Or, Audubon gets it wrong.
John James Audubon was not
above trying to discredit his contemporaries when it appeared that they
might be obtaining more praise and adoration than he. Read this to mean
financial support, as money was always in short supply and there was
never enough to share with contemporaries. In particular, he made a point
of never mentioning the works of the Bartrams. Of course they
preceded him in passage through the frontiers as did George Catlin and Hector St.
John de
As Peattie points out in his book, Audubon's America, Audubon
enjoyed a good laugh, as a jokester he was not above planting seeds of a
weed in another&rsquos garden so that when mature all could see the
folly. (Not unlike the folly in LeDu's gardens in Maryland. At a
distance, an awesome building appears on the grounds. However, on
inspection it is a "folly", a miniature framed by the impressive
plantings making it appear to be a grand structure.)
In such light, a recent article in Smithsonian Magazine praised Audubon
and in the process became the subject of one of his practical jokes. Bil
Gilbert (the author of the article) thought that Audubon was playing a
joke on Rafinesque. The joke was actually on Audubon and Gilbert.
Audubon correctly judged that Rafinesque (in
his desire to catalog all creatures, plants and other natural
occurrences) would accept his drawings since Audubon had considerable
standing as a naturalist. His hope was that Rafinesque would incorporate
them into his writings and thus would be roundly criticized for such.
So Audubon "created" a mythical creature with strange features, not
knowing that such a beast actually existed. (He had probably heard tales
of such a critter from the locals but had never seen one. In many of his
writings he captured the sense of the frontier by repeating such
stories.) His drawing of a fish with a big nose and scales was accepted
by Rafinesque. We now know that there are two different fish that
somewhat fit this description. The "paddle-fish" of the Missouri pretty
much fits the sketch by Audubon. These fish are in most of the
tributaries of the Mississippi and Arkansas Rivers. They are also found
in the head waters of the Missouri, in Montana and Wyoming. And, if
that's not enough, the Ohio river has its own, "spoon-billed" catfish
that sure looks like Audubon's drawing. Since Gilbert didn't look, he
accepted Audubon at face value, becomes the victim of Audubon's pen, and
Rafinesque is vindicated.
Don't want to make too much of this rivalry but just as today, the
scientist had to publish or perish and was always looking for a leg up
over the competition. Audubon also took on George Catlin who preceded him
up the Missouri. When Audubon observed Indians pulling bloated buffalo
from the river and eagerly using them for food, he was highly critical of
their efforts and viewed them as savages. Little did he know that they
had discovered a fact about the tenderizing action of enzymes. Once
released from the tissues of the dead animal the enzymes digest the
connective tissues making the meat much more flavorful and tender. (We
now know this as "aged" in the case of beef.)
Audubon's statement bears repeating: "Ah! Mr. Catlin, I am now sorry to
see and to read your accounts of the Indians you saw -- how very
different they must have been from any that I have seen! We saw no
'carpeted prairies,' no 'velvety distant landscape'; and if these things
are to be seen, why, the sooner we reach them the better." How sad that
Audubon was right. After the plague of man and disease decimated the
tribes, there was little of grandeur left for Audubon to see. It is
fortunate that George Catlin did make his remarkable visits to the West
and capture the Indians and their country as they can no longer be. And
we owe Catlin further; he envisioned the National Parks as we see them
today.
Nevertheless, Audubon provides us with some of the most beautiful
drawings of the animals and birds and for this we should be grateful. And
his writing skills were awesome. Too bad his pen was poisoned as he
sought to destroy those who also were perhaps even more deserving of the
title of "Naturalist". So the creature that Audubon constructed in
Kentucky when viewed from a distance appears as Rafinesque's folly,
but is Audubon's instead.
****
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