ALEXANDER WILSON.

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nent cheek bones, were unfavourably united to a stature not above the middle height. His dress, consisting of a short coat, trousers and waistcoat of gray cloth, was one unfrequent in that part of the country. His object in calling was to secure Audubon's patronage and a fresh subscription for his work. Audubon, on the eve of assenting to his request, was arrested by an interrogation from a friend, with an acpanying suggestion--that his own drawings were far superior. Whether from vanity, which too willingly corroborated the assertion, or a conscientious conviction of its truth, Au. dubon then declined to subscribe.

The astonishment of Wilson, on examining the collection of Audubon was as great as had been his on recognizing a fellow labourer. Pursuing the same objects and proposing the same ends, they had remained in entire ignorance of each other's inquiries and achievements; and like too many students toiling in solitude to laborious discoveries, were surprised and disappointed to find them forestalled.

Audubon strove to efface the annoyance, evidently caused through his dissent, by every friendly demonstration to Wilson, even offering to allow him to publish the results of his own researches, which he had not the intention of doing himself at that time, with the condition

only, that their origin should be mentioned. The proposal was, however, declined. Wilson departed, leaving Audubon disagreeably perplexed as to what reminiscence of this singular occurrence would be retained by him. To his regret he was enlightened, afterwards, on read. ing the following paragraph in “Wilson's Ornithology."

“March 23d, 1810.-I bade adieu to Louisville, to which place I had four letters of recommendation, and was taught to expect much of everything there; but neither received one act of civility from those to whom I was recommended, one subscriber, nor one new bird; though I delivered my letters, ransacked the woods repeatedly, and visited all the characters likely to subscribe. Science or literature has not one friend in this place."

This bitter record of disappointment-certainly, in some measure justified by Audubon, --then, apparently, under the happiest auspices, for his own success, was felt by him as a lasting alloy in his pleasurable associations with Louisville. After a residence there of two years, Au. dubon's next dwelling was at Henderson, on the Ohio, whither he repaired in 1811. Remark. able fertility of soil characterizes the Kentuckian State. The beauty of its borders, extending along the margin of the most magnificent of

THE PASSENGER PIGEON.

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rivers, its forests, streams, springs and caves, its verdurous heights and charming valleys must have rendered this abiding place nothing inferior in attraction, to Louisville. Here he remained for several years, and unfaltering in enterprise, added fresh stores to his ornithological lore. Among the most interesting of his observations were those relative to the character and habits of that bird of romantic tradition the passenger pigeon. The flight of this bird is performed with singular rapidity. With shrewd caution, it breaks the force of its descent by repeated flappings as it nears the earth, from dread of injury on alighting too suddenly. Its migrations, which are for the purpose of securing food, and not on account of temperature, do not, therefore take place at any fixed season. It remains for several years in Kentucky. This is owing, probably, to the exuberant fertility of the soil, the passenger pigeon requiring, apparently, a plentiful supply of food, equivalent to its powers of digestion, which are as extraordinary as its capacity of flight

These aerial passengers, travelling at the rate of four hundred miles in six hours, are enabled, if so inclined, to visit the whole European continent in two or three days. They are facilitated in the object for which they fly--the discovery

of food-by the keenness of their vision, so that when skimming a barren track, they soar high, with extended front, in order to survey hundreds of acres at once. Finding the earth abundantly supplied, they fly low; and, when enticed to alight by a particularly plentiful spot, they hover round in circles to review it. The dense mass they then form, presents, during its evolutions, the most beautiful appearances; now a glistening sheet of azure,—when their backs are in view; and, again, by sudden simultaneous change, a canopy of rich deep purple. Lost for a moment, midst the foliage, they again emerge, and, flapping their wings, with a rushing noise, as of distant thunder, sweep through the forests to see if danger is near. Their aerial motions are so extraordinary as to resemble the action of military discipline. In the process of throwing up the withered leaves, in search of food, the rear ranks pass continuously over the main body, alighting in front, in such rapid succession, that the whole force seems still on wing. If menaced by a hawk, they rise suddenly with the might of a torrent, and pressing into a solid mass, dart forward in undulating lines, descend and sweep close over the earth with wonderful velocity, mount perpendicularly in a vast column, and, when high aloft, wheel and twist within their lines, which then resemble the coils

BARRENS OF KENTUCKY.

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of a gigantic serpent. Multitudes are seen, sometimes, in groups, at the estimate of a hundred and sixty-three flocks in twenty-one minutes. The noonday light is then darkened as by an eclipse, and the air filled with the dreamy buzzing of their wings.

Not unfrequently a terrible massacre of these birds takes place, when an armed company of men and boys assemble on the banks of the Ohio for their destruction. Great pomp attends the cruel victory-a camp is formed, fires are lighted, and overpowering is the din and confusion of the contest. Enormous quantities are destroyed, and the remains left unappropriated on the ground. Spite of these devastations, the number of the birds is always doubled, and often quadrupled yearly.

But more terrible to the winged tribes, than forest crusades, sweeping with desolation through the woods like tornadoes, are the earthquakes, which menace a traveller over those vast and dreary plains—the famed Barrens of Kentucky. Wandering over them one November afternoon, Audubon was surprised by a sudden and strange darkness, spreading from the western horizon. Regarding it as the forerunner only of one of the hurricanes, a storm to which he was well used, without further apprehension, he merely spurred his horse to reach the sheltering roof of