In the 1826 Journal, Audubon shows an increased awareness of his text as a text and of himself as an author, referring to himself at one point as “a Naturalist; nay Let me fully Write an author!” Compared to Mississippi River Journal, the 1826 Journal features a greater density of parallelism, allusions, apostrophe, and alliteration. In the 1826 Journal, Audubon (or Audubon’s speaker) appears more conscious of how he says things, but also in what he chooses to say or not to say. Audubon creates content through evasions—he says by not-saying—and this complex method of rendering reality draws attention to the problems of representation and preservation that Audubon faces as an author, artist, and naturalist.

Part of Audubon’s project as a naturalist is to preserve and represent nature to others. Audubon reveals the extent to which he values representation when he says of Sir Walter Scott, “Where art thou? Wilt thou not come to my Country? Wrestle with Mankind and Stop their Increasing ravages on Nature & describe her Now for the Sake of Future Ages” (186). To Audubon, representation of nature is both a way to preserve nature for future generations and also a potential method for affecting societal change. Yet representing nature entangles “art” with nature; that is, it is impossible for Audubon to replicate the birds he sees in nature, so he must make artistic decisions in how to represent them. This creates a difficulty for Audubon, because to him nature is distinct from art, and distinctly valuable. Audubon emphasizes this point when he criticizes a priest, who is “a Closet Priest I Mean by One who had not studied Nature herself Beautifull Nature devoid of Art” (170). The version of nature that Audubon creates through his drawings and writing is never devoid of art.

Audubon takes this deficiency—the inability to perfectly replicate nature—and makes it an asset; he uses deletion and evasions to create content. In his drawings, he kills bird to depict them as life-like; he draws birds contorted in unnatural positions to capture the feeling and emotion the birds invoke; he places eagles above the clouds to give the viewer a sense of the awe one might feel seeing the bird in nature. A similar method comes through in the 1826 Journal, the most obvious example being Audubon’s addresses to Lucy, in which he frequently breaks off in the middle of intense moments of imagination. The first example occurs as Audubon closes his “At Sea” entry:

“I recollect Just now that when I first I knew thee, Dearest Friend: Frequently I was asked if this Passion of mine would be of Lasting Duration—help, I am now Entering on a Sacred Subject = husband, Shut thy Book, pray =” (164).

Another example occurs toward the end of his July 31^st entry:

“I thought of Such an Evening Walking Gently arm in arm together towards the Watters of the Bayou Sara to Watch thee Bathe thy gentle form in its current. I thought of the Happiness I have enjoyed, whilt gazing on the Happy Couple before me. I thought!—ah my Dearest Friend Mr Hodgson…” (169).

And a final example occurs at the end of his November 1^st entry: “I Dreamed of the Beech Woods, of a House there! Of a female there; Of a—” (184). Through these deletions, Audubon evokes feelings of passion and an almost religious devotion that are too intense—or too risqué—to be contained by the text. The deletions serve better than a more direct description because they emphasize that Audubon’s passion is beyond description.

Another type of deletion or deferral occurs when Audubon frequently claims he is not able to describe something, even though he will go on to describe it. In his July 31^st entry, Audubon states, “I am sorry I cannot paint portraits—I would represent to thee, the Meekness of his Blue Eyes—his sweetness of Language—his comely movements, but My Dear Lucy, thou knowest that in all my attempts I never yet reachd the original” (168). The denial is one sense absurd, both because Audubon literally can create portraits and because Audubon’s very denial contains a “portrait” of the person in question. Still, Audubon fears he “never yet reachd the original”—in other words, he cannot create a replication. But Audubon’s denial becomes part of the rendering, because it causes the reader to imagine something intangible beyond the “Blue Eyes” and “sweetness of Language” that Audubon names.

Audubon’s various deletions and deferrals—his methods of not-saying—reveal a deeply artistic sensibility that would perhaps not be tolerated in naturalists or scientists today. Even Audubon’s metaphors and similes are ways of saying by not-saying that frequently reveal the shifting and uncertain relationships between signifier and signified. When “one of the most Scientific Men” inspects Audubon, Audubon says he looked “at me as I Look at the Eye of a Bird as it looses its brilliancy & I fear to Lose its caracter” (181). In this simile, Audubon is both watcher and watched, representer and represented, the inverted roles pivoting on the brilliant eye of the bird that is also Audubon’s brilliant eye. Audubon fears to “lose its caracter” because as a scientist he is always attentive to faithful representation, but as an artist Audubon also understands how the most faithful representation can be a figurative one.