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Show ' ; JOHN J. AUDUBOX. I Word comes that a movement is on ' . ; j foot in New Orleans to erect a monu- I ! j ment to the memory of John Jamos Au- I , dubon, the ornithologist.. Although A u- . I ,;,! dubon was not the first of American f ' ! ornithologists, still his fame is greater ! - than any who preceded him or succeeded f :! 1 " hini. His fame rests upon his artistic ; m work rather than upon his scientific I . I work. . In scientific accomplishments j ; ; it is doubtful whether he was ! . i : . the equal of Wilson or the su- j i perior of Nuttall. When compared to I ; s Bch ornithologists as Cassin. Baird, I 1 1 Brewer and Itidgway he pales into insig- ;t nificance. Yet this is more owing to the I ; undeveloped state in which the science . of ornithologj was in his day than any i j I other cause. Terhaps the most purely ; 5 scientific work on ornithology ever pub- f i f lished in America is Vol. IX. of the Pa- J j cific Railroad Survey Reports, and which i I ' '; was tue work of rrof- s- F- Baird. But j t sn then the science has advanced rap- ! ; idly, and the rules for classification have j I I leen much modified, while the pystem of ; nomenclature has undergone a complete j I f . revolution. So complete has this revolu- I I .:. tion bQen tliat the tri-nomial system, Si which is almost universal in America, j r ' ' has received the distinctive apjiellation J I . ' of the American system. In Europe ' i . i it does not obtain to iiny considerable ex- !, - ,'( ten The advocates of the system sav ' ) i it makes almost as much of a departure ' : and. advance in science as the bi-nomial i , i : system of Linmeus did. But this is very j ' doubtful. To show ihe great advance j I ' . r ' that has been made in the science and j j ' , Kiuay oi ornnuoiogA', it is only necessary f ; to compare the first and second editions ! of Dr. Elliot Coues' "Key to North Amer-! I !i! I ican Birds,'! and the first edition of that j " j . work ouly appeared in 1872, and the sec- j I mi ond within a year or two. Audubon does not belong to this school, but f i, ' there is 'not : one American orni- I 1 thologiBt to-day whose fame is so ' . ( ; I assured as is that of Audubon. But his : fame will, rest upon his art. In his ; . . ' ' ! t . i ' j "Birds of North America" he painted his birds life sizer and there is in them a life . and action which has never been surpassed. sur-passed. His tints are of the most beautiful,' beauti-ful,' and the birds of " iiis book are so beautiful and 'true to nature that they seem to be the birds of heaven.1 His critic and biographer in the ninth edition of the "Encyclopedia Britannica," says that Audubon's drawing is not true. If this is true, then only the eye of the keenest critic can detect the fault. The pupil of David may have erred occasionally occasion-ally in his drawing, but he never erred in his instinct of grace and beauty. Audubon's life was passed mostly amidst the scenes of nature, for he was the child oi nature. In his wanderings and journeyings he met with many adventures, ad-ventures, and once lodged in the cabin of a veritable Meg Merriles, and had it not been for the warnings of an Indian who was also there, his earthly career might have been terminated in a lone cabin in the heart of the forest. His "Ornithological Biography" is his best known work, but in this his figures of birds are painted on a scale. In connection connec-tion with the Rev. Mr. Bachman he got out a work on the "Quadrupeds of North America," but this work never had the same fame that his bird works enjoyed. America has no fitter name to whom to erect a monument than that of John James Audubon. |