held by France, and to every outward appearance it had enjoyed such
unbounded and steadily increasing prosperity that it was regarded with
envy on every side; in fine, it seemed to be one of the richest and most
desirable colonies in the whole world. Historians, said an observer
of a later day,[30] were "never weary of enumerating the amount of
its products, the great trade, the warehouses full of sugar, cotton,
coffee, indigo and cocoa; its plains covered with splendid estates, its
hillsides dotted with noble houses; a white population, rich, refined,
enjoying life as only a luxurious colonial society can enjoy it." Few
could then see the foul blot beneath so fair a surface, or realize that
what had been bought by the misery and blood of a prostrate race would
demand an equivalent, and that a settlement might be forced.
Negroes had been imported into Santo Domingo from the African coasts
in incredible numbers, first by Spain after she had succeeded in
exterminating the inoffensive native Caribs, and later by France. One
hundred thousand blacks of all ages were entering the colonies each
year, and to secure this number of _bossals_, as the native Africans
were called, involved the death of nearly as many more, either through
the fighting that preceded their capture on land, or from the terrors
of pestilence or shipwreck that awaited them at sea. By 1790 the blacks
of Santo Domingo outnumbered the whites sixteen to one, and the number
of blacks then in the island was estimated at 480,000, in contrast to
30,800 whites, and about 24,000 free mulattoes or "people of color."
Under French rule the blacks had been subjected, as many believed, to a
system of slavery unsurpassed for cruelty and barbarity. No doubt there
were Frenchmen who, in their fierce struggle to become rich, worked
their slaves beyond human endurance and did not hesitate to terrorize
them with the severest punishment upon the first symptoms of revolt;
but, on the whole, such sweeping denunciations were probably unjust. An
impartial observer and historian of that day, himself an Englishman,[31]
declared that the French treated their slaves quite as well as the
English did theirs, and clothed them better. He believed that the lot of
the Santo Domingo blacks at the period of which we speak would compare
favorably with that of the peasantry of Europe, a comment made familiar
to American ears when applied to the slave population of the South.
The real trouble came from the more enlightened disaffection of the
mulattoes and free negroes, fanned by the fanatic zeal of abolitionists
abroad, particularly of those who formed the society of _Les Amis des
Noirs_ in France, who were determined to carry out their policies by
any means and at whatever cost.
The mulattoes were really in worse plight than the actual slaves,
for they were virtually slaves of the State and had no master to whom
they could appeal, being subject to military service without pay, to
the _corvée_ or labor upon the highways, the hardships of which were
insupportable, as well as to a constant and galling tyranny. The law
was invariably framed in favor of the white man, who, if he struck a
mulatto, was subject to a trivial fine, while retaliation by the man of
color might cost him his right hand. It should be added, however, that
custom was usually more lenient than the law, and that such atrocious
enactments were generally a dead letter.
As might have been expected in the circumstances, the mulattoes took
their revenge on the despised blacks, whom they were permitted to hold
as slaves. They were notoriously the hardest taskmasters in the island,
and in return they were naturally envied and hated by the ignorant mass
of black humanity. The whites, to complete the discord, were divided
among themselves, the Frenchmen from Europe affecting a superiority over
the white Creoles, the seasoned natives of the island, a condition that
never made for good feeling. Moreover, the white planter, who endeavored
to gain a foothold by producing sugar, cotton or coffee, seems to have
had a just grievance against the merchants whom the law favored and
who set the price for negroes and all other commodities that had to be
bought in exchange for produce. Such at least was the conviction and
experience of a keen observer, Francis Alexander Stanislaus, Baron de
Wimpffen,[32] who went to Santo Domingo in 1788, tried to establish
himself as a coffee planter at Jaquemel, on the southern coast not far
from Les Cayes, and after three years of fruitless effort, gave up the
attempt in disgust, glad to escape, as from the flames of purgatory, to
the United States, where he settled in Pennsylvania. Baron de Wimpffen's
lack of success no doubt colored his impressions of the country to some
extent, but after making due allowance on this score, we find in his
letters, beyond a doubt, an essentially true picture of Santo Domingan
society and plantation life at the very time and place with which our
story is most intimately concerned. A sketch of the picture which the
Baron has drawn, though in brief outline, will enable us better to
understand the real condition of affairs.
The prevailing taste in Santo Domingo, according to this observer, was
creolian tinctured with _boucan_, or with the characteristics of the
buccaneers. White society on the island was divided into governmental
or town officials, merchants, and planters, the several classes having
their own interests, which were often conflicting. The planters were
concerned only with negroes, their sugar, their cotton or their coffee,
and could talk of nothing else; values were reckoned in negroes, or in
sugar, for which slaves were commonly exchanged. The laxity of morals,
the absence of schools, and the total lack of books were patent on
every hand. After sunset dancing was the chief form of amusement in the
towns, and handsome mulattoes were the acknowledged Bacchantes of the
island. It was from this class that housekeepers were usually chosen by
the greater part of the unmarried whites. They had "some skill," said
Baron de Wimpffen, "in the management of a family, sufficient honesty
to attach themselves invariably to one man, and great goodness of heart.
More than one European, abandoned by his selfish brethren, has found in
them all the solicitude of the most tender, the most constant, the most
generous humanity, without being indebted for it to any other sentiment
than benevolence."
Expense of cultivation at this time is said to have risen out of all
proportion to the value of the product. While negro service was a prime
necessity to the planter, the African mine was becoming exhausted; even
then slave dealers were penetrating a thousand leagues or more from the
Guinea coast. Added to the cost of slaves, which was yearly increasing
and had already reached to 2,000 or even 3,000 francs per head, the
Government exacted a ruinous capitation tax, which bore with special
weight on the planter.[33] Physicians and lawyers, however ignorant,
exacted exorbitant fees; masons and carpenters, however inefficient,
demanded an unreasonable wage; they, we are told, with the merchant and
official governmental class, were the only money makers on the island.
The merchant whom we have seen taking the planter's produce at his own
price, in exchange for slaves again at his own price, had the advantage
in every business transaction; the planter, as a result, was his chronic
debtor, and at usurious rates.
Subject to an enervating climate, which Europeans with their intemperate
habits could seldom endure for long, the planter, though weak and sick
himself, was often obliged to be overseer, driver, apothecary, and
nurse to his negroes, the slave of his slaves. In spite of every care,
out of one hundred imported negroes the mortality was nearly twenty per
cent in the first year. Where less oversight was given to their food,
the slightest scratch was likely to degenerate into a dangerous wound,
while the most dreaded disease, then known in English as the "yaws" and
in French as _la grosse vérole_ (to distinguish it from the smallpox,
_la petite vérole_), was a scourge for which no remedy had then been
found. Every slave was branded with a hot iron on the breast, with both
the name of his master and that of the parish to which he belonged, but
notwithstanding such precautions desertions were far from uncommon.
The Santo Domingan blacks were put to work in the morning with a crack
of the _arceau_, a short-handled whip, delivered on their backs or
shoulders, and so accustomed had they become to the regularity of this
stimulus that they could hardly be set in motion without it. How to
manage the true _bossal_, as distinguished from the African creole, with
humanity and success was a problem to which many considerate planters
must have addressed themselves in vain, if, as this one declared, the
black's ruling passion was to do nothing, and he was by nature a thief,
to whom indulgence was weakness and injustice a defect of judgment that
excited both his hatred and his contempt.
Stanilaus further observed that the soil of Santo Domingo was then
already becoming exhausted, and he believed that the day of rapid
fortunes for the planter had passed. "Calculate now," said he, "the
privations of every kind, the commercial vicissitudes, the perpetual
apprehensions, the disgusting details, inseparable from the nature of
slavery; the state of languor or anxiety in which he vegetates between
a burning sky, and a soil always ready to swallow him up, and you will
allow with me that there is no peasant, no day-labourer in Europe, whose
condition is not preferable to that of a planter of San Domingo." "I
never met," he adds, "a West Indian in France who did not enumerate to
me with more emphasis than accuracy, the charms of a residence at Saint
Domingo; since I have been here, I have not found a single one who has
not cursed both Saint Domingo, and the obstacles, eternally reviving,
which, from one year to another, prolong his stay in this abode of the
damned."
Having followed De Wimpffen to this point, the reader is entitled
to hear his parting epigrams. "The more I know," he said, of the
inhabitants of Saint Domingo, "the more I felicitate myself on quitting
it. I came hither with the _noble_ ambition of occupying myself
solely in acquiring a fortune; but destined to become a master, and
consequently to possess slaves, I saw, in the necessity of living with
them, that of studying them with attention to know them, and I depart
with much less esteem for the one, and pity for the other. When a person
is what the greater part of the planters are, he is made to have slaves;
when he is what the greater part of the slaves are, he is made to have
a master."
Whether Jean Audubon's long experience would have confirmed all that has
just been said is doubtful, for he was primarily a merchant or dealer
and thus belonged to the favored class. But what especially interests
us now is that both he and De Wimpffen were owners of plantations in
the southern province of Santo Domingo at the same time. The one who
wished to retain a valuable property followed the custom of the time by
confiding the management of his affairs to an agent, either at a fixed
salary or on a profit-sharing basis; while the other, who stayed long
enough to discern the trend of events, was glad to sell his land and
his slaves and shake the dust of the island from his feet forever.[34]
Before resuming the intimate details of our narrative, we must follow
the whirlwind of political events already set in motion in the island
colony. In the spring of 1789 the white colonists of Santo Domingo
took administrative matters into their own hands, and without vestige
of legal authority, elected and dispatched eighteen deputies to the
States-General, then sitting in France. These men reached Versailles in
June, a month after that body had declared itself the National Assembly,
but only six were ever admitted to its counsels. For a long time
opposition to the planters had been fomented in Paris by the "Friends of
the Blacks," the abolition society to which we have referred; stories
of cruelty to the slaves, colored and intensified in passing from
mouth to mouth, as invariably happens when atrocity tales are used as
partisan weapons, added to the arrogance and extravagant habits of many
planters when resident in the mother country, did not tend to soften the
prejudice of the public towards their class. The planters could get no
consideration at home, and, as we have seen, the Declaration of Rights
followed promptly in August, while a legislative Assembly was ordered
in September. Meantime the mulattoes on the island were clamoring for
the political rights which the decree had promised them, and, to make
matters worse, some of the influential whites espoused their cause, even
preaching the enfranchisement of the blacks, from whom up to this time
little had been heard. In short, the whites were divided as effectually
as were blacks and mulattoes.
The dominant party in Santo Domingo, led by the Governor-General,
were determined to uphold the old despotic _régime_, while the General
Assembly, which met at Saint Marc in obedience to orders from the mother
country, on April 16, 1790, drafted a new constitution. The clash came
in July of this year, and in the northern province, where the first
blood of the revolution was drawn at Port-au-Prince. On October 12,
1790, James Ogé, a mulatto, inspired, financed and equipped by the
"Friends of the Blacks" in Paris, landed secretly in Santo Domingo,
established a military camp at Cap François and called all mulattoes
to arms. His plan was to wage war on the whites as well as upon all
mulattoes who refused to join his standard of revolt; but Ogé and his
company were quickly suppressed, and this incompetent leader, who fled
to Spanish territory, was later extradited and broken on the wheel.
This episode naturally infuriated the whites against all mulattoes, who
took up arms at Les Cayes and at other points. The whites also armed,
and a skirmish occurred at Les Cayes, Jean Audubon's old home, where
fifty persons on both sides lost their lives, but a temporary truce was
immediately effected. This was the first serious incident in which the
town of Les Cayes figured in the bloody revolution of Santo Domingo;
it occurred, we believe, in the late autumn of 1790. Audubon's mother
had then been dead four years, and her son, the future naturalist, had
left the country in the fall of 1789; in order to bring out these facts
clearly it has seemed necessary to enter into this detail.
Later events in Santo Domingo now moved in a direction and with a
velocity which few then were able to comprehend. The danger and
the potency of the volcano that had long been muttering beneath
their feet needed but a few touches from without to reveal its full
explosive power. These were furnished not only by the mulattoes, many
of whom, after having fought under French officers in the American
Revolution, had returned to the island and there spread wide the
spirit of disaffection and revolt; but also by the National Assembly
in France, which by its vacillating policies destroyed every hope of
reconciliation. In March, 1790, this Assembly granted to the citizens of
Santo Domingo the right of local self-government, but only a year later,
on May 15, 1791, tore up this decree and emancipated the mulattoes. When
the news reached the island six weeks later, the colony was thrown into
the utmost consternation; the whites as a class refused point-blank to
accept the decision and summoned an Assembly of their own, which met
in August. The mulattoes again took up arms, and the blacks, who by
this time had been won to their side, started a general revolt which
had its origin on a plantation called "Noé," in the parish of Acul,
nine miles from Cap François. They began by burning the cane fields
and the sugar houses and murdering their white owners. Thenceforth
Santo Domingan history becomes an intricate and disgusting detail of
conspiracies, treacheries, murders, conflagrations, and atrocities of
every description. The only ray of light comes from the first genuine
leader of the blacks, the gallant but unfortunate Toussaint, in 1793.
As has already been intimated, Jean Audubon's Santo Domingo property
suffered long after he left the island, and certainly after 1792 when,
as we shall soon see, revolutions were demanding his attention and all
his energies at home.
CHAPTER IV
AUDUBON'S BIRTH, NATIONALITY, AND PARENTAGE
Les Cayes—Audubon's French Creole mother—His early
names—Discovery of the Sanson bill with the only record of
his birth—Medical practice of an early day—Birth of Muguet,
Audubon's sister—Fougère and Muguet taken to France—Audubon's
adoption and baptism—His assumed name—Dual personality in
legal documents—Source of published errors—Autobiographic
records—Rise of enigma and tradition—The Marigny myth.
Santo Domingo, though repeatedly ravaged by the indiscriminate hand
of man, is a noble and productive land, which, for the diversity and
grandeur of its scenery and the rare beauty of its tropical vegetation,
was justly regarded as one of the garden spots of the West Indies and
worthy to be in truth a "Paradise of the New World." For every lover of
birds and nature this semi-tropical island, and especially Les Cayes,
upon its south-westerly verge in what is now Haiti, will have a peculiar
interest when it is known, that there, amid the splendor of sea and sun
and the ever-glorious flowers and birds, the eyes of America's great
woodsman and pioneer ornithologist first saw the light of day.
Jean Audubon met somewhere in America, and probably at Les Cayes,
a woman whom he has described only as a "creole of Santo Domingo,"
that is, one born on the island and of French parentage, and who is
now known only by the name of Mlle. Rabin.[35] To them was born, at
Les Cayes, a son, on the twenty-sixth of April, 1785. This boy, who
was sometimes referred to in early documents as "Jean Rabin, _créole
de Saint-Domingue_," and who again was called "Fougère" (in English,
"Fern"), received the baptismal name of Jean Jacques Fougère six months
before his sixteenth birthday.
The bill of the physician, Doctor Sanson of Les Cayes, who assisted at
young Audubon's birth still exists, and as the reader will perceive,
it is a highly unique and interesting historical document.[36] Written
in the doctor's own hand, it is receipted by him, as well as approved
and signed by Jean Audubon himself. This tardy discovery, along with
other pertinent records in the commune of Couëron, in France, finally
resolves the mystery which has ever hedged the Melchizedek of American
natural history. The child's name, of course, is not given in the bill,
but authentic records of Audubon's subsequent adoption and baptism agree
so completely in names and dates as to establish his identity beyond a
shadow of doubt. Much other documentary evidence which also has recently
come to light is all in harmony with these facts, and further shows that
the natal spot and time as given in the Sanson bill can refer only to
this talented boy. But before turning to these legal documents we must
examine the personal record of Jean Audubon's physician.
Dr. Sanson's carefully itemized account, to the amount of 1,339 francs,
extends over a period of nearly two years, from December 29, 1783,
to October 19, 1785; it was accepted and signed by Captain Audubon on
October 12, 1786, and receipted by the doctor when paid on June 7, 1787.
The bill is interesting as a commentary on the medical practice of an
early day, as well as for the light which it throws on Jean Audubon's
Santo Domingan career, his establishment at Les Cayes, and his treatment
of black slaves and dependents. This quaint document, moreover, tends to
confirm a remark of Baron de Wimpffen to the effect that every doctor in
Santo Domingo grew rich at his profession, and also recalls what he said
in regard to the household remedies of the period. "Every colonist," to
quote this observer again, "is commonly provided with a small chest of
medicines, of which the principal are manna, salts, and rhubarb; the
country itself produces tamarinds, and the leaves of the cassia tree,
a slight infusion of which, with a little orange juice, makes as good
a purge as a mixture more scientifically composed."
[Illustration: FIRST PAGE OF THE BILL, RENDERED BY DR. SANSON, OF
LES CAYES, SANTO DOMINGO, TO JEAN AUDUBON FOR MEDICAL SERVICES
FROM DECEMBER 29, 1783, TO OCTOBER 19, 1785.
After the original document in possession of M. L. Lavigne,
at Couëron. The note in upper left-hand corner, "très curieux
Mlle. Rabin & son enfant," has been added by a later hand.]
[Illustration: SECOND PAGE OF THE SANSON BILL, BEARING, IN THE ENTRY
FOR APRIL 26, 1785, THE ONLY RECORD KNOWN TO EXIST OF THE DATE OF
AUDUBON'S BIRTH.]
[Illustration: THIRD PAGE OF THE SANSON BILL, SIGNED AS ACCEPTED BY
JEAN AUDUBON, OCTOBER 12, 1786, AND RECEIPTED BY THE DOCTOR, WHEN
PAID, JUNE 7, 1787.]
This physician's chief resources are seen to have been ipecacuanha,
purgative decoctions, including such as the tamarind tree provided,
manna, mineral waters, lotions, plasters, and _kino_, an astringent
juice derived from different leguminous plants, which gave a red color
to the saliva, not to speak of "other medicines," the nature of which
is not revealed, which were liberally supplied to whites and blacks,
both old and young, alike. It will be noticed further that the slaves
of African birth when not named are referred to as "_bossals_" though
many young blacks and mulattoes are called "Joue";[37] that a cooper,
attached presumably to the Audubon sugar refinery, was dosed thrice
daily with _kino_ on four days in succession; and that this favorite
treatment was repeated a month later. A clerk in the establishment,
Monsieur Aubinais, is mentioned as requiring frequent attention, as well
as Jean Audubon himself, who was once bled at the arm.
In the entry for March 27, 1784, there is this interesting reference:
"Inoculated Cæsar, Jupiter, and Rose, at thirty francs each, ninety
francs"; and if there were any doubt why Cæsar had been inoculated, a
hint is immediately given under May 11: "For attention, visits, and
remedies, during the smallpox (_la petite vérole_) of the mulatto
Joue, sixty francs"; again we read: "June 30, inoculated a little
negro _bossal_, named Joue, thirty francs." Every fresh batch of
negroes landed in the colonies led to a new outbreak of this terrible
scourge, and but one other disease, _la grosse vérole_,[38] was more
common or more fatal among the blacks. For a long period it had been a
common practice to inoculate both whites and blacks directly with the
smallpox in order to secure some degree of protection against its most
virulent form, but this method of fighting the devil with fire had its
disadvantages. By the end of the eighteenth century opinion was about
equally divided upon the advisability of continuing the measure, since
induced variola or smallpox was apt to be virulent, and was often quite
as infectious as when manifested in the usual and natural way. Then came
Edward Jenner's grand discovery, made twelve years before this date but
not announced until 1798, that vaccinia would prevent variola. Almost
immediately vaccination spread like wild fire over Europe, and it has
never been appreciated more fully or more highly lauded by the best
representatives of the medical profession everywhere than at the present
day.
The most interesting references in this historic document are to "Mlle.
Rabin," whose name occurs no less than seventeen times, beginning May
21, 1784, and closing with the entry for the seventeenth of August,
1785. We learn that the physician spent the nights of April 24 and
25, 1785, at the woman's bedside, and that her child was born on the
twenty-sixth day of that month, probably in the morning. It will be
noticed further that she had been bled previously at the arm, that she
had suffered also from the erysipelas, and that later she was treated
for abscesses. These frequent attentions of the physician, extending
over several months, the last record being for August 17, show only too
clearly that at this time Audubon's mother was in feeble health. All
that is further known about her is that she died either at the close
of 1785 or in 1786, when her infant son was probably less than a year
old.[39]
A daughter of Jean Audubon, Rosa, who was first called Muguet (in
English, "Lily of the Valley"), was also born in Santo Domingo,
and probably at Les Cayes, on April 29, 1787. Her mother, Catharine
Bouffard, "_créole de Saint-Domingue_," who subsequently went to France,
had another daughter, born also at Les Cayes, named Louise, who was
living at La Rochelle in 1819.[40]
When Captain Audubon finally left the West Indies in the autumn of 1789,
he took with him, in the care of trustworthy slaves, these two children,
Fougère or Jean Rabin, aged four and a half years, and Muguet or Rosa,
an infant of less than two. We know that he visited Richmond, Virginia,
to collect a long outstanding claim against David Ross, then engaged
in an iron industry near that city (see Chapter VIII, p. 121), and it
is possible that he traveled by way of New Orleans and the Mississippi
and Ohio rivers. After spending some time at the close of this year in
the United States, he went to France and made a home for his children
at Nantes. This city became essentially their permanent abode until
their father's retirement from the navy on January 1, 1801, when he
finally settled in the little commune of Couëron, on the north bank of
the Loire. The storm that burst over Nantes soon after their arrival
revealed the true colors of Jean Audubon's patriotism, and the man was
seen at his best, as will be related in the following chapter.
Madame Audubon, who had no children of her own, tenderly received the
little ones, thus wafted from over the sea to her door in the Rue de
Crébillon.[41] As the story proceeds we shall see that she was a most
kind, if over-indulgent, foster mother, and became excessively proud
of her handsome boy. "The first of my recollective powers," said the
naturalist when writing of himself in 1835,[42] "placed me in the
central portion of the city of Nantes ... where I still recollect
particularly that I was much cherished by my dear stepmother ... and
that I was constantly attended by one or two black servants, who had
followed my father to New Orleans and afterwards to Nantes."
Jean Audubon, who spent a good part of his life at sea and in a country
almost totally devoid of morals, must be considered as the product
of his time. He was better, no doubt, than many who made greater
professions, better certainly than a Rousseau, who gave excellent advice
to parents upon the proper methods of rearing their children but sent
his own offspring to orphan asylums. As most men have their faults, said
the son, the father "had one that was common to many individuals, and
that never left him until sobered by a long life"; but, he added, "as a
father, I never complained of him; his generosity was often too great,
and his good qualities won him many desirable friends." Whatever his
faults, Jean Audubon was just, generous and possessed of a kind heart.
He was in reality a truer father than many who give their children
their name but deny them sympathy and a wise oversight. Jean Audubon
not only cherished the two children but made them his heirs. On March
7, 1793, Fougère at the age of eight and Muguet at six were legalized
by a regular act of adoption in the presence of witnesses at Nantes as
the children of Jean and Anne Moynet Audubon.
This step was taken at the very moment when the storm had burst over
La Vendée, when the fate of Nantes was trembling in the balance and the
life of her citizens was most insecure. The act of adoption reads:[43]
_Extract from the registers of births of the
sections of La Halle and Jean Jacques of the commune
of Nantes, department of the Loire inférieure, on
the seventh of March, 1749, the second year of the
Republic, one and indivisible, at ten o'clock in
the morning._
Before us, Joseph Theulier, public officer, elected to
determine the public status of citizens, have appeared in the
town hall, Jean Audubon, commanding the war sloop _Cerberus_,
vessel of the Republic, aged forty-nine years, native of Les
Sables d'Olonne, department of La Vendée, and Anne Moinet his
wife, aged fifty-eight years, native of the former parish
of Saint-Leonard, of this commune, who, assisted by René
Toussaint Julien Beuscher, manufacturer, aged twenty-five
years, living in the section of La Halle, Rubens Street, and
by Julien Pierre Beuscher, marine surgeon, aged twenty-four
years, living in the section of La Fraternité, Marchix Street,
and employed steadily in the said war sloop _Cerberus_, have
declared before me that they do adopt and recognize from this
moment as their lawful children, to wit:
A male child named Fougère, born since their marriage,
which took place on the twenty-fourth of August, 1772, in
the commune of Paimbœuf, in this department, to him, Jean
Audubon, and a woman living in America, who has been dead
about eight years, and a female child, named Muguet, born
also since the marriage aforesaid, to him and another woman
living in America, named Catharine Bouffard, of whose fate he
is ignorant.
The two children being present, the first aged nine years,
that will expire on the 22d of next April, the second aged
seven years, that will also expire on the 26th of April
next, and both having been born in America, according to this
declaration that the witnesses above mentioned have signified
as true, I have drawn up the present act, which the natural
father and the mother by adoption, as well as their witnesses
have signed, together with myself in this said day and year.
It will be noticed that in this legally attested document, Bouffard,
the true name of Muguet's mother, is given, while the name of the mother
of Audubon is suppressed. It might therefore be inferred that the name
Rabin, which appears later, was assumed, but as already remarked, such
evidence is not conclusive.
Fougère, who was also called Jean Rabin, was baptized on October
23, 1800, by a priest of the church of Saint-Similien at Nantes. The
archives of this church for the period in question have disappeared,
but Jean Audubon's copy of the record has survived, and reads as
follows:[44]
THE ACT OF BAPTISM OF JEAN AUDUBON-RABIN
October 23, 1800
We, the undersigned, certify to have baptized on this day
Jean Jacques Fougère Audubon, adoptive son of Jean Audubon,
lieutenant of a frigate of the Republic, and of Anne Moinet,
his legitimate wife, who being present bear witness that the
adoption of the said Fougère, made by them, is in accordance
with the present act.
[Signed] TARDIVEAU, priest of Saint-Similien,
of the town of Nantes.
The act of adoption was drawn at a time when Captain Audubon could have
had little leisure to consult records had he been disposed to do so,
but the dates of birth which he then gave for these two children were
correct both as to the year and month. Fougère, however, was born on
the twenty-sixth, instead of the twenty-second of April, and Muguet, on
the twenty-ninth, instead of the twenty-sixth, of that month. Audubon's
mother's name is indicated in numerous legal documents of later date,
and, as will appear, in every instance her son's identity is clearly
established.
Young Audubon, who disliked the names of Fougère and Rabin, and
naturally wished to be rid of their early associations, adopted the
fanciful name of "La Forest,"[45] but used it only sporadically and for
a short time. Some of his drawings of birds made at Nantes or Couëron
as early as 1805, and in New York in 1806 and 1807, and possibly
others of slightly later date, are signed "J. L. F. A.," or "J. J. L.
Audubon."[46]
Jean Audubon and his wife are said to have settled some property upon
"Jean Rabin, _créole de Saint Domingue_," which he refused to accept,
saying, "my own name I have never been permitted even to speak;
accord me that of Audubon, which I revere, as I have cause to do."[47]
The reference in this instance was, I believe, to the final will of
Lieutenant Audubon,[48] according to which his property, after being
held in usufruct by his wife during her lifetime, was to be equally
divided between their two adopted children. In his first will the son
was referred to as "Jean Audubon," but in the second and last document,
executed in 1816, two years before the testator's death, he appears
as "Jean Rabin." Madame Audubon drew four wills; in the first, dated
December 4, 1814, her adopted son is called "Jean Audubon"; in the
next, of 1816, he is "Jean Rabin, _créole de Saint-Domingue_," while
in a draft written December 26, 1819, he is styled simply "Jean Rabin";
finally, in her fourth and last testament of July 16, 1821, the wording
is "Jean Audubon, called 'Jean Rabin.'" It is thus very plain that
Audubon's foster parents considered it advisable to have his identity
clearly set forth in legal documents. In one of his autobiographical
sketches Audubon remarked that his own mother was said to have been as
wealthy as she was beautiful, and if this were true, such caution might
be explained and a key found to certain other enigmatical conditions
which seemed to hedge his early life. But to such possibilities it will
be necessary to revert at a later point of our story.[49]
[Illustration: AUDUBON'S SIGNATURE AT VARIOUS PERIODS FROM 1805 TO
1847.
The first, fourth and sixth are from early drawings; the
second from Audubon and Rozier's "Articles of Association";
the fifth from a release given to Rozier; and the remainder
from letters.]
This dual personality was set forth by the naturalist himself, but in
a more curious form, in a power of attorney[50] executed at Henderson,
Kentucky, on July 26, 1817, in favor of his brother-in-law, Gabriel
Loyen du Puigaudeau. This measure was taken more than a year after
Audubon's father had drawn up his last will, in which the son was
referred to as "Jean Rabin," and was evidently designed to facilitate
any settlement of this will which events in France might render
necessary. The naturalist was then engaged in his famous but disastrous
financial enterprises on the Ohio River,[51] but whether any intimation
had come to him of possible legal troubles, which later actually ensued
in France, cannot be stated.
In reading the published accounts of Audubon's early life many have been
puzzled by the absence of definite dates, as well as by the numerous
contradictions in which they abound. It is needless to burden this
narrative with a tedious reference to all these errors or to attempt
to trace their origin, which no doubt had many sources, but since we
have given the first true account of the naturalist's birth, we cannot
pass these matters without a word of comment. The situation is somewhat
involved, since we should possibly differentiate between what Audubon at
different times believed to be true, and what he wished to make known
to his family or to the public; possibly also we should discriminate
between what he actually published over his own signature during his
lifetime and the material which has appeared since his death, even
though originally written by his own hand.
The first definite date which Audubon ever gave concerning his own life
was that of his marriage in 1808, when he was twenty-three years of age,
and all that he ever published of a biographical nature is to be found
in his _Ornithological Biography_.[52] In the introduction to this work
he simply said that he had "received light and life in the New World,"
and further that he returned to America from France, whither he had
gone to receive the rudiments of his education, at the age of seventeen.
Since Audubon's first return to America was in the autumn of 1803, when
he was actually about eighteen and one-half years old, this statement
is not so wide of the mark as to imply that the date of his birth was
not then well understood. Moreover, the record of his adoption, which
was certified to at the time of his baptism in 1800, was carefully
preserved among the family documents, and there is no reason to suppose
that knowledge of his age was ever withheld from him. Nevertheless,
Audubon was inclined to overestimate his years, a characteristic rare
in these days; when at Oxford in 1828 he was asked for his autograph,
and was begged to inscribe also the date of his birth; "that," he said
in recording the incident, "I could not do, except approximately," and
his hostess was greatly amused that he should not know.
While going down the Ohio River in 1820, bound for New Orleans, Audubon
took advantage of a rainy day to write in his journal something about
himself that he thought his children at some future time might desire to
know. This brief record may or may not have been at hand when in 1835 he
wrote the more extended version that finally saw the light in 1893.[53]
Since the manuscript of the later sketch was presumably in possession of
Mrs. Audubon when the biography of her husband was prepared in New York
about the year 1866, that account in its various versions has furnished
biographers with practically all of the available material, not purely
conjectural, concerning the naturalist's early life. Such additions as
were made subsequently have proved to be very inaccurate.
In the first of these sketches, which, so far as it goes, is more
in strict accord with facts, Audubon said nothing of his birth, and
of his mother remarked only that he had been told that she was "an
extraordinary beautiful woman," who died shortly after he was born. His
father, he added, saw his wealth torn from him, until there was left
barely enough to educate his two children, all that remained of the
five, his three elder brothers[54] having been "killed in the wars."
He then believed, as he said, that his first journey to France was made
when he was two years old.
The later and fuller biography, referred to above as written in 1835
and published in 1893, begins with these words:[55]
The precise period of my birth is yet an enigma to me, and I
can only say what I have often heard my father repeat to me
on this subject, which is as follows: It seems that my father
had large properties in Santo Domingo, and was in the habit
of visiting frequently that portion of our Southern States
called, and known by the name of, Louisiana, then owned by
the French Government.
During one of these excursions he married a lady of Spanish
extraction, whom I have been led to understand was as
beautiful as she was wealthy, and otherwise attractive, and
who bore my father three sons and a daughter,—I being the
youngest of the sons and the only one who survived extreme
youth. My mother, soon after my birth, accompanied my father
to the estate [_sic_] of Aux Cayes,[56] on the island of
Santo Domingo, and she was one of the victims during the
ever-to-be-lamented period of the negro insurrection of that
island.
My father, through the intervention of some faithful servants,
escaped from Aux Cayes with a good portion of his plate
and money, and with me and these humble friends reached New
Orleans in safety. From this place he took me to France, where
having married the only mother I have ever known, he left
me under her charge and returned to the United States in the
employ of the French Government, acting as an officer under
Admiral Rochambeau. Shortly afterward, however, he landed in
the United States and became attached to the army under La
Fayette.
The true history of Jean Audubon's commercial, naval, and civic career
is given in the preceding and following chapters.
The naturalist, in his letters and journals, made frequent allusions to
his age, but, as his granddaughter remarked, with one exception, no two
agree; hence, his granddaughter concluded that he might "have been born
anywhere from 1772 to 1783." In the face of such uncertainty she adopted
the traditional date of May 5, 1780, adding that the true one was no
doubt earlier. Audubon was thus five years younger than his biographers
supposed, and twenty-one years were added to the age of his father, who
actually lived to be only seventy-four years old, while his son died in
his sixty-seventh year.
Wherever there is mystery there tradition is certain to raise its head,
and though the naturalist carried his "enigma" to the grave, others,
building upon his story, have fixed upon the very house in Louisiana in
which he is said to have been born. Indeed, advocates of more than one
house in that state as the probable scene of Audubon's nativity have
arisen in recent times. We are obliged, therefore, to examine somewhat
farther the now universally received but thoroughly erroneous idea
that John James Audubon was a native of Louisiana at a time when that
Commonwealth was part of a province of France.
Upholding a tradition of rather recent growth, Audubon's granddaughter
has expressed the belief that the naturalist was born in a
house belonging to the famous Philippe de Marigny and known as
"Fontainebleau." This was a sugar plantation on the north side of Lake
Ponchartrain, three miles east of what is now the village of Mandeville
and twenty-five miles due north of New Orleans.
Pierre Enguerrand Philippe de Mandeville, Ecuyer Sieur de Marigny,[57]
at one time owner of vast estates in and about New Orleans, was born in
that city in 1750, and served as its alcade or mayor for two years. A
lavish dispenser of hospitality, in 1798 he entertained in great state
the Duke of Orleans, later known as Louis Philippe of France, together
with his two brothers who accompanied him. He died at New Orleans,
leaving five sons, of whom the third, Bernard Marigny, later became
the owner of "Fontainebleau," which it has been mistakenly assumed was
inherited from his father. At the time of the Duke of Orleans' visit
just mentioned Jean Audubon had been out of the country nine years;
there is no evidence of his ever having owned property at New Orleans,
or ever having sustained any relations with the Marigny family.
Before following the Marigny myth further, it will be interesting to
notice a late echo of the "Fontainebleau" story. In 1910 the Reverend
Gordon Bakewell, then in his eighty-ninth year, gave some interesting
reminiscences of Audubon, and spoke very definitely concerning both the
time and place of his birth. Dr. Bakewell was a nephew of Mrs. Audubon,
and as a youth, in 1834, had passed some time at her home in London.
John W. Audubon, with his father's assistance, painted at that time a
portrait of young Bakewell, who at a later day was welcomed in their
home on the Hudson. Dr. Bakewell's contribution was as follows:[58]
The uncertainty as to the place of Audubon's birth has been
put to rest by the testimony of an eye witness in the person
of old Mandeville Marigny now dead some years. His repeated
statement to me was, that on his plantation at Mandeville,
Louisiana, on Lake Ponchartrain, Audubon's mother was his
guest; and while there gave birth to John James Audubon.
Marigny was present at the time, and from his own lips,
I have, as already said, repeatedly heard him assert the
above fact. He was ever proud to bear this testimony of his
protection given to Audubon's mother, and his ability to bear
witness as to the place of Audubon's birth, thus establishing
the fact that he was a Louisianian by birth.
We do not doubt the candor and sincerity of the excellent Dr. Bakewell,
but are bound to say that the incidents as related above betray a
striking lapse of memory and an even greater misunderstanding of
recorded facts. Singularly a footnote to the paragraph quoted shows that
the Marigny to whom he refers was, as must have been the case, Bernard
Mandeville de Marigny, who was born in 1785, the same year as the
naturalist. Since both were in the cradle at the same time, he is hardly
available as a witness. Moreover, the official records of the United
States Government prove that the estate called "Fontainebleau" was not
in possession of the Marigny family at the time of Audubon's birth.
The land in question was granted to a creole named Antonio Bonnabel,
on January 25, 1799, by Manuel Goyon de Lemore, Governor-General of
the Province of Louisiana and West Florida. Bonnabel sold his tract to
Bernard Marigny in 1800, and Congress confirmed his title to it by a
special act in 1836.[59]
Bernard Marigny served in the French army towards the close of the
Napoleonic period, and his return to the United States from France,
about 1818, is said to have been hastened by a duel which he fought
with one of his superior officers. On his return he named Bonnabel's old
tract on Lake Ponchartrain "Fontainebleau," in remembrance of the place
where his regiment had been assigned for duty in France, and eventually
built upon the estate a sawmill and a sugar-house, and planted sugar
cane, living meanwhile on another plantation two and one-half miles
away. The latter estate was allotted by him in 1832, when he gave it
the name of Mandeville; the settlement thus started has since grown to
a village of some 1,500 people. Here a summer house which belonged to
Bernard's father still exists, although in altered form; it has been
raised to accommodate a lower story, and is now known as the "Casino."
According to those who have most carefully investigated existing
records, this is the only house in Mandeville which belonged to the
elder Marigny at the time of which we speak.
Bernard Marigny was one of those who befriended Audubon when he was
in desperate straits at New Orleans in 1821, by advancing him money in
return for portraits or drawings of birds. He died in that city in 1868,
when in his eighty-third year, a poor and honest man.
CHAPTER V
LIEUTENANT AUDUBON AS REVOLUTIONIST
Background of Audubon's youth—Nantes in Revolution—Revolt in
La Vendée—Siege of Nantes—Reign of terror under Carrier—Plague
robbing the guillotine—Flight of the population—Execution
of Charette—The Chouan raid—Citizen Audubon's service—He
reenters the navy and takes a prize from the English—His
subsequent naval career—His losses in Santo Domingo—His
service and rank—Retires on a pension—His death—His character
and appearance.
The ancient city of Nantes, long famed for the beauty of its situation
on the banks of a noble river, within easy reach of the sea, as well as
for its importance in the arts of war and peace, numbered at the time
of the Revolution 70,000 souls. The modern visitor to this favored spot
will find quiet and orderly streets adorned with monumental statues
(one of these representing Guépin, the revered historian of the city),
the old buildings nearly all replaced by better, the Loire spanned by
handsome bridges, and the ancient bounds of the town extended until
it has become the sixth city of the Republic. Since Nantes formed a
somber background to Audubon's youth, we shall follow in brief some
of the ordeals through which his family, in common with thousands of
other Nantais, were destined to pass during those eventful years which
witnessed the close of the eighteenth century in France.
When Captain Audubon reached Nantes presumably not far from the
beginning of 1790, he found the city in a state of the greatest turmoil
and agitation. The commons, or third estate, included hundreds of its
rich and influential citizens, and their demands for a fair hearing and
a representation equal to that of the other orders had then passed the
stage of open revolt, for they had planted their "liberty tree" and
were sworn to defend it. In August of 1789 a permanent Committee of
Public Safety had been constituted at Nantes, and by the end of that
month 1,200 had volunteered for service in the National Guard. There
were many loyalists in the city but they could not crush the ardent
spirit of this revolt, and when in September money was needed to equip
the revolutionary soldiery, young school children raised large sums
for the popular cause. Jean Audubon immediately cast his lot with the
revolutionists and joined the National Guard, but how much service he
saw in the field cannot now be determined; it is known, however, that
he was with these troops in the spring of 1792.[60]
In March, 1793, the loyalists of La Vendée rose to arms, and marching
on Nantes under the able leadership of Charette, threatened to put
its garrison to the sword if it were not surrendered within six hours.
The National Guard met these invaders outside the walls and left the
citizens to shift for themselves. Thus thrown upon their own resources,
the Nantais showed that they could help themselves. They requisitioned
and used for defense everything at hand; they exhumed the leaden coffins
in their grand cathedral and appropriated waterspouts for ammunition,
while their church bells were molded into cannon. Though held in
check, the Vendeans laid siege to the city, and but for the resolution
of its mayor, Baco, Nantes would probably have fallen—in which event
Audubon would have had a different history and would probably never
have become a pioneer naturalist in America. Baco, disregarding the
advice of his military chiefs, immediately placarded the walls of
Nantes decreeing death to any who should suggest capitulation, and
called all the inhabitants to arms, sparing neither woman nor child. The
Vendeans had met their match, for they were dealing with many of their
own blood, but though the siege began in early March, they were not
effectually dispersed until the end of June, and then only after much
bloodshed without the walls. When the immediate crisis had passed, the
Constitution of the Republic was unanimously accepted by the eighteen
sections of Nantes, on the twenty-first day of July, 1792.
A few months later in that fateful year a more terrible calamity
befell the city, when the reign of terror under the notorious
ultra-revolutionist, Jean B. Carrier, began. Carrier reached Nantes on
October 8 and at once proposed to exterminate both the Vendean royalists
and their Nantais sympathizers. He reorganized the entire administration
to suit his purposes, and to carry out his plans recruited from the
lowest classes a revolutionary army to spy upon, denounce and arrest
private citizens, many of whom were sent to Paris for trial when not
secretly dispatched. The whole district was soon paralyzed by the
barbarity of the crimes then committed, and the unhappy Vendeans were
dragged to Nantes, to be shot, guillotined or drowned, in such numbers
that the city was unable to bury its dead or the river to discharge them
to the sea. Thus perished thousands, uncounted if not unknown, and the
pestilence of typhoid fever that immediately followed claimed another
heavy toll regardless of political sympathies. While these dire scenes
were being enacted, Jean Jacques Fougère Audubon, then a lad of eight
years, was living in the heart of Nantes, and his father was one of its
leading revolutionists. An aunt of the future ornithologist, according
to his account, who was one of these wretched victims of revolutionary
fury, was dragged through the streets of Nantes before his eyes, but
apparently she did not actually meet her death at that time.[61]
That Jean Audubon moved his family out of Nantes during the
revolutionary crisis is possible, and Couëron would have been available
as a place of refuge. Many Nantais are known to have fled to Lorient on
the coast of Brittany, where they found in the heroic youth Julien the
ardent and fearless patriot who was destined to become the real savior
of their stricken city. Young Julien denounced Carrier in his letters
to Robespierre, and when one of these was intercepted, defied him in
person. When his stirring appeals finally reached the Tribunal at Paris,
its misnamed representative was recalled, and left Nantes under cover of
night on February 14, 1794. During his mad reign of four months, Carrier
had gone far towards carrying out his theory of republican government,
that should begin, as he openly avowed, by "suppressing" half of the
population of France. The records show that nearly nine thousand bodies
were buried in Nantes in a little over three months, from January 15
to April 24, 1794. The plague of fever no doubt accounted for many of
these, but the wide reaches of the Loire never told their full story.
Though the most grievous affliction of Nantes passed with the recall
of Carrier, the city had no lasting peace until the execution of the
Vendean leader, Charette, in March, 1796; "Poor Charette," said Audubon,
writing in his journal at Liverpool, December 24, 1827, "whom I saw shot
on the place de Viarme at Nantes." This virtually ended the war in the
Vendée, but the Chouans, under their intrepid chief, Dupré, the miller,
called "Tête-Carrée," managed to furnish considerable excitement, and
raided Nantes in 1799. Dupré's followers stole in secretly at three
o'clock on the morning of October 19 and left before daylight, after
liberating fifteen royalists from the prison, which seems to have been
their chief purpose. The cannon of alarm was fired from the Chateau;
the tocsin sounded, calling the city to arms; there was much street
fighting, but it was too foggy and dark to distinguish friend from
foe, and when the National Guard was finally assembled, the enemy
had vanished. This brief attack cost the city twenty-one deaths and
wounds for twice the number,[62] but it was only a passing incident in
comparison with events that had gone before. Thenceforth the history of
the town is blended with that of the nation.[63]
We have only slight indications of Jean Audubon's activities from the
close of 1789, when, according to his own statement, he was in the
United States, to the period of his service in the National Guard at
Nantes in the spring of 1792; he was then living in the house of Citizen
Carricoule, rue de Crébillon, and the lease of his "Mill Grove" farm,
which was renewed in October, 1790, was dated at Nantes. We may safely
assume that he was engaged in revolutionary business during most of this
interval: his name begins to appear in the written records of Nantes
and of the department of the Lower Loire in January, 1793, and existing
documents[64] show that he was engaged as a commissioner and member
of the Department and as a member of the Council of the Navy until the
twenty-fifth of June, when he enlisted for active service in the navy of
the Republic. Jean Audubon served also on various republican committees,
his duties comprising the enlistment of recruits, organizing the
National Guard, soliciting funds and food supplies for Nantes, finding
cannon and other military or naval materials, posting proclamations,
administering the oath of allegiance, and watching the movements of
loyalist troops in the district. We have seen that the father of the
naturalist was a game and determined fighter, and there is ample written
testimony to prove that in the commune of Nantes he was regarded as
an ardent patriot, who could be relied upon to act with tact, and if
necessary with force.
[Illustration: LIEUTENANT JEAN AUDUBON ANNE MOYNET AUDUBON
AFTER OIL PORTRAITS PAINTED BETWEEN 1801 AND 1806, NOW IN
POSSESSION OF M. L. LAVIGNE, AT COUËRON.]
[Illustration: JEAN AUDUBON
AFTER AN OIL PORTRAIT PAINTED BY THE AMERICAN ARTIST POLK,
AT PHILADELPHIA, ABOUT 1789, NOW IN POSSESSION OF MRS. MORRIS
FRANK TYLER. PUBLISHED BY COURTESY OF MISS MARIA R. AUDUBON.]
Having been appointed a Civil Commissioner by the Directory of the
Department on January 17, 1793, Citizen Audubon was sent to Savenay, a
town of some importance twenty-five miles to the northwest of Nantes.
His instructions on this mission were to gather useful information
on the civil, moral and political state of the district, "in order
to bring a remedy," and to administer the oath of allegiance to all
administrative and judicial bodies. Jean began operations without delay,
and his report, which was kept in journal form and embraces the period
from January 19 to September 10, 1793, is an interesting document; it
covers fifty-one large foolscap pages, written now in a fine and again
in a bold, regular hand, in the course of which his characteristic
signature[65] occurs no less than twenty-two times, each section of the
report having been signed as completed. In one section of this journal
he wrote: "Our operations having been finished, we assembled around the
tree of liberty, and there sang the hymn of the Marseillaise, which was
interrupted with frequent shouts of '_Vive la république!_,' '_Vive la
nation!_,' and more than one charge of musketry."
[Illustration: ONE OF JEAN AUDUBON'S SIGNATURES IN HIS REPORT TO THE
DIRECTORY, 1793.
From the original in the archives of the préfecture at Nantes.]
Jean Audubon with eight others was charged with organizing the National
Guard in the canton of Pellerin, and ordered to accompany the detachment
that marched to the relief of Pornic, March 27, 1793. The Citizen was
busy also in other directions. He said in his report:
In virtue of the power conferred upon us by the Central
Committee, on the ninth of April we were transported to the
parish of Couëron, where we arrived at seven o'clock in the
morning. Proclamations were posted both at Couëron and at
Port Launay close by, while some were sent across the river
to Pellerin. We availed ourselves on this occasion of the
services of two officers of a corsair, who demanded that we
aid in removing from Pellerin four cannon with four-pound
balls, and we succeeded in putting to flight a small barque
and four men, who an hour later returned with cannon.... The
parish of Couëron appears very tranquil, and is in a better
mood than [at first] seemed to us.
A little later Jean proceeded to Paimbœuf on a similar errand. His
letters to the citizen-administrators of that commune are dated at
Nantes on the seventeenth of April and the fourteenth of May; in one
of these he refers to "the sum of four hundred francs" due from the
Administration "for one year's rent of my house in calle Rondineau (_à
la calle rondino_), which you have taken for a _corps de garde_" (see
Vol. I, p. 32).
In July and August of this second year of the Republic, Citizen
Audubon was sent to his native town of Les Sables d'Olonne to follow
the movements of the loyalist generals Westermann and Boulart,[66] a
mission which could hardly have been agreeable if, as seems to have
been the case, some of his own people were loyal to the old _régime_.
Correspondence by sea between Les Sables and Nantes, which was open
before the siege, was not broken at this time, for the royalists had
named one of their representatives, Benoit, as a delegate "to fraternize
with the citizens of Nantes, to invite the authorities to correspond,
and beg them to send food if they had more than they required." Four of
Jean's letters, dated at Les Sables on the fifth and eighth of July and
the sixth of August, besides one from La Rochelle on the fourteenth of
July, all addressed to the Administration of the Loire inférieure, have
been preserved.
In the manuscript records of the Department for 1793 is found also a
notice of Jean's appointment as Special Commissioner, with a memorandum
of all the money paid to reimburse him for the expenses of his numerous
journeys. Thus, it is noted that he had been paid 145 francs for a
service of twenty-nine days, which would represent the modest allowance
of a dollar a day. Another item shows that he had received 100 francs
for a tour of ten days; a note which was added to this item to explain
the Directory's sanction for the payment of another forty-five francs
and ten sous reads as follows: "by its order of the sixth of March last,
the Council had, in effect, named Citizen Audubon as its Commissioner,
to visit the coasts and to secure signatures, with full power to treat
with all people, to acquire materials for the navy and other objects of
his mission; if this mission did not prove successful, it was solely
through force of circumstances, and not from any lack of zeal on his
part."[67]
On the twenty-fifth of June, 1793, while engaged in duties to which
we have just referred, Jean Audubon was appointed, with rank of
ensign, to command the Republican lugger named the _Cerberus_.[68]
During this charge, which lasted until the twenty-second of November
of the following year, he fought one of the stiffest engagements of
his career. On the twelfth of July he encountered the _Brilliant_, an
English privateer of fourteen cannon which had captured an American
ship laden with flour; and after a desperate battle which lasted three
hours, in the course of which Jean was wounded in the left thigh, the
Englishman, beaten and obliged to surrender his prize, was glad to
escape under cover of night. Jean towed the American into the port of
La Rochelle, and afterwards sent to the Administration a full account
of the engagement.[69] Ensign Audubon's next command was a dispatch
boat called _L'Eveillé_ ("The Awakened"), on which he served for nearly
nine months, from November 23, 1794, to August 14, 1795. He was then
detailed for port duty at La Rochelle from August 15, 1795, to January
24, 1797. His last ship was _L'Instituteur_ ("The Institutor"), which
he commanded with the rank of _lieutenant de vaisseau_, January 25 to
October 3, 1797, while he was engaged in governmental business between
the ports of La Rochelle and Brest.
The financial losses which Lieutenant Audubon sustained at Les Cayes in
consequence of the revolution in Santo Domingo were a crushing blow to
him; he never recovered his fortune, later estimated by his son-in-law
at a sum which at that day would have been fabulous.[70] The business
house in which he was interested failed; his plantations, refinery,
houses and stores, the rents from which, as we have seen, in certain
years after 1789, had yielded 90,000 francs, were presumably ravaged and
partially destroyed. When the news of this misfortune reached him after
1792, his hands were tied by revolutions at home. Though he applied to
his Government for relief, as undoubtedly did a host of other losers,
he was eventually granted only a small indemnity, not exceeding 30,000
francs.
Friends of Jean Audubon at Nantes had made repeated demands of the
Ministry of Marine that he be given a rank more in accord with his
patriotism and efficient service to the State, and on October 11, 1797,
he was commissioned lieutenant-commander (_lieutenant de vaisseau_),[71]
one grade below that of captain. He held this rank for three years,
during which he was engaged in vigilance service at Les Sables d'Olonne
and in military duty at Rochefort, or until he was retired from the
navy for disability, January 1, 1801 (_le 11 nivose, an 9_), at the age
of fifty-seven.[72] He had served the State for over eight years, and
his total period of active duty on sea and land when employed in the
merchant marine and navy of France, as estimated from port to port,
amounted to nineteen years, nine months and twelve days, while it had
extended with interruptions over more than forty years.[73] After this
long period of service, when, suffering from a pulmonary affection, he
applied to his Government for a pension, he received the paltry annuity
of 600 francs or $120.
[Illustration: CERTIFICATE OF SERVICE OF LIEUTENANT JEAN AUDUBON,
FEBRUARY 26, 1801.
From a photograph of the original in the Lavigne MSS.]
With this modest pension and a property yielding an income not above
$2,000 a year[74], Lieutenant Audubon retired to his quiet villa of "La
Gerbetière," at Couëron, where he could indulge his taste for country
life and for raising his favorite fruits and flowers; he is said to
have kept some live stock, but could have been a farmer only on a modest
scale. Meanwhile he continued to maintain a house, or at least rooms, at
Nantes, whither he went periodically to conduct his correspondence and
business affairs. The following letter of attorney, issued by Lieutenant
Audubon a year after he had retired from the navy, shows that he still
had interests in Santo Domingo, and was endeavoring to collect rents,
long overdue, from houses and stores that belonged either to himself or
to his clients. Whether through the dishonesty of agents or from what
other cause, this property which the elder Audubon held in his own right
seems gradually to have melted away:
The 19th pluviose, in the eleventh year of the Republic, one
and indivisible [January 7, 1802], before the public notaries
of the department of Loire inférieure, who reside in Nantes
and Doulon, the undersigned have seen present the citizen Jean
Audubon, lieutenant of frigate, retired, and proprietor at
Santo Domingo, aged 59 years, infirm and unable in consequence
of his infirmities to go himself to attend to his business
affairs in Santo Domingo, living in Rubens Street, in the
Mocquard house,[75] No. 39, in the city and commune of Nantes,
department of Loire inférieure:
Who has made and constituted for his general and special
attorney Jean François Blanchard, merchant, and originally
from the commune of Chateaubriand, department of Loire
inférieure, living at the town of Les Cayes, in the southern
section of the island of Santo Domingo, opposite Ile à Vaches,
to whom he gives full and complete powers to revoke for him,
and in his name, every preceding bill of attorney, for the
purpose of managing the stores [_magazins_] at Les Cayes, in
the southern part of Santo Domingo, opposite Ile à Vaches:
To demand and obtain all accounts from the holders of said
properties, who have had or still have charge of them there;
to examine the said accounts, to debate, close up and stop
them ... to lease the said properties, without the power of
making any extensive repairs to them whatsoever, about which
he had not informed the constituent in France, and that he has
not authorized him there to do, at least by a special letter,
it being understood that the actual tenant is obliged to make
all the necessary repairs to the said houses and stores to the
extent of 15,000 francs, and he should not use more than 4,000
francs yearly for the space of five years, counting from the
month of thermidor, year 8 [July 19-August 17, 1800].
It is demanded of citizeness Fauveau, or of her assigns, to
know the reason why she has failed, to the present moment,
to pay to the constituent in France for the domicile of the
citizeness Coyron,[76] the twelve thousand six hundred francs
that she should annually pay to him, according to the act of
July 15, 1788, as given by Domergue, notary at Les Cayes. You
will satisfy them with the state of the dwelling house in the
plain of Jacob, opposite Ile à Vaches.
This was sold by the said act to the said citizeness Fauveau
and to her late husband by the said constituents, to whom he
will report regularly on the state of affairs, at least twice
in the year....
[Signed at Nantes] J. ROYER [one of
the undersigned notaries]
Lieutenant Jean Audubon died at Nantes,[77] when on a visit to that
city, on February 19, 1818, at the age of seventy-four, "regretted most
deservedly," said his son, "on account of his simplicity, truth, and
perfect sense of honesty"; "his manners," he continues, "were those of
a most polished gentleman ... and his natural understanding had been
carefully improved both by observation and by self education." Jean
Audubon's means in France had been reduced partly by bad debts, for
he seems to have been generous in lending money to his friends; Madame
Audubon found herself greatly hampered by lack of ready money, although,
as her son-in-law remarked, her hands were full of notes.
When Jean Audubon applied for nomination to the naval service of the
Republic in 1793, we find a description of his previous life and habits
recorded as a part of the information required by the Committee of
Public Safety. The commune of Nantes at that time gave a flattering
testimonial to his patriotism, in which he was described as an officer
of merit, who had acquired through long experience at sea an extensive
knowledge of navigation, who was a man of honor, and devoid of any
inclination to vice or gambling; his nautical experience had been
chiefly gained in American waters, the voyages of his choice being those
to Santo Domingo and the United States.
At the age of forty-eight the elder Audubon thus briefly described
himself: short in stature, measuring five feet, five inches; figure,
oval; eyes, blue; nose and mouth, large; eyebrows, auburn; hair and
beard turned gray. Contrary to the naturalist's expressed belief, there
seems to have been little or no physical resemblance between father
and son. At a corresponding age, John James Audubon, according partly
to his own account, stood five feet, ten inches in stockings; his hair
was dark brown; he had sunken, hazel eyes, flecked with brown, and of
remarkable brightness; while his clean-cut profile showed an aquiline
nose. "In temper," said the son, to continue the comparison, "we much
resembled each other, being warm, irascible, and at times violent, but
it was like the blast of a hurricane, dreadful for a time, when calm
almost instantly returned."
Though passionate at times, Jean Audubon was a man of force and
decision, as his career amply shows. If he does not loom large in the
history of his time or was but little known beyond the limits of his
province, it must be remembered that the time called forth thousands of
the ablest men of his nation.
CHAPTER VI
School Days In France
Molding of Audubon's character—Factor of environment—Turning
failure into success—An indulgent stepmother—The truant—His
love of nature—Early drawings and discipline—Experience at
Rochefort—Baptized in the Roman Catholic Church.
It is now commonly believed that of the three great factors which mold
character—environment, training and heritage, the last is the most
important, since it alone is predetermined and unalterable. Environment
may be uncertain or unsuitable, training defective or deferred, but
blood is the one possession of which the child cannot be robbed; and
since it sets the limits to possibility, in no small degree must it
determine the acquisitions and accomplishments of a lifetime. This,
however, is not the whole truth. Race may account for much, but it does
not account for everything; the child is effectually robbed whenever
it is not permitted to realize to the full upon its inheritance. To
be able to convert possibilities into actualities it must receive fit
training and right incentives, and if at critical times the proper spur
is wanting, its patrimony may be sadly wasted. The "good environment"
for the youth, too often thought to be the soft conditions of an easy
life, is in truth that only which provides the proper and necessary
stimulus. This may be now fear or pride, now hard necessity or bitter
want; again, an awakened sense of responsibility or ambition to excel
may be induced by concrete examples and fostered, as it often is, by
lofty purposes and the uplift of a high ideal.
Audubon's life affords a striking proof of the power which environment
can exert in awakening dormant capacity, in developing talents to their
full and calling into use every force held in reserve. When we consider
what his life work finally became, and what he eventually accomplished
in a field for which he had no training, except in drawing, we find
it easier to wonder at the man than to criticize him. With a formal
schooling in France of the slenderest sort, in which the writing of
his own language was never completely mastered, at eighteen he came to
America and adopted a new tongue, which he first heard from the Quakers.
Twenty years more were to elapse before he had a definite plan,—during
which his environment was mainly that of a trader and storekeeper in the
backwoods, never remote from the white man's frontier, hardly the soil
one would seek for the development of budding talents in art, literature
or science. Failure in trade was one of the spurs which started Audubon
on his ultimate career, for it led to the immediate development of the
talents which he possessed; the encouragement which he received from his
wife was undoubtedly another. When he finally emerged, like a somewhat
wild but well ripened fruit, at the age of forty, rich in experience,
ready to absorb what from lack of earlier motives or opportunities he
had failed to acquire, and with the determination to succeed, he won
recognition as much through his personality and enthusiasm as by his
extraordinary versatility and talents.
In an early sketch of his life Audubon said that his father had given
both him and his sister an education appropriate to his purse; his
teachers were possessed of agreeable talents, and he might have stored
up much had not the continental wars in which France was then engaged
forced him from school at an early age, when, much against his will,
he entered the navy as midshipman, at Rochefort. This naval experience
terminated, as he then recorded, in 1802, during the short peace between
England and France; he was then seventeen years of age.[78] This was
the year following his father's retirement, and the year previous to
his first independent visit to the United States.
More details of this early period were given later, when the naturalist
spoke with great affection of his foster mother, to whom his education
had been mainly entrusted. "Let no one speak of her as my step-mother,"
said he; "I was ever to her as a son of her own flesh and blood, and
she was to me a true mother." His every idle wish was gratified, he
tells us, and his every whim indulged, in accordance with the notion
that fine clothes and full pockets were all that were needed to make
the gentleman: "She hid my faults, boasted to every one of my youthful
merits, and, worse than all, said frequently in my presence, that I was
the handsomest boy in France."
If Madame Audubon broke the prevailing tradition and by going to
the other extreme did her best to spoil this affectionate boy, some
allowance must be made for parental over-indulgence. In 1793, when the
future naturalist was eight years old, the public buildings of his city
had been converted into prisons and its streets were both unsanitary and
unsafe, while in the following year, as we have seen, a mortal plague
began to rob the prisons and the guillotine. Many had lost their all
in the tempest that swept over them; many more had fled, and public
schooling at Nantes must have been at a stand or disorganized for a
considerable period.
Young Audubon could not have tasted much schooling before the outbreak
of the Revolution, when he was seven years old, and but little after
it, since this discipline practically terminated in 1802. His passionate
love of nature, which was undoubtedly innate, was manifested at an early
day. Living things of every description which he found by the banks of
the Loire or along the stonewalls and hedgerows of Couëron gave him the
greatest pleasure, but birds were his early favorites. These he soon
began to depict with pencil and crayon, but to the dryer discipline of
the school he ever turned with laggard feet.
When the versatile Lord Avebury, who became one of the greatest modern
students of the powers of ants and other social insects, was four years
old, his mother made this record in her diary: "His great delight is in
insects. Butterflies, Caterpillars or Beetles are great treasures, and
he is watching a large spider outside my window most anxiously." The
same boy at eight, when writing home from school, added this postscript
to a letter: "I am a favorite with most of the boys because I do not
care about being laughed." The boy who has a good inheritance, follows
his own bent, and does "not care about being laughed," may be on the
road to success and with talents may achieve distinction. John James
Audubon was one of those boys, although his path was never strewn with
the roses that many have imagined.
The naturalist tells us that his father hoped that he would follow in
his footsteps, or else become an engineer, and he saw that his son was
instructed in the elements of mathematics, geography, fencing and music.
But as Lieutenant Audubon was continually on the move, supervision in
those matters fell to the over-indulgent stepmother, with the result
that, instead of doing his duties at school, young Audubon took to the
fields. Every night, he said, he would return with his lunch basket well
laden with the spoils of the day—birds' nests, eggs, and curiosities of
every sort destined for the museum into which his room had already been
transformed. He was then in the "collecting stage," when that sense of
possession dominates the heart of the boy, which, if well directed, can
be turned to excellent account.
Lieutenant Audubon encouraged his son's taste for natural history and
for drawing, but did not regard such accomplishments as a substitute
for what he considered more serious subjects. He himself had suffered
too much from lack of a formal education and was resolved to give his
children the best opportunities within their reach. "Revolutions," he
once remarked, according to his son, "were not confined to society,
but could also take place in the lives of individuals," when they were
all "too apt to lose in one day the fortune they had before possessed;
but talents and knowledge, added to sound mental training, assisted by
honest industry," could "never fail, nor be taken from any one when once
the possessor of such valuable means."
When the elder Audubon returned from one of his periodic cruises,
"my room," said the naturalist, "made quite a show," and the father
complimented him on his good taste; but upon being questioned in regard
to the progress made in his other studies, he could only hang his head
in silence. His sister Rosa, on the contrary, who was also called to
account, was warmly commended upon the improvement shown in her musical
exercises. The next morning at dawn a carriage was drawn up before the
Audubon door, and with the father and son, together with the latter's
trunk and violin, was soon proceeding in the direction of Rochefort.
The sailor had laid his plans and was about to execute them in his own
way. Presently, said the son, his father drew forth a book and began to
read, thus leaving him to his own resources. In this way they traveled
for a number of days, not an unnecessary word being spoken during the
entire journey, until the walls of Rochefort had been passed, and they
alighted at the door of the father's house in that city. When they had
entered, the naturalist continues, "my father bade me sit by his side,
and taking one of my hands, calmly said to me: 'My beloved boy, thou art
now safe. I have brought thee here that I may be able to pay constant
attention to thy studies; thou shalt have ample time for pleasures, but
the remainder _must_ be employed with industry and care. This day is
entirely thine, and as I must attend to my duties, if thou wishest to
see the docks, the fine ships-of-war, and walk around the wall, thou
mayest accompany me.'"
The youth accepted his father's proposal with good grace, and was
presented to the officers whom they met, but he soon found that he
was like a prisoner of war on parade. He was enrolled at once in
the military school, where he was placed under the immediate care of
Gabriel Loyen du Puigaudeau, his future brother-in-law. It was not
long, however, before young Audubon gave his guardian the slip; he
jumped from the window of his prison and made for the gardens of the
Marine Secrétariat, but a corporal, whom he had recognized as a friend,
suddenly nipped his plans in the bud; he was ordered, he said, aboard
a pontoon, then lying in port, and there was obliged to remain until
his father, who was absent at the time, finally released him, "not
without a severe reprimand." The following record, written long after,
is reminiscent of this period: "This day twenty-one years since I was
at Rochefort in France. I spent most of the day at copying letters of
my father to the Minister of the Navy.... What has happened to me since
would fill a volume.... This day, January first, 1821, I am on a keel
boat going down to New Orleans, the poorest man on it."
Audubon's stay at Rochefort, the date of which is no doubt correctly
given in the journal just quoted, was destined to be short. After a
year he returned to Nantes, and later to "La Gerbetière," where as
before he spent all of his leisure in roaming the fields and looking
for birds, their nests, their eggs and their young. At about this time,
when fifteen years of age, Audubon began to make a collection of his
original drawings of French birds, which was greatly extended in 1805
and 1806.
He has recorded that at the behest of his foster mother, who was an
ardent Catholic, he was confirmed in that Church when "within a few
months of being seventeen years old"; he was surprised and indifferent,
but "took to the catechism, studied it and other matters pertaining to
the ceremony, and all was performed to her liking." Since no record of
this act has been found, it is probable that the ceremony in question
was confused with that of his baptism, which, as we have noticed,
occurred on October 23, 1800, six months before he attained his
sixteenth birthday.
After having seen something of the character of Audubon's early training
in France, it will not be surprising to find that when, at the age of
forty-five, he first seriously began to write for publication and in
English, which was not his mother tongue, he found himself handicapped
in many ways. In after life he wrote that the only school which he had
ever attended was that of Adversity, and that his tuition there had been
of a prolonged and elaborate character. Though this statement was made
under the stress of present feeling, it was not wholly devoid of truth.
CHAPTER VII
FIRST VISIT TO THE UNITED STATES, AND LIFE AT "MILL GROVE"
Audubon is sent to the United States to learn English and
enter trade—Taken ill—Befriended by the Quakers—Settles at
"Mill Grove" farm—Its history and attractions—Studies of
American birds begun—Engagement to Lucy Bakewell—Sports and
festivities.
If there were ever a time when Lieutenant Audubon wished to see his son
following the victorious eagles of Napoleon, whom he is said to have
idolized, the hated conscription of that day, which was robbing every
home in France of its best blood, might well have brought counsels of
prudence. Little could the father have thought that by following other
eagles of his own choice, his son was destined to add a far greater
luster to the family name. Whatever may have turned the scale, in 1803
a decision was quickly reached, and the issue was fortunate for the
future of natural science in America; it was decided that young Audubon
should emigrate at once to the United States, with what end in view we
shall soon see expressed in the sailor's own words. Accordingly, to his
"intense and indescribable pleasure," the future naturalist, who had
now passed his eighteenth birthday, eagerly prepared for the journey,
the first of many that were later to become memorable in the annals of
American science. No record of this voyage has been preserved, but from
evidence derived from a variety of sources we can fix the time as the
autumn of 1803.[79]
Audubon's introduction to the country of his adoption proved most
inauspicious, for, to follow his account, when walking to Greenwich
in Connecticut, some thirty miles from New York, to cash the letter
of credit that his father had given him, he was seized with the yellow
fever.[80] Fortunately at this critical moment his captain came to his
aid, and placed him in the care of two Quaker ladies who kept a boarding
house at Morristown in New Jersey. To the faithful ministrations of
these kindly sisters the naturalist believed that he owed his life.
When Jean Audubon finally left the United States not far from the
beginning of 1790, he placed his business interests in America in
charge of an agent, named Miers Fisher, "a rich and honest Quaker of
Philadelphia," and to the hands of this trustworthy man he now confided
his son. Accordingly, when young Audubon had been nursed back to health,
word was sent to his father's friend, who came in his carriage and drove
the lad to his own home in the outskirts of Philadelphia. To follow
the account which the naturalist gave, when writing of this visit a
quarter of a century later, his host, finding his charge to be a comely
youth, and having a daughter "of no mean appearance," proposed that he
should remain with them and become one of the family. Audubon seems to
have suspected that this was a premeditated scheme to entangle him in
marriage, and as he had no liking for the severity of Quaker manners,
determined to make his escape. This, he said, was finally accomplished
by appealing to his own rights and to the honest Quaker's sense of duty
in seeing him established on the estate which his father had designed
for him.
Though effective for the time, as will presently appear, this appeal
was quite fanciful, for Jean Audubon's ideas concerning the future of
his son were of a more practical character, and he had no intention
at this time of establishing him at "Mill Grove," which was soon to be
sold. The friend to whom the following letter was addressed is implored
to aid in finding a good American family in which his son could acquire
the English language as a step to entering trade:[81]
This will be handed to you by my son, to whom, I request you
will render every service in your power, wishing that you
shd. join Mr. Miers Fisher to procure him a good and healthy
place where he might learn english. I come to point out to you
Morristown, and look for a good and decent familly in that
place to recommend him to her as your own Son. This service
from you will deserve my everlasting gratitude. I am Sir, with
consideration.
Yr Mo ob Ser—.
Mr. Miers Fisher, who evidently received a copy of this letter, no doubt
considered his own family as good as the best, and in detaining young
Audubon at his home, we must credit him with the desire of following
the instructions thus received.
"Mill Grove," which was finally reached in the spring of 1804,[82] was
a new-found paradise to the young naturalist. Here, however, he was
destined to spend but little over a year, though it was doubtless the
happiest year of his life. The farm was then conducted by a Quaker,
named William Thomas, who was installed as tenant with his wife and
family. It was arranged, said Audubon, that he should receive from them
a quarterly allowance in ready money, in a sum that "was considered
sufficient for the expenditure of a young gentleman."[83]
Well might any youth fond of wild life in the country have fallen
in love with this secluded spot, the beauty and charm of which are
suddenly revealed to the visitor of today as he approaches it from
the old Philadelphia road. Standing high on the rugged banks of the
Perkioming Creek, which empties into the Schuylkill River just below
this point, the old house, facing west, commands a wide and diversified
scene, extending from the living waters below, over bottom lands of
the valley, to the dim, undulating lines of the Reading hills in the
farther distance. This old landmark[84] of Colonial times remains today
in perfect preservation, thanks to the never-failing care and interest
of the present owner,[85] who has done all in his power to maintain its
historic associations, and to keep the memory of the naturalist green in
one of the few spots in America where material landmarks of his career
have not been completely effaced. The place has had an interesting
history, and though Audubon's occupancy was brief, it affected, as we
shall see, his whole after-life.
[Illustration: "MILL GROVE" IN 1835, SHOWING THE MILLS ON THE BANK OF
PERKIOMING CREEK, THE FARMHOUSE, AND THE OLD SMELTING WORKS (BUILT
BY SAMUEL WETHERILL), THEN IN DISUSE.
After a water-color painting by Charles Wetherill, son of
Samuel Wetherill, and uncle of William H. Wetherill, the
present owner of the estate.]
[Illustration: "MILL GROVE" AS IT APPEARS TO-DAY.
The above from photograph by, and this published by courtesy
of, Mr. W. H. Wetherill.]
Audubon thought nothing of walking to and from Philadelphia when no
conveyance was at hand, but to-day the railroad brings the traveler
within a mile and a half of his old farm. Not far to the south, beyond
the present railway station of Protectory, lies Valley Forge and the
wooded hills where Washington's ragged veterans passed in log huts
the ever memorable winter of 1777-8. Audubon fancied that his father
had made the acquaintance of General Washington at that date, but this
was eleven years before the place had come into the possession of his
family, and at that time Captain Audubon was sailing the seas (see
Chapter II, p. 32). Equally fanciful also was the idea that his mother
had once lived there, which he expressed in a letter (quoted in full
in Chapter XXXIII) written from New York on February 10, 1842, to young
Spencer F. Baird, at Carlisle, Pennsylvania. The naturalist was assuring
his young friend that the slow but beautiful "Little Carlisle" was to
be preferred to "Great New York, with all its humbug, rascality, and
immorality," and added: "It is now a good long time since I was young,
and resided near Norristown in Pennsylvania. It was then and is now a
very indifferent place as compared with New York; but still my heart and
my mind oftentime dwell in the pleasure that I felt there, and it always
reminds me that within a few miles of that village, my Mother did live."
The soil of this farm region is of a dark red color, owing to a
friable shale which outcrops everywhere. The high, wooded bank of the
Perkioming abounds in caves, scooped out by the hand of nature or man,
as well as in great pits and shafts, for deep down under its shale,
"Mill Grove" was rich in minerals, particularly the sulphide of lead,
associated with copper and zinc, to reach which many excavations have
been made. The lead mines of this farm are said to have been famous in
Revolutionary times, and have been worked sporadically for a hundred
years; if traditions are trustworthy, many a winged bullet that laid
a Red-coat low in the War of Independence was a messenger from "Mill
Grove." In some of the old conveyances, which go back to the time of
Penn, the place was commonly designated as the "Mill Grove Mines Farm."
It is recorded that the original tract of two thousand acres, extending
from the Schuylkill to the Perkioming as far as the mouth of Skippack
Creek, was sold to Tobias Collett by William Penn in 1699 for fifteen
shillings. We shall soon see that the mineral wealth which "Mill Grove"
was supposed to hide beneath its rugged slopes was a source of no little
trouble to the Audubons, the Roziers, and their successors for many a
year.
At the foot of the declivity towards the west, half hidden by foliage,
stood a picturesque stone mill, at a point where a solid rampart had
been thrown across the stream to divert its power to the use of man.
Hard by was the miller's house, which antedates the mansion, and which
was built and first occupied by James Morgan, who came into possession
of the property in 1749. It was this old mill site, originally distinct
from the farm, that gave the name to the place. Behind the gristmill
an extensive sawmill, built over the mill race, was also in operation.
Today the dam is broken through, and the great mill wheel of wood and
iron, twelve feet in diameter and fifteen feet wide, has come to rest
after turning for more than a century.
Like the mill, the original house on the hilltop was built of rough-hewn
native stone, which is brown or red and very hard. It consists of two
stories, with central hall, and a curiously divided attic with dormer
windows, which Audubon is said to have converted into a museum. A marble
slab in the south gable bears the date of 1762; an addition of the same
rough stone was built on the north side, but at a considerably lower
level, in 1763, and the commemorative tablet in this instance bears
the initials "J. M.," proving that the construction of the buildings of
"Mill Grove" was due to the old miller, James Morgan. The interior, with
its odd chimney-corner, low ceilings, bold fireplace and hand-wrought
iron-work, bears witness to a time when honest, substantial construction
and pride in workmanship received the first consideration. The present
owner of "Mill Grove" has added attractive porches at the front and
back. Ampelopsis climbs over the walls, which are shaded by handsome
trees; one of these, a fine black walnut at the easterly porch, which
in August bore its great green balls in full clusters, must have been
vigorous in Audubon's day, and possibly suggested the introduction of
sprays of this full-fruited tree into some of his plates.
While on a visit from Santo Domingo in 1789, concerned with his business
interests, Captain Audubon spent some time in Philadelphia. On March 28,
1789, he purchased the "Mill Grove" property, at that time consisting
of 284½ acres of land, mansion house, mill, barns, furniture, tools and
live stock, from Henry Augustin Prevost[86] and his wife, for the sum of
2,300 English pounds, in gold and silver. He never lived there, and that
he never intended to make it his immediate residence is shown by the
fact that in less than a fortnight he leased the farm in its entirety,
as already noticed, to its former owner, and gave him a mortgage which
stood for seventeen years.[87]
Young Audubon lived at "Mill Grove" from the winter of 1804 to the
spring of 1805, and again for a few months in the summer of 1806, the
year of its final sale by the Audubons and Roziers (see p. 148). In his
journal of 1820 the naturalist wrote that his father had once the honor
of being presented to General Washington, and also to Major Crogan, of
Kentucky, "who was particularly well acquainted with him." Jean Audubon
left at "Mill Grove" oil portraits of himself and of Washington, both by
an inferior American artist named Polk,[88] and it is probable that the
one of himself was painted while he was at Philadelphia in the spring
of 1789; the drawing is hard and flat, but the appearance of the face
clearly indicates a man past middle life, and Captain Audubon had then
reached his forty-fifth year.
Young Audubon, we may be sure, lost no time in exploring the resources
of this fine estate, where every bird, tree and flower came to him as a
new discovery. In following the Perkioming above the mill dam he found
a cave, carved out of the rocks, as he thought, by nature's own hand,
which was a favorite haunt of the unpretentious but friendly pewees,
the first American birds to attract his serious attention. So delighted
was the youthful naturalist that he decided to make the pewees' cave
his study; thither accordingly he brought his books, pencils and paper,
and there made his first studies of American bird life, in the spring
of 1804, in the third year of the presidency of Thomas Jefferson. It
was early in the season when Audubon chanced upon this quiet retreat;
the buds were swelling and maples had already burst into bloom, but
snow still lingered in patches through the woods, and the air was
piercing chill. The pewees were not yet at home, but one of their nests,
fashioned of mud and finest moss, was fixed above the vaulted entrance;
their coming was not long delayed, and Audubon, marking the very night
or day's dawn when the first pewee arrived, saw them beginning to
restore their old home on the tenth of April.
Strange to say, almost at that very time another pioneer in American
ornithology, Alexander Wilson, who will enter this history later, was
teaching a rough country school at Gray's Ferry, Kingsessing, also on
the Schuylkill, and not over twenty-five miles away. Though Audubon's
early studies were very desultory, both naturalists began their
observations at about the same time, for on June 1, 1803, Wilson wrote
to a friend that many pursuits had engaged his attention since leaving
Scotland in 1794, and that then he was "about to make a collection of
all our finest birds."
It must be set down to Audubon's credit that in the little cave on the
banks of the Perkioming, in April, 1804, he made the first "banding"
experiment on the young of an American wild bird. Little could he or any
one else then have thought that one hundred years later a Bird Banding
Society would be formed in America to repeat his test on a much wider
scale, in order to gather exact data upon the movements of individuals
of all migratory species in every part of the continent. After a few
trials, "I fixed," said he, "a light silver thread on the leg of each,
loose enough not to hurt the part, but so fastened that no exertions of
theirs could remove it." In the following spring he had the satisfaction
of catching several pewees on their nests farther up the creek, and
of "finding that two of them had a little ring on the leg," proving
that the young of a migratory bird, steering by the "compass" which is
carried in its brain, did sometimes return to its home region, if not
to the actual cradle or home site.
Across the Philadelphia road, which today leads to the little railway
station, and not more than a quarter of a mile from Audubon's farmhouse,
stood another but more pretentious mansion of the Colonial era, called
"Fatland Ford," pertaining to an extensive farm of that name which was
noted for the fertility of its alluvial acres. A road from the present
village of Audubon to the Schuylkill River and the ford runs through the
"Fatlands of Egypt," as the most productive parts of this old farm were
then called. From the house could be seen the camping grounds of the
Revolutionary soldiers, and James Vaux, its owner and builder, is said
to have entertained General Howe at breakfast and to have shown him the
room which General Washington, his guest of the previous day, had left
just in time to avoid an introduction.
Shortly before Audubon reached "Mill Grove," William Bakewell, an
Englishman who had emigrated to New Haven in 1802, bought this farm,
and with his wife and family took possession in the winter or spring
of 1804.[89] Of the six Bakewell children, the two eldest, Lucy Green
and Thomas Woodhouse, were but three years younger than the naturalist.
The senior Bakewell, said Audubon, called at "Mill Grove" to pay his
respects, but being then from home, and having brought with him a
Frenchman's dislike for everything English, he failed to respond. In
the autumn, however, when grouse had become plentiful in the woods, a
chance meeting brought them together, and young Audubon, who was a great
admirer of his neighbor's expert marksmanship and well trained dogs,
duly apologized for his neglect and forthwith paid a visit to "Fatland
Ford."
We shall let the naturalist tell in his own words of his first meeting
with the young woman who afterwards became his wife:
Well do I recollect the morning, and may it please God that
I may never forget it, when for the first time I entered Mr.
Bakewell's dwelling. It happened that he was absent from
home, and I was shown into a parlor where only one young
lady was snugly seated at her work by the fire. She rose
on my entrance, offered me a seat, and assured me of the
gratification her father would feel on his return, which,
she added, would be in a few moments as she would despatch a
servant for him. Other ruddy cheeks and bright eyes made their
transient appearance but, like spirits gay, soon vanished from
my sight; and there I sat, my gaze riveted, as it were, on the
young girl before me, who, half working, half talking, essayed
to make the time pleasant to me. Oh! may God bless her! It
was she, my dear sons, who afterward became my beloved wife,
and your mother.
When Mr. Bakewell returned, his daughter, Lucy, presided at the tea that
was served, and Audubon received his first experience of hospitality
in the English style, that was to be repeated in Britain at a later
day on a more lavish scale. A hunting expedition was arranged and the
men started out at once. Festivities of various sorts, and, later,
skating parties, became the order of the day, and it was not long before
hospitalities were exchanged, when Audubon, having secured, with the
aid of his tenant's son, as many partridge as possible, had the whole
Bakewell family to dinner under his roof at "Mill Grove."
Audubon's choice of a wife, thus quickly made, marked a turning-point
in his career, and the curious fact remains that while he might have
ransacked the country from Florida to Maine, as he afterwards repeatedly
did in his search after birds, and woefully blundered, the woman who
by her sterling qualities of mind and heart was the one to recognize
and call forth the best that was in him, should have been placed by
circumstances close by his door. Whatever the world has ever owed to
Audubon is a debt due to Lucy Bakewell, for every leaf of oak that is
plaited for his brow, another of lavender should be twined for hers.
During this gay but brief period of his life, Audubon has described
himself as inordinately fond of dress, often cutting, as he said, an
absurd figure by shooting in black satin breeches and silk stockings,
and wearing the best shirts which the Philadelphia market could afford;
he took pride, he adds, in riding the best horse that he could procure,
and in having his guns and fishing tackle of the most expensive and
ornate description. "Not a ball," he said, "a skating match, a house or
riding party took place without me."
[Illustration: "MILL GROVE" FARMHOUSE, WEST FRONT, FACING PERKIOMING
CREEK.]
[Illustration: "FATLAND FORD," THE CHILDHOOD HOME OF LUCY BAKEWELL
AUDUBON.
This and the above after photographs of August 16, 1914.]
While freely acknowledging his follies at this time, he was able to
say that he was addicted to no vices. His usual custom was to rise with
the dawn, when his bird studies would begin, in the early hours which
are best for this purpose. According to his own account, Audubon was
extremely abstemious in his youth, for he declared that he had lived
on fruits, vegetables and milk, with only an occasional indulgence in
game and fish, and that he had not swallowed a single glass of wine
or spirits until his wedding day. This was the more remarkable in a
youth coming from a country which flowed with good wine, where school
children are still served with watered wine for lunch, and where the
cooks, as Goldsmith believed, could concoct seven different dishes out
of a nettle-top, and who, if they had enough butcher's meat (a want that
has since been abundantly supplied), would be the best purveyors in the
world. Audubon attributed his iron constitution to this simple regimen,
which had been followed, he said, from his earliest recollection, though
he admitted that while in France it was extremely annoying to all about
him; for this reason he would not dine out when his peculiar habits were
likely to be the subject of unpleasant comment. To follow this account
of himself:
Pies, puddings, eggs, milk and cream, was all I cared for in
the way of food, and many a time I have robbed my tenant's
wife, Mrs. Thomas, of the cream intended to make butter for
the Philadelphia market.... All this time I was as fair and
rosy as a girl, though as strong, indeed stronger than most
young men ... and why have I thought a thousand times, should
I not have kept to that delicious mode of living, and why
should not mankind in general be more abstemious than mankind
is?[90]
William Gifford Bakewell, a younger brother of Lucy, has left this
interesting record of a visit paid to "Mill Grove" in the summer of
1806:
Audubon took me to his house where he and his companion,
Rozier, resided, with Mrs. Thomas, for an attendant. On
entering his room, I was astonished and delighted to find that
it was turned into a museum. The walls were festooned with
all kinds of birds' eggs, carefully blown out and strung on a
thread. The chimney-piece was covered with stuffed squirrels,
racoons, and opossums; and the shelves around were likewise
crowded with specimens, among which were fishes, frogs,
snakes, lizards, and other reptiles. Besides these stuffed
varieties, many paintings were arrayed on the walls, chiefly
of birds. He had great skill in stuffing and preserving
animals of all sorts. He had also a trick in training dogs
with great perfection, of which art his famous dog, Zephyr,
was a wonderful example. He was an admirable marksman, an
expert swimmer, a clever rider, possessed of great activity,
prodigious strength, and was notable for the elegance of
his figure and the beauty of his features, and he aided
nature by a careful attendance to his dress. Besides other
accomplishments he was musical, a good fencer, danced well,
and had some acquaintance with legerdemain tricks, worked in
hair, and could plait willow baskets.
CHAPTER VIII
DACOSTA AND THE "MILL GROVE" MINE
Advent of a new agent at "Mill Grove"—Dacosta becomes guardian
to young Audubon and exploits a neglected lead mine on the
farm—Correspondence of Lieutenant Audubon and Dacosta—Quarrel
with Dacosta—Audubon's return to France.
If young Audubon was playing the _rôle_ of a prodigal son at the "Mill
Grove" farm, which in a certain sense was doubtless true, an episode
soon occurred which put a check to his carefree existence. Not long
after the naturalist had arrived, William Thomas, the tenant, called his
attention to the lead-ore deposits, which he thought had been discovered
by a Mr. Gilpin in 1791, and the news of this prospect was promptly
communicated to the elder Audubon in France. Though the presence of
this mineral at "Mill Grove" had been known, as we have seen, at a much
earlier day, its rediscovery excited great interest, and may have been a
factor of influence in the steps which were soon to be taken. It should
be noticed, however, that before May, 1803, a young Frenchman from
Nantes, bearing the Portuguese name of Francis Dacosta, had preceded
young Audubon to "Mill Grove," and apparently had acquired at that
time a certain interest in the farm.[91] Dacosta soon succeeded Miers
Fisher as Jean Audubon's agent, and becoming enthusiastic over the lead
mine, was anxious to exploit it. Acting also upon the senior Audubon's
request, he assumed a sort of guardianship over the son.
Dacosta began to dig for ore in the following year. News of his
enterprise spread rapidly, and this long neglected mine was heralded
in the newspapers as "one of the first discoveries yet made in the
United States."[92] On December 15, 1804, Dacosta purchased a one-half
undivided interest in "Mill Grove,"[93] giving, as we believe, a
mortgage, and hoping to pay for his share out of the profits of the
lead mine. Thereafter for about two years he continued to conduct the
farm and develop the mine, upon the basis of a one-half interest, in
addition to a small salary.[94] In case the mine proved a success, it
was understood that young Audubon was to be taken into the business and
thus obtain a means of self-support.
Dacosta was at first averse to forming a company, but the Quaker tenant,
William Thomas, who caught the fever, and who was thought to possess
more knowledge of the mine than he was ready to divulge, seems to have
been taken conditionally into the partnership. Dacosta made full reports
of his progress to the old sailor at Couëron, who came regularly to
Nantes to send back to America his well considered answers and candid
advice. Dacosta also called persistently for money, but as Lieutenant
Audubon was unable to meet these demands, he applied to his friend
François Rozier, a wealthy merchant at Nantes, to supply the needed
capital. Rozier invested 16,000 francs, and to complicate matters took
a mortgage upon one-half of the value of "Mill Grove," in which the
earlier proprietor, John Augustin Prevost, as well as Francis Dacosta,
was also interested. Jean Audubon, Dacosta and Rozier thus became
partners in an enterprise which seems to have swallowed up all of the
money which was advanced and never to have made any substantial returns.
The eventual failure of the lead mine must be attributed in part to the
high cost of materials, as well as to the expense involved in uncovering
the ore, a difficulty which all later exploiters seem to have found
insuperable. Dacosta also discovered that the management of his youthful
charge was quite as difficult as making a success of the mine. His
grievances on this score were duly reported at Couëron, and if he was
really trying to carry out the instructions which came from France, it
was perhaps no wonder that he received the undisguised contempt of his
rebellious pupil. How just the naturalist's charges against his hated
tutor may have been, will be considered in the sequel, but Lieutenant
Audubon's letters,[95] to be given presently at length, clearly show
that in spite of the strained relations which later ensued, Dacosta
continued to enjoy his confidence for some time after young Audubon's
return to France in 1805. The more serious troubles that followed seem
to have arisen from entanglements into which all were later drawn.
In the first two letters to be given, but the third and fourth of
the series, Jean Audubon refers particularly to "Mill Grove" and the
prospective mine, and to the proposed marriage of his son to Lucy
Bakewell, concerning which he was reluctant to give his consent for
reasons which he specifies at length; his sanction was in fact withheld
until the young man was on the road to self-support two years later.
_Jean Audubon to Francis Dacosta_
[NANTES, 1804-5]
I told you to sell to W. Thomas the portion on the other side
... but your letter of the 27th of September with that of Mr.
Miers Fisher, who is not in favor of it, has made me change
my mind in the meantime. If your plan succeeds, as I wish it
may, this part of the farm would become almost indispensable
for exploitation [of the mine]. Moreover, has not Mr. W.
Thomas intentions, which we do not know? Might it not be
possible that in this very same part he had made more valuable
discoveries than those which he has shown us? In all these
matters, however, I rely entirely on the wisdom of Mr. Miers
Fisher and of yourself, and I thank you for your willingness
to remain in charge of my affairs,[96] by accepting anew
the power of attorney, which he sends me together with the
indenture to be signed by my wife and by myself in presence
of witnesses. But you ask that this should be done before
the mayor of Nantes, while we have been living, since you
departed, in the commune of Couëron; accordingly this will be
taken before the mayor of that commune, and legalized by a
prefect of the department. That, I believe, will fulfil the
same obligations, for should it be necessary for my wife to
come to Nantes in the weather that we are constantly having it
might cause a delay that would be prejudicial to us. Remember,
my dear Sir, I expect that if your plan succeeds, my son will
find a place in the works, which will enable him to provide
for himself, in order to spare me from expenses that I can,
with difficulty, support. Your first letters have almost
persuaded me that this so-called mine was of little or no
account, but the arrangement that you have made with W. Thomas
is so important that I do not doubt you made certain of the
value of the object before deciding to grant him a recompense,
which was to be only in the thing itself. In this work we
should then be making a very great sacrifice, and it would be
a loss. If, however, you propose to forestall the payment of
the sums that you owe, I accept [the proposition] to be paid
in Philadelphia; I will reflect upon it, and will look into
it. If I can arrange matters for this [plan] with Mr. Dupuir,
my next will be more explicit upon this subject. My son speaks
to me about his marriage. If you would have the kindness to
inform me about his intended, as well as about her parents,
their manners, their conduct, their means, and why they are
in that country, whether it was in consequence of misfortune
that they left Europe, you will be doing me a signal service,
and I beg you, moreover, to oppose this marriage until I may
give my consent to it. Tell these good people that my son is
not at all rich, and that I can give him nothing if he marries
in this condition.
_Jean Audubon to Francis Dacosta_
NANTES, _le 19 ventose, an 13 9 March, 1805_
MR. DACOSTA, Philadelphia:
I have received at this very moment your duplicate of the
twelfth of November, and your letter of December fifth, which
is not so favorable for several reasons as the one preceding
it, yet this impels us to hope that your last tunnel will not
be a deserter, and that the oxides of iron which are present
will not vanish upon further digging; this, at least, is my
hope. You do well to make every effort to obtain associates.
If this does not succeed, and if you should wish to work for
our interests, I should always approve of everything that you
do, since you have my confidence. In this case I believe ...
that you should make the most urgent repairs, above all at
the principal house, before going there to live. As to Mr.
W. Thomas, you do well to keep him for yourself for every
reason that you give me, and I believe that he will not be
stubborn about withdrawing until he has, or has not, deserved
his reward.
I am [vexed] Sir; one cannot be more vexed at the fact that
you should have reason to complain about the conduct of my
son, for the whole thing, when well considered, is due only
to bad advice, and lack of experience; they have goaded his
self-esteem, and perhaps he has been immature enough to boast
in the house to which he goes, that this plantation should
fall to him, to him alone. You have every means to destroy
this presumption; it is known at Philadelphia that you have
the same rights as I have, and that you are doing nothing but
for our mutual advantage. I am writing to him on this subject,
for he does not speak of it to me, and I am giving him the
rebuke that his indiscretion deserves. Read this letter, and
have the kindness to seal it before delivering it to him.
You tell me that I can refer, in regard to his conduct, to
the report that Mr. Miers Fisher has given of it in his long
letter of the month of September; that, unhappily, I have not
received, for Mr. Fisher tells me nothing about him, neither
what is good nor bad. As to going to that country, this seems
well nigh impossible; to recall my son is not easier; the
reasons which made me send him out [there] still remain. Only
an instant is needed to make him change from bad to good; his
extreme youth and his petulance are his only faults, and if
you have the goodness to give him the indispensable, he will
soon feel the necessity of making friends with you, and he
can be of great service if you use him for your own benefit.
It is necessary then, my dear Sir, that we endeavor, by
gentleness, to reclaim him to his duty. If you are indulgent
with him, it will be I who should be under every obligation
to you. I hope that the enclosed letter will work a change
with him. This is my only son, my heir, and I am old. When
Mr. Miers Fisher shall have shown my letter to the would-be
father-in-law, he will see that he is mistaken in his
calculation upon the assumed marriage of his daughter, for if
it should take place without my consent, all help on my part
would cease from that instant; this, if you will have the
kindness, is what you may say to the would-be father-in-law,
that I do not wish my son to marry so young.
Your letters of the 28th of October and the 12th of November
are in the country.[97] I cannot reply categorically upon
their contents; I will examine them, and will tell you in my
next what I think about them. Your family, which I have seen,
is well. Our ladies thank you for your kind remembrance. I
am....
When the preceding letter was written young Audubon was on his way to
France, to protest, as he said, against Dacosta's treatment of him. At
the date of the letter which follows, he was at Couëron, hunting birds
with Dr. d'Orbigny.
_Jean Audubon to Francis Dacosta_
NANTES, _14 June, 1805_
TO MR. DACOSTA, Philadelphia:
I have received, at this very moment, your letter of the 8th
of April. I have replied to your preceding by duplicate. Like
yourself I am greatly astonished that you should not have
received the contracts which I forwarded to you at once. I
have reserved copies of these papers, which I have literally
copied.
If I had the least idea that they would not reach you, and
that an accident had befallen the ship, I should forward them
in duplicate, but as this boat, at the time of its departure,
was long delayed by the embargoes as well as by bad weather,
I am persuaded that this is the sole cause, and that they will
have reached you since.
You are about to appeal to the supreme court to prove your
ownership; is there a living being who can contest it? If our
deeds, granted in France, have not their full force in that
country, nothing can annul them for us who are French. You
shall do in this matter what you like; the greatest objection
is this, that it stops your operations; but who is to blame?
It is due to distance, and not to any negligence.
You say that you will do nothing until you have these
documents; if your intention is to work for our benefit, as
you say in your preceding, a company still being disagreeable
[to you], that ought not to stop you; you have every power,
[and] time lost is irreparable. I am much annoyed at the
delay that this Mr. Miers Fisher causes you; as you say, he
is an honest man, but negligent, and this in consequence of
his age, and absorption in his great business.
We now return to Mr. David Ross,[98] who in his letter tells
a pack of lies. At the close of 1789 I presented myself
at his house with the power of attorney of Mr. Formon,[99]
when we settled the business of the "Count of Artois," and
the "Annette."[100] There never has been, as he said, any
dissolution of the partnership between Mr. Formon and myself.
I settled the accounts at that time both with him and with
Samuel Plaisance concerning these vessels, with the exception
of a residue of three thousand francs which are due me from
Mr. Edward, their associate, who died at London. When I asked
him for his certificates, he gave me for excuse that they were
at the iron factory above Richmond, and that he had given Mr.
Formon a private obligation that he would be very glad to have
an exchange for the certificates. This affair has rested there
ever since, and according to his letter Mr. Formon has taken
out seven thousand, four hundred dollars, which exceeds his
share by 1,650 dollars. If the estate of Mr. Formon is not
without resources, it is to his heirs that you must apply for
this overdraft, and get from Mr. David Ross all that you can,
for with such people one cannot rely upon getting anything
except with iron hooks.
The son-in-law of Mr. Formon doubtless will have found among
his papers all that constitutes the legal basis of my portion;
his certificates, his letter of attorney prove it, and this is
a title, and I believe that I have proofs by accounts current.
I salute you.
_Jean Audubon to Francis Dacosta_
NANTES, _22 June, 1805_
TO MR. DACOSTA: