1 HARVARD COLLEGE LIBRARY FROM 1918 S1174.766 Entered according to Act of Congress, in the year 1856, BY C. S. FRANCIS & Co., Southern District of New York. Ito PREFACE. The materials of this narrative have been derived from Audubon's works, from the recollections of his friends, and from fragments published in the United States. The writer's object has been, exclusively, to follow the adventurous American through those episodes of romance and discovery which constituted his career as a naturalist. Those unacquainted with the enthusiasm which carried him onward in the project of his life, may be at times startled at the extreme vigour of his descriptions ; but when it is recollected that his original language was French, and that in rendering his thoughts and feelings in English, he found it wanting in the sweetness and vividness requisite for the expression of his poetic imagination, and to illustrate the beauties of nature as he felt them, then his style will be fully appreciated, and the reader will follow him through his career, wondering that nature had so many beauties before unknown to him. It has been found necessary to correct the English edition in many particulars of fact, and in the order of events, which are better known on this side the water. Some additions have been made by the American publishers. CONTENTS. PAGE Crags and Cliffs of the St. Lawrence.. The El Dorado of the Naturalist. Audubon, the Genius of the Woods.... His early Devotion to the Study of Nature. Disappointments and Difficulties... Burns hundreds of his Early Sketches. Is sent to France to be Educated... Has David for his Master...... Has no taste for other than Natural Subjects.. Unwearied in the Study of Creation..... Returns to the Woods of the New World. Resumes his early Studies....... |