April 26, 1826, Audubon sailed for England. Arriving at Liverpool, he was able to arrange for the display of his drawings at the Liverpool Exhibition. The entrance fee was one shilling, and the receipts were from fifteen to twenty dollars a day. Surely fame was coming at last. Lord Stanley spent five hours in examining the collection, and said, "This work is unique, and deserves the patronage of the Crown." He invited Audubon to visit him at his town house in Grosvenor Square. The naturalist made portraits of various friends who were desirous of obtaining specimens of his drawing. From the exhibition of his pictures in Liverpool he realized five hundred dollars.
From this city he went to Manchester, and from thence to Edinburgh. Here he met the naturalist Professor Jameson, who promised to introduce his book to the public in his "Natural History Magazine." Professor Wilson (Christopher North) volunteered to introduce Audubon to Sir Walter Scott. Audubon was asked to sit for his portrait. The Royal Institution offered their rooms for the exhibition of his drawings, and the receipts were from twenty-five to seventy-five dollars a day.
Truly things had changed, since those desolate days in America, when he slept on the deck of a steamboat, because unable to pay for a bed, and could not summon the courage to ask the loan of fifteen dollars.
Invited to dine with the Antiquarian Society, he met Lord Elgin, who presided, and was obliged to respond to a flattering toast, which made him "feel very faint and chill. I was expected to make a speech," he says, "but could not, and never had tried. Being called on for a reply, I said, 'Gentlemen, my incapacity for words to respond to your flattering notice is hardly exceeded by that of the birds now hanging on the walls of your institution. I am truly obliged to you for your favors, and can only say, God bless you all, and may your society prosper.' I sat down with the perspiration running over me."
Professor Wilson prepared an article upon Audubon and his work for "Blackwood's Magazine." His picture was hung in the Exhibition room. He was made a member of the Wernerian Natural History Society, and of the Royal Society. He was pleased, and said, "So, poor Audubon, if not rich, thou wilt be honored at least, and held in high esteem among men."
No wonder he wrote to his wife: "My success in Edinburgh borders on the miraculous. My book is to be published in numbers, containing four birds in each, the size of life, in a style surpassing anything now existing, at two guineas a number. The engravings are truly beautiful; some of them have been colored, and are now on exhibition.... I expect to visit the Duke of Northumberland, who has promised to subscribe for my work.... One hundred subscribers for my book will pay all expenses. Some persons are terrified at the sum of one hundred and eighty guineas for a work,"—nearly a thousand dollars,—"but this amount is to be spread over eight years, during which time the volumes will be gradually completed. I am fêted, feasted; elected honorary member of societies, making money by my exhibition and by my paintings. It is Mr. Audubon here, and Mr. Audubon there, and I can only hope that Mr. Audubon will not be made a conceited fool at last." There was no fear of this. He always remained the modest, earnest, devoted student of nature.
He read before the Natural History Society a paper on the habits of the wild pigeon. He says, "I began that paper on Wednesday, wrote all day, and sat up until half-past three the next morning; and so absorbed was my whole soul and spirit in the work, that I felt as if I were in the woods of America among the pigeons, and my ears were filled with the sound of their rustling wings. After sleeping a few hours, I rose and corrected it.... Captain Hall expressed some doubts as to my views respecting the affection and love of pigeons, as if I made it human, and raised the possessors quite above the brutes. I presume the love of the mothers for their young is much the same as the love of woman for her offspring. There is but one kind of love; God is love, and all his creatures derive theirs from his: only it is modified by the different degrees of intelligence in different beings and creatures."
With all this attention, his heart was never callous to suffering. "I was sauntering along the streets," he says, "thinking of the beautiful aspects of nature, meditating on the power of the great Creator, on the beauty and majesty of his works, and on the skill he had given man to study them, when the whole train of my thoughts was suddenly arrested by a ragged, sickly-looking beggar boy. His face told of hunger and hardship, and I gave him a shilling and passed on. But turning again, the child was looking after me, and I beckoned to him to return. Taking him back to my lodgings, I gave him all the garments I had which were worn, added five shillings more in money, gave him my blessing, and sent him away rejoicing, and feeling myself as if God had smiled on me."
There is no sympathy so sweet as that born of experience. Noble-hearted Audubon! God had indeed "smiled on him." Hereafter he was to walk in the sunlight of that smile. He was to work, of course, for there is no approbation for idleness, but he was to know want no more.
March 17, 1827, he issued the prospectus of his book, which was to cost him over one hundred thousand dollars. Here was courage, but he had been fighting obstacles all his life, and he believed he could succeed. In this he said, "The author has not contented himself, as others have done, with single profile views, but in very many instances has grouped his figures so as to represent the originals at their natural avocations, and has placed them on branches of trees, decorated with foliage, blossoms, and fruits, or amidst plants of numerous species. Some are seen pursuing their prey through the air, searching for food amongst the leaves and herbage, sitting in their nests, or feeding their young; whilst others, of a different nature, swim, wade, or glide in or over their allotted element."