himself so unceasingly in the preparation of his work that he impaired his already weakened condition and hastened death. It is said that in his eagerness to obtain a rare bird, he swam across a river and caught cold from which he never recovered.
All the plates for the remainder of his work having been completed under Wilson’s own eye the letter press work on the ninth volume was supplied by his friend, George Ord, his companion in several of his expeditions, who also wrote a memoir of Wilson to accompany the last volume, and edited the eighth. Four supplementary volumes were afterwards added by Charles Lincoln Bonaparte.
An edition of Alexander Wilson’s poems was published at Paisley in 1816, and another at Belfast in 1857. A statue of him was erected at Paisley in October, 1874.
Wilson was followed by another Pennsylvanian, John James Audubon, who lived for many years on the Perkiomen near its mouth. He published an immense work upon the “Birds of America,” which brought him lasting fame. Thus the two greatest ornithologists of America are claimed as residents of our state.
In the quiet retreat of the churchyard of the old Swedes Church, or “Gloria Dei,” at Weccacoe, where he delighted to worship, repose the remains of Alexander Wilson. The distinguished ornithologist requested to be laid to rest there, as it was “a silent, shady place where the birds would be apt to come and sing over his grave.”