One after another the scientific, literary, and arts societies of the modern Athens elected Audubon to honorary membership; Combe, the phrenologist and author of _The Constitution of Man_, examined the naturalist's head and modeled it in plaster, for of course it proved to be a perfect exemplification of his system; Syme, the artist, did his portrait for Lizars to engrave. Meanwhile the press was giving such flattering accounts of the man and his work that Audubon confessed that he was quite ashamed to walk the street. At the annual banquet of the Royal Institution, held at the Waterloo Hotel and presided over by Lord Elgin, Audubon was toasted, and it required all his resolution to rise and, for the first time in his life, address a large assembly; this, however, he managed to do in the following words: "Gentlemen; my command of words in which to reply to your kindness is almost as limited as that of the birds hanging on the walls of your Institution. I am truly obliged for your favors. Permit me to say; may God bless you all, and may this society prosper." On the 10th of December he wrote: "My situation in Edinburgh borders on the miraculous," and he felt that his reception in that city was a good augury for the future. But the life that he was compelled to lead was extremely fatiguing, and he often longed to return to his family and to his favorite magnolia woods in Louisiana. "I go to dine," he wrote, "at six, seven, or even eight o'clock in the evening, and it is often one or two when the party breaks up; then painting all day, with my correspondence, which increases daily, makes my head feel like an immense hornet's nest, and my body wearied beyond all calculation; yet it has to be done; those who have my best interests at heart tell me I must _not refuse_ a single invitation." But notwithstanding the tax which society always levies upon the lion's strength, he wrote almost daily in his journal or diary,[332] and its pages, from which we have been quoting, became a mirror of all that he saw, heard, or did. Audubon was generous with his time, as with everything else, and would never hesitate to lay aside his own work for the sake of a friend who was eager to acquire his method of drawing. But when his entertainment commenced with an invitation to breakfast, he began to be alarmed at the large share of his working hours which had to be surrendered to his friends. "I seem, in a measure," he said, "to have gone back to my early days of society and fine dressing, silk stockings and pumps, and all the finery with which I made a popinjay of myself in my youth.... It is Mr. Audubon here, and Mr. Audubon there, and I can only hope they will not make a conceited fool of Mr. Audubon at last."