ralist is apt to be. Poor Wilson, indeed, with his morose and fitful temper, will always be cited as an exception. Yet, that strong man had bitter woes enough to contend with, in his earlier days, to have grown a gall beneath an angel's heart. The bursts of sunshine and exultation which now and then show through his writings, indicate that his nner self sometimes had fed healthfully withal. We have often tried to trace as far hack as possible into the days of our childhood, the period at which our memory of consciousness first became linked with external things—or, in other words, our memory of life began-and curiously enough, we never have been able to get farther than to a time when we were kicking and screaming in our nurse's arms, with ecstasied and uncontrollable eagerness, to get our hands upon a beautiful Albino hare, which had been purchased as a curiosity by our father, and sent home in a basket. The picture of that snowy creature, with its pink eyne,' and long ears laid back, couched and trembling amidst the tow on which it had been placed in its wicker cage, is, to this hour, distinct as a scene of yesterday it is identified with our first amazed realization of a separate being, and questioning of that mysterious outer world, where such shapes of wondrous beauty grew.

All our pleasantest memories of calm, unmixed delight, from that time up to this day, are somehow associated with those fresh articulations of God's thought in forms. The sunny attic we proudly called our room, was a sort of caravansary, filled with the travelers of the air and wood. What a happiness it was to familiarize each new prisoner with our presence, and sit and watch in lowbreathed quiet all their ways, and laugh out suddenly till the old house rung, at some odd whimsicality of passionate gesture. When the snow came, that was to be a joyful time! When the grey, heavy cloud gathered over night, and a few broad flakes came scattering slowly down through the twilight-then we knew there would be a heavy snow in the morning. What a restless, fidgety fever we were in! We went to bed early that night, that we might get up early, and meanwhile sleep away the suspense we forgot to say our prayers, for we did say them nightly in those sinless days and lay and tossed in restless visions of traps and snares and dead falls -of monstrous hares, big as our dog

Milo," swung up by the neck at the end of a pole-of great flocks of quails, with. strange, beautiful birds among them, fluttering and peering their heads through the sticks of our traps-of white foxes or black foxes, or a great possum lying with head crushed beneath our dead-falls -or of tracking some creature that left the foot-mark of an elephant on the fresh snow, for miles and miles through the bowed and foreign-looking woods, until it had been treed' at last; when after toiling and tugging with sweaty brow, we had drawn it forth from the hollow, and held it in our hand, we saw without the least surprise that it was a soft, little wood-mouse! Ah! delicious fantasies were they! When at cock-crow we bounded out of bed, and ran to the window, how we clapped our hands, and waked everybody with our shouts, "The snow! the snow! A deep snow!" Then what a fussing time-making new traps

stealing clap-boards, and every other sort of boards that were available to be split into "trap-pieces." What a teasing our father for " triggers”—triggers for spring-falls--nooses, partridge-traps and all. How we wondered we couldn't get the old gentleman to understand that we should be ruined!-dead ruined !—if we couldn't get them ready to be set by breakfast time-that all the other boys would have set theirs and taken the best places. Little did we care for the hot coffee and cakes that morning, but with a sup and a bite, shouting for "Milo," and " Pomp" the negro boy, to help us -we were off, discussing eagerly by the way, whether the sink-hole" in the pasture, the thicket in the cornfield fencerow, or the blackberry patch in the edge of the woods, were the surest place for bob whites' (partridges), or molly cotton-tails,' (hares.) There was no deciding between them-so, to settle the matter, a trap was set at each place, and one in addition, for larks, and doves, and red birds, by the old wheat stack behind the barn. Pompey carried the spade— the snow was dug away from each sagaciously chosen spot, and the black earth exposed, so that our tempting bait could show afar-the trap placed in the bare spot, and set with careful nicety; and then with many a wistful look behind to see if the birds were not at it already, we went on to the next. When this was got through with, then came hunting hares under the snow. Ah! that was the sport! Molly-cotton' would sit still, wherever the snowstorm

overtook her, until it began to cover her over; then she would crowd, and push back and forth, and press the snow to one side, until she had formed a roomy little chamber all about her, while the snow would go on heaping, until a domed arch grew over all, with just one small round hole kept open through its top to let in the air--and there she sat, snug as a Russian Princess in her palace of ice, dreaming of the cabbage-leaves and apple-shoots in a neighboring garden. But Molly's golden visions are as subject to be rudely dispelled, as those of other people. See, Milo's keen nose has marked one of these "breathing holes" on the smooth, glistening surface of the snow-how suddenly he stops with his foot raised-"Steady, boy! steady!" We plunge with long leaps through the snow,-helter skelter, here we comewe, Milo, Pompey, all together tumbling head over heels upon the snowy roof of mistress Molly's palace. There she is we feel the soft, warm fur-"squeak! squeak!" her plaintive cry rings out! we have her!-Every hour or two the traps are visited. From afar we can see that one is down-our heart jumps-we long sorely to run-Pompey starts off-we call him back. It is necessary we should be dignified, and prove to him and all the world, by our unhurried calmness,

"That our demerits

May speak unbonneted to as proud a for

tune

As this that has befallen."

We walk slow and stately, feeling exalted by our self-denial-speculating after what manner the fates are about to reward us-thinking of a dozen Partridges, a male Red Bird, or may be, a large fat Grouse, or some new and wondrous creature, as befitting our just claims. We are close at hand-we can see the little tenement shake-hear the heavy beat of struggling wings-too much for our stoicism is that sound. With a fluttering pulse, we spring eagerly forward-Bah! It is nothing but a common, thieving Jay. We almost staggered, from the revulsion of our lofty aspirations; while Pompey proceeds to get him out with sundry abusive epithets and threats of neck ringing. "Yah, yah, ole feller! cotch at last! carry sticks to de debbil fur to make fire to burn dis child wid-does you! Da! now carry sticks to de debbil!" Away flutters the poor Jay's headless body, over the bloodied snow! We are not cruel, and

it was a perfect agony for us to see any of our prisoners killed; but the shock of the fall of our high-flown hopes was too severe in this case for our recovery in time to save the poor victim of a superstition universal among the negroes, and to which, were we not ashamed of the confession, we might admit, our having been somewhat inclined ourselves.

Ah! they were a passion within us those bright and gentle-eyed birds! By the time the snow was gone, our "attic" was populous enough. But when the breezy, gay and glowing spring had come, and the carolling out of doors, and the warm deepening green, and the faint odors of the youngest flowers, were stealing on the air, the prisoners grew so restless, and looked so out of place in their bare wooden cages, that day by day compunctious visitings grew upon us, until one after another, with many a yearning sigh as we looked after them, all were turned loose upon the sunny earth again. We were saddened for days to think of their ingratitude; for no one of them would ever come back to us!

But sorrows never lasted long in those times. The sap run vigorously, and new pleasures soon grew over the old scars. This was the nesting time of birds. What an eye we had for the localities most apt to be selected by our favorites to build their homes in. We were seldom taken by surprise in finding a nest. We could almost tell beforehand the very fork in which the Jay would hide its clumsy house. We knew the limb the Robin meant to build on. We could tell the very stump yonder pair of Blue Birds would select. The thicket where the Thrush would build was known to us, and the very Pear Tree, or the Locust, the Oriole would hang its cradle from, was prophetically foreshadowed. could tell there was a Tom Tit's populous nursery in the Woodpecker's deserted chamber of yonder dead young Mulberry, before we came to it; as for the Flicker, we knew his ways better than his betterhalf; many a sunshiny morning have we set, and mocked, and laughed at each other. We knew where the Screech Owl hid in that old hollow Beechwhere the robber Hawk, and Eagle eyried on the cliff, or sturdy Oak top. It was no mystery to us where the shy Flame, Bird hid its eggs; and even that matchless artist, the Humming Bird, could not deceive us with his moss-cloaked bulb, that looked so like the gradual swell

We

ing of a natural knot upon the limb where it was placed. The noisy, cunning Crow could never baffle us, with all his loud-mouthed gammon! Even the weird and subtle Mocking Bird had to give in to our untiring watchfulness. As for the meek and simple-hearted Dove, we especially patronised her; and used daily to visit her, to watch, lest some rude boy, or prowling cat had marked the low and exposed nest the silly thing had placed upon some Apple Tree limb, across the orchard path; and respecting the Wren Miss Kitty,' the jade, I believe she would have built in our coat sleeve, had we given her half a chance! The Blue Martin and we knew each other's faces Spring in and Autumn out; for many a friendly and familiar gossip had we held together from our attic window. But the tyrant Bee Martin would ruffle his vermilion crest at the very sight of us, and dip toward our head with his waspish, querulous twittering. Well he knew we were his mortal foe, and but that he had won our respect by his indomitable game,' our hate would verily have been exterminating-for the scamp lived such a life of brawls and rows, that no decent, well-behaved bird could stay in his neighborhood. Many a time boiling over with indignation to see him buffet and persecute that happiest embodiment of blithe and gushing music, the orchard Oriole-have we seized our gun and sallied forth for new game; but the little warrior would scream his defiance even as he fell, and peck and claw to the very last gasp, and then we stood over him and sorrowed for our hasty wrath!

We were a daring climber in those days. A clean shaft, thirty feet to the limbs, was a mere irritation to us, especially if we had spied a grey Squirrel's summer pavilion swinging to the breeze upon its lofty top. When we had mounted, what a joy it was-rocking from the utmost fork-to look out over the upheaving, rustling ocean of green leaves, and hear its low, solemn murmurings go by! Many a feruling has a bird or squir rel's nest cost us, savagely laid on by a brutal and captious pedagogue. We hate the mean oppressor to this day. We were a scape-grace truant, to be sure; but God made the bright sun and beautiful earth that wooed our lagging steps, and we should not have been scarred and bruised by a base thick-blooded wretch, because we yielded an hour to the holy spell, and could forget, amid scenes of

such enchantment, even the terrors of his gloomy reign! That " Old Field Schoolmaster" will have many grievous sins to answer for in his day of accounts. May the justice which shall be measured unto him be more lenient than any he meted out to us. We fought him at last, tooth and finger nails, with the scornful but futile spite of one of our little warrior King-Birds, caught napping by the claws of a carrion Crow. We ran away to our friends and were protected from his vengeance. Dread was the ire that shook his mighty soul when he saw that the victim was beyond the reach of his tyranny-it rose and expanded into prophecy-and he registered the vow before the fates that "he would live to see us— the worst boy in the county-hanged!” Ha! ha! it might have befallen with us, as with Absalom, to have been hung by the hair in a tree-top, for daily we ran the risk in climbing for bird's nests; but as yet the neck of the "worst boy in the county" is innocent of any unpleasant familiarity with hemp;' may the shadow of that ominous prophecy never be less! Ah! boys who loved the green wood better than the Horn-book, saw hard times in our young days! We hope "the school-master abroad" in these latter years, has read Audubon, and is therefore a more pitiful personage!

Audubon delightful name! Well do we remember what a hold it took upon our young imagination, when we heard the fragmented rumor from afar, that there was a strong man abroad then, who lived in the wilderness with only his dog and gun, and did nothing day by day but follow up the birds-watching everything they might do-keeping in sight of them all the time wherever they went while the light lasted-then sleeping beneath the tree where they perched, to be up and follow them again with the dawn, until he knew every habit and way that belonged to them. That when he was satisfied, he would shoot them some way so as not to tear their plumage, and then sit down on the mossy root of an oak, and, with nobody to connoisseur for him but his wise-looking dog, and the Squirrel, that stamped and scolded at him from the limbs above, he would draw such marvellous pictures as the world never saw of birds before!

Oh, what a happy, happy being that curious man must be, we used to thinkand what a brave one too, to sleep out among the panthers and the wild-cats, and

where the Indian's whoop was heardtrusting only to his single arm and his faithful dog. We loved to speculate about that dog-he must be larger than our "Milo," we thought, and just about as gentle and true, but a little more knowing. How we envied him the happiness of such a master and such a life. As for the master, what magical conjurations of a charmed fancy we loved to associate with him. He must be noble and good, and wear such lofty calmness upon his brow. We had an ideal of physical perfection, and below it we could not bear to conceive that so heroic a philosopher could fall. What a martyr spirit his must be, and what a holy enthusiasm leads him on through tangled swamps, where the Cougar yelled, Alligators roared, and hideous Serpents parted, with their wavy, spotted lengths, the green scum of stagnant pools-up difficult mountains, where the rattle-snake sprung its deadly alarum amidst the mossy fissures of the crumbling stones, and the eagle whetted his hooked beak upon the crag-points or beneath the profound shadows of primeval forests, where the few sunbeams that straggled through at noonday, looked like gold dust scattered over the black earth-down the destructive flood of mighty rivers, or beside crystal lakes set in a columnar rim of giant cypressesout on the sky-bounded, ocean-heaved prairies, or where the green and glinting icebergs thundered crashingly against the hoar cliffs of "fretted Labrador," or the tropic gulf' hurled at the low keys' its foamy mountains-through, amidst, and over all, his dauntless spirit was passing, led always by the winnowing sound of wings. What a poetical enchantment there was to us in such a life!-what sights of awe and beauty he must seewhat images of touching truth-of odd, peculiar humors he must have storedand that magical power he was said to possess, to tame in colors the very waves upon the leap, and the arrowy Albatross upon the plunge into its beaded crest!--all these were so surprising and miraculous to us, that we wondered, in our simplicity, whether such devotion was not sinful, and such surpassing works would not bring upon their author persecution and imprisonment for necromancy, as the story books told had been the case of old. It seemed to us, too much bliss and too many gifts for a single mortal to enjoy! We felt not envious, but a deep emulation was stirred within us by such thoughts

-we swore in our inmost heart that we would first see all these things for ourself, with our own eyes, where and as he had seen them out upon the broad face of the extended world-and then we could look upon his work and know, with an appreciative knowledge, whether he had wrought these miracles or not.

This resolve gave much of its tone to our after life. Many a tie was rent, and much agony endured by our friends, when we became an unrecking wanderer through wild and distant regions. The uttermost arms and channels of our tremendous seaward floods saw us amongst their springs. The salt and tumbling Gulf tossed us upon its southern shore, and broad savannahs swelled in our westward course into undulating plains; and they yet rose, across their wearisome breadth, into tall rounded hills that grew apace with crags upon their heads, until heap upon heap far glinting through the clouds, the pinnacled, sharp rocks climbed upwards, and the vast forest of crags speared its white bloomy tops among the stars.

Our restless tread was everywhere-our eager eyes saw all that our great continent could show. The grisly bear and the tropic bird' were equally known to us. The savage trooper and the Mexican slave had been familiars, as well as the fierce bandit and the stern simple-hearted hunter. Years of our earlier manhood passed in these erratic wanderings. We had grown familiar with all wild, grotesque and lonely creatures that populate those infinite solitudes of nature that own not man's dominion." The visions and the passion of our boyhood still haunted us, and the rustling of free wings by our ear yet awaked all pleasantest images. Now we felt we had a right to know and see, face to face, that remarkable man whose deeds and life had so much occupied our imagination—who had so made a living reality out of what had been to us the poetry of life-aye! a poetry which had been with us stronger

"Than stipulations, duties, reverences," and driven us far and wide, an April shadow chased before the fitful winds! Should we ever see him? The eager questioning lived about our heart whenever we heard his name. We returned home the prodigal son,' our spirit much tamed and chastened; yet the old leaven fermented deep beneath the calmer surface.

Not long had our restless steps been still. We were again a traveler. Our boat landed one morning about daybreak at Pittsburg--that singular city that looks as though it had been built over the very gates of Acheron. Soon as we made our appearance in the raw, foggy air upon the wharf, early as it was, we were surrounded by scores of strikers' and agents of the different hotels and transportation lines. Amidst the yells and deafening clamors of contending claims on every side, we permitted ourself to be bodily ravished into a coach, and hurried off, bag and baggage, for-the word of the darkie striker being accepted "the most splendiferous hotel in the city"! As it happened to be the one we knew, and had selected beforehand, we were content to take his definition of its superlative excellence. Before we reached our destination, the coach was hailed from a street corner, and a fellow, muffled in Pilot cloth, sprang in and took a seat beside us. To our no little astonishment, he seemed to take the most sudden and peculiar interest in us; and greatly to the exaltation of our inward consciousness of great deserts, prefaced a series of the sharpest questioning as to our whereabouts "when we were at home"-our destination, and above all, our route with the roundest and most voluble protestations as to the affectionate interest he felt in seeing that all travelers, specially such looking ones as we, were properly warned of the complicated impositions and knaveries practiced habitually upon them, by the many pretended transportation lines in this wicked city; and to wind up this touching exordium, he frankly assured us that the "Stage Route" across the mountains was the cheapestthe most safe-the genteelest, and altogether the route he would recommend to such a gentleman as we! The milk of human kindness was somewhat stirred in our veins, responsive to this gratuitous exhibition of a broad philanthropy-but as it happened that we had determined upon the "Canal Route," we waived, with the most thankful acknowledgments, any present committal, and gratefully accepted the card he thrust into our hand. But, as it most unfortunately occurred, we found the office of the " Canal Route" for Philadelphia, &c., was next door to our hotel; and we were tempted, weakly enough, no doubt! to go in and book our name" clear through." Insensate creature that we were! The canal boats

would not start until after dark, so that we spent the hours allotted to day light by the Cathedral clocks, in exploring the streets of this dim Cyclopian city. The incessant clang of sledge-hammers had become sufficiently monotonous to us, when the evening closed in, and we were glad enough to take coach and be transported to the Canal Depôt, where the usual vexations and delay consequent, had to be endured. Finally, however, we got under weigh, with such a cargo of pigs, poultry and humanity, as even canal boats are seldom blessed with. We stood upon tiptoe for the fresh air in the thronged cabin, until the time had actually come when people must go to bed. Then that awful personage, the Captain, summoned us all together, and informed us that every man, woman and child aboard, must stow his, her or itself away along the face of the narrow walls, in the succession of their registration during the day. Now it happened, that as gentlemen are not usually up before daybreak, that we stood first upon the list, and were of course entitled to the first choice of hammocks. We panted in the centre of the close-jammed crowd, waiting till the ladies, who always take precedence in America, had been called off. Now, as it happened that this right of choice was finally definitive for the route, and determined whether one should sleep upon a hammock, or the floor, or tables, for several successive nights-it was a matter of no little moment.

66

It occurred while the ladies were being disposed of, that we heard above the buzz around us the name of Audubon spoken. Our attention was instantly attracted by that magical sound. We listened in breathless eagerness. We heard a gentleman near us say, "Mr. Audubon is last on the list; I fear he will not get a bed, we are so crowded!" We felt our heart leap. What," said we, leaning forward quickly, "is it possible Monsieur Audubon can be aboard? We thought he was still on his Rocky Mountain tour!" "We are just returning, sir,” said the gentleman, courteously, half smiling as he observed the excited expression of our face. "But you are joking, are you not?" said we, hardly able to realize so much happiness. "He cannot really be in this boat. Where? Which is he?" "He is actually in this very cabin," said he, turning full upon us. "The man of all others in the world I wanted to see most," we ejaculated, half