Audubon met at this time a more appreciative engraver in Mr. Fairman, who urged him to take his drawings to Europe and have them engraved in a superior style; on July 12 the naturalist wrote that he had drawn "for Mr. Fairman a small grouse to be put on a banknote belonging to the State of New Jersey." By some lucky chance this incident brought him the acquaintance of Edward Harris,[306] whom he met that summer in Philadelphia, and who became one of his most constant and disinterested friends. It was Harris who a few days after their meeting took all of the drawings which Audubon had for sale and at the artist's own prices;[307] who for years was continually sending him rare or desirable specimens of birds; who accompanied him through the Southern States to Florida in 1837 and on the famous Missouri River Expedition in 1843. Edward Harris became a patron of science through his friendship with scientific men, and many besides Audubon were indebted to him for judicious advice as well as more substantial benefits. [Illustration: AN EARLY LETTER TO EDWARD HARRIS, DATED JULY 14, 1824 AT THE BEGINNING OF THEIR LIFE-LONG FRIENDSHIP. From the Jeanes MSS. Audubon's last letter to Edward Harris, from the same source, is reproduced in Volume II, page 287.] The Academy of Natural Sciences, founded in 1812, was well established at this time, and its rapidly growing Museum was already the largest and most valuable in the New World; ornithology was a favored subject, and the Academy's roll embraced every American pioneer worker of note in the entire field of the natural sciences. The following account of a meeting of the Academy, held on October 11, 1825, when Ord presided, has been preserved in a letter of the period:[308] A few evenings since I was associated with a society of gentlemen, members of the Academy of Natural Sciences. There were present fifteen or twenty. Among the number were Le Sueur, Rafinesque, Say, Peale, Pattison, Harlan, and Charles Lucien Bonaparte.