Page:Audubon and His Journals.djvu/159

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THE EUROPEAN JOURNALS
119

present, ranged ourselves and toasted "Our enemies in war, but our friends in peace." I am particularly fond of a man who speaks well of his country, and the peculiar warmth of Englishmen on this subject is admirable. I have had a note from Lord de Tabelay, who is anxious to see my drawings and me, and begs me to go to his domain fourteen miles distant, on my way to Birmingham. I observed that many persons who visited the exhibition room investigated my style more closely than at Liverpool. A Dr. Hulme spent several hours both yesterday and to-day looking at them, and I have been asked many times if they were for sale. I walked some four miles out of the town; the country is not so verdant, nor the country seats so clean-looking, as Green Bank for instance. The funnels raised from the manufactories to carry off the smoke appear in hundreds in every direction, and as you walk the street, the whirring sound of machinery is constantly in your ears. The changes in the weather are remarkable; at daylight it rained hard, at noon it was fair, this afternoon it rained again, at sunset was warm, and now looks like a severe frost.

September 14, Thursday. I have dined to-day at the home of Mr. George W. Wood, about two miles from the town. He drove me thither in company with four gentlemen, all from foreign countries, Mexico, Sumatra,Constantinople, and La Guayra; all were English and had been travelling for business or pleasure, not for scientific or literary purposes. Mrs. Wood was much interested in her gardens, which are very fine, and showed me one hundred bags of black gauze, which she had made to protect as many bunches of grapes from the wasps.

September 15. FROST. This morning the houses were covered with frost, and I felt uncommonly cold and shivery. My exhibition was poorly attended, but those who came seemed interested. Mr. Hoyle, the eminent chemist, came with four very pretty little daughters, in little gray