As we entered the avenue, which led to the farm, every step brought to my mind the memory of past years, and I was bewildered by the recollections until we reached the door of the house, which had once been the residence of my father as well as of myself. The cordial welcome of Mr. Wetherill, the owner, was extremely agreeable. After resting a few moments, I abruptly took my hat and ran wildly to the woods, to the grotto where I first heard from my wife that she was not indifferent to me. It had been torn down, and some stones carted away; but raising my eyes towards heaven, I repeated the promise we had mutually made. We dined at Mill Grove, and as I entered the parlor I stood motionless for a moment on the spot where my wife and myself were forever joined. In this dramatic rehearsal the naturalist clearly implies that he was married in the parlor of his own home, but his excellent wife, who was surely in this instance the better authority, explicitly states that their marriage took place in her father's house at "Fatland Ford." Since Audubon was in the habit of sending extracts from his journal to his family, it is clear that errors of this sort were the simple result of an impulsive temperament; the moment his imagination pictured his wedding as having taken place in his old abode, down went the jotting in the journal, which was written at odd moments anywhere, often at late hours, and with no care in revision or thought of future publication. On August 1, 1824, Audubon recorded in his diary that he had left Philadelphia for New York on the day before, "in good health, free from debt, and free from anxiety about the future." Sully had given him glowing letters of introduction to Gilbert Stuart, Washington Allston and Colonel Trumbull, but then as now midsummer was not a propitious time to find city people at home, and he began to consider the advisability of visiting both Albany and Boston. Alternately elated or depressed by the prospects of the day or the hour, Audubon wrote on August 4 that he had called with a letter of introduction on Dr. Mitchell, who had given him "a kind letter to his friend Dr. Barnes." This hurriedly penciled note from the Nestor of American science of that day has been carefully preserved, and reads as follows:[310] _Dr. Samuel L. Mitchell to Dr. Barnes_ Mr. A. who brings strong testimonial of excellence from our friends in Pha is now sitting with me—I have been delighted and instructed by a Display of his Port Folio containing Drawings Done from Life of North American Birds and illustrating the Connect, of ornithology with Botany. he has Superior attainments & skill in the natural sciences which he has cultivated for more than 20 y.