In February of 1847, after having been abroad with General Tom Thumb for three years, punctuated by two short trips to New York, Barnum returned to this country. He had renewed the lease of the American Museum for ten years at a rental of $10,000 a year, and taxes; he also leased the adjoining buildings and enlarged the Museum and the Lecture Room. The news of Barnum’s triumphs on the continent as well as the receptions of the Connecticut Yankee at the Court of Queen Victoria had been copied by the New York newspapers from the foreign journals, and after Barnum’s return the Museum was more popular than ever. In Europe he had kept it constantly in mind, and he made many purchases for the ever-increasing collection. Models of machinery and duplicates of the dissolving views which were so popular in London, were shipped to the Museum. [Illustration: BARNUM’S AMERICAN MUSEUM From “Gleason’s Pictorial Drawing Room Companion” _Westervelt Collection_] [Illustration: GENERAL TOM THUMB An engraving made in England during his first appearance, 1844 _Houdini Collection_] Barnum also made an offer for Shakespeare’s home, which he knew would never be permitted to leave England, but which he planned to remove in sections to his Museum, if he could get away with it, for he admitted to his own mind no impossibility until everything had been tried in an endeavor. Barnum’s designs became public in London, Englishmen interfered, and the Shakespeare home was purchased by the Shakespearean Association. “Had they slept a few days longer,” Barnum wrote of this project, “I should have made a rare speculation, for I was subsequently assured that the British people, rather than suffer that house to be removed to America, would have bought me off with twenty thousand pounds.” He made an offer of 500 pounds for a tree on which Lord Byron had carved his name, and which was then growing on the poet’s English estate. Colonel Wildman, who had bought Byron’s estate and cherished it, flew into a military rage of great proportions at the indignity of Barnum’s offer. In London Barnum also made complete arrangements for the transfer of Mme. Tussaud’s famous Waxworks to New York, but after the papers were drawn up the enterprise was canceled by the English owners. In Paris Barnum purchased Robert Houdin’s automatic writer, which had won the gold medal at the Quinquennial Exposition. Barnum visited Robert Houdin at his home, and was delighted with the mechanical conveniences and contrivances of the magician’s residence. Instead of a butler, a slot for a visiting card greeted Barnum after he rang the bell. Doors opened apparently by their own volition, and luncheon was served when Houdin pressed a button that caused the dining table to rise from the floor. Barnum also purchased in Paris a diorama of Napoleon’s funeral, showing all the processional details from the embarkation of the body at St. Helena to its entombment in the Invalides.