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AUDUBON, John James (1785-1851)

The Birds of America, from drawings made in the United States and their territories

New York & Philadelphia: E.G.Dorsey for J.J.Audubon and [vols.I-V] J.B.Chevalier, [1839-]1840-1844. 7 volumes, octavo (10 3/8 x 6 5/8 inches). Half-titles, 18pp. subscribers' lists. 500 hand-coloured lithographed plates after Audubon by W.E. Hitchcock, R. Trembley and others, printed by J.T. Bowen of Philadelphia (plates 1-135, 151-500) or George Endicott of New York (plates 136-150), numerous wood-engraved anatomical figures in text. Contemporary black half morocco over black grained cloth-covered boards, covers with border bwteen cloth and leather ruled in gilt, spines in five compartments with semi-raised bands, the bands highlighted in gilt and flanked by fillets in blind, lettered in gilt in the second and fourth compartments, marbled endpapers (expert repairs to joints of vols.I, VI and VII). Housed in modern maroon cloth boxes, leather gilt labels. Provenance: W.S. Lincoln (subscriber from Boston, signatures to title pages in vols. II-VII).

A very fine subscriber's copy of the first octavo edition of "Audubon's Great National Work" with the plates remarkably free of the spotting that often mars this work. This is the first complete edition and the first American edition, with the 'Black-shouldered Elanus' plate (no. 16) in its earliest state. The work is one of the "most beautiful, popular, and important natural history books published in America in the nineteenth century... [also] representing the best of pre-Civil War American lithography and giving Audubon the opportunity finally to display his scholarship and genius to a large American audience for the first time" (Ron Tyler)

The plates, here accompanied by the text for the first time, were reduced and variously modified from the Havell engravings in the double-elephant folio. Seven new species are figured and seventeen others, previously described in the Ornithological Biography but not illustrated, were also shown for the first time. Audubon may have been prompted to publish the reduced version of his double-elephant folio by the appearance in 1839 of John Kirk Townsend's rival Ornithology of the United States, or, as he writes in the introduction to the present work, he may have succumbed to public demand and his wish that a work similar to his large work should be published but `at such a price, as would enable every student or lover of nature to place it in his Library'.

The first edition of the octavo work is certainly the most famous and accessible of all the great American colour plate books, and now represents the only realistic opportunity that exists for collectors to own an entire collection of Audubon images in a form that was overseen and approved by the great artist himself. The octavo Birds of America was originally issued in 100 parts, each containing five plates. The whole story of the production of the book, with detailed information about every aspect of the project, is told by Ron Tyler in Audubon's Great National Work (Austin, 1993). The story Tyler tells of the difficulties of production and marketing are revealing of the whole world of colour printing in mid-19th-century America. The enormous success of the work was important to Audubon for two main reasons: first, it was a moneymaker, marketed throughout the United States on a scale that the great cost of the original Birds of America had made impossible. Second, by combining a detailed text with careful observations next to his famous images, he offered further proof that he was as good a scientific naturalist as the members of the scientific establishment who had scorned his earlier work.

Bennett p.5; Fries, Appendix A; Nissen IVB 51; Reese Stamped With A National Character 34; Ripley 13; Ron Tyler Audubon's Great National Work (1993) Appendix I; Sabin 2364; Wood p.208; Zimmer p.22

#21358$115,000.00
 
 
AUDUBON, John James (1785-1851)

The Birds of America. A selection of plates [... A selection of landscape plates]

Leipzig & London: printed in the German Democratic Republic for Edition Leipzig and the Ariel Press, 1972-1973. 2 volumes, double-elephant folio (38 5/8 x 26 5/8 inches). 2 printed facsimiles of the original titles bound as additional titles. 40 plates, printed in colours, after John James Audubon. Original bindings using complementary colours: half linen over paper-covered boards, titled on upper covers.

The 'Leipzig Audubon': limited to 1000 numbered sets signed by a director of the Ariel Press, of which only 250 sets (numbered between 751 and 1000) were offered for sale in the United States

The "Leipzig Edition' includes a selection of Audubon's greatest images, offering a full-size alternative to the original Havell edition.The images included in vol.I are: White-throated Sparrow, Baltimore Oriole, Blue-winged Yellow Warbler, Carolina Parrot, American Goldfinch, Painted Bunting, Red-shouldered Hawk, Passenger Pigeon, Le petit Caporal, Florida Jay, Pileated Woodpecker, Snowy Owl, Rose-breasted Grosbeak, American Sparrow Hawk, White-crowned Pigeon, Summer Wood Duck, Scarlet Tanager [and others], White-winged Crossbill, Band-tailed Pigeon, and Ten Woodpeckers. The 'landscape' images in vol.II are: Black-billed Cuckoo, Swallow-tailed Hawk, Willow Grous or Large Ptarmigan, Louisiana Heron, Tufted Auk, Red Phalarope, Purple Heron, Tropic Bird, King Duck, Harlequin Duck, Blue Crane or Heron, Roseate Spoonbill, Shoveller Duck, Long-tailed or Dusky Grous, Cock of the Plains, White Heron, Glossy Ibis, Louisiana Hawk, Scarlet Ibis, Western Duck.

This selection was printed in facsimile from the Meiningen State Museum copy of the original work printed by Havell. The Havell edition was expensive at the time of publication and this has not changed. The last complete copy to appear on the market sold for a staggering $8,802,500 in a sale in New York in March 2000. Currently, the increasingly rare individual plates from this edition, when they do appear, generally sell for between $2,500 and $150,000 depending on the image. The quality of the Leipzig Audubon plates is apparent to any discerning collector and it is clear that they offer an attractive alternative to the equivalent Havell edition plates, given the latter's spiraling prices.

Cf. Anker 17; cf. Fine Bird Books (1990) p.73; cf. Fries The Double Elephant Folio (Chicago, 1973); cf. Nissen IVB 49; cf. Zimmer pp.18-20.

#23549$3,750.00
 
 
BELON, Pierre (1517-1564)

L'Histoire de la nature des oyseaux, avec leurs descriptions, & naifs portaicts retirez du naturel: escrite en sept livres

Paris: [colophon: imprime ... par Benoist Prevost] On les vend en la grand salle du Palais, en la boutique de Gilles Corrozet, 1555. 7 parts in one volume, folio (12 3/4 x 8 1/4 inches). General title-page with integral large woodcut printer's device, 6 divisional titles with similar smaller devices, each hand-coloured. Uncoloured woodcut portrait of Belon on the verso of the general title, 2 large hand-coloured woodcuts offering a comparison of the skeletons of a human and a bird, 158 woodcuts of individual birds, all finely hand-coloured, numerous uncoloured woodcut headpieces and initials (some historiated). 17th century full calf, covers bordered in a blind double fillet with small arabesque designs in blind at the corners, rebacked to style, spine in six compartments with raised bands, ruled in gilt on either side of each band and titled in gilt in the second compartment. Provenance: Seymour (early signature on title); Johannes Lyndesius (i.e. John Lindsey or Lyndsey, inscription on title dated 1576); Sir John Bridgeman (Castle Bromwich Hall, early armorial bookplate).

The Seymour-Lindsey-Bridgeman copy: a very rare hand-coloured copy of the first edition of one of the most important natural history books of the Renaissance and "one of the earliest books dealing entirely with birds" (Zimmer).

In this work, Belon attempted to match the names of birds used by Aristotle and Pliny with the species then in France. He was a pioneer of comparative anatomy, illustrating and describing the homologies of human and avian skeletons. L'Histoire de la nature des oyseaux was also one of the first ornithological compendiums to be based, at least in part, on field observations, and many of the woodcut bird portraits were taken from actual specimens. In the Preface, Belon acknowledges the work of artist Pierre Goudet, but evidently a number of artists contributed to the work, with some of the cuts signed with an arrow, a Lorraine cross, a white cross in a black lozenge, or unsigned.

Pierre Belon du Mans studied medicine in Paris, where he took the degree of doctor before becoming a pupil of the brilliant botanist Valerius Cordus at Wittenberg, with whom he travelled throughout Germany. Cordus died of malaria in Italy in 1544, and Belon, on his return to France, came under the patronage of François de Tournon. De Tournon provided him with the means that allowed Belon in 1546 to undertake a wide-ranging journey, apparently of scientific intent. He travelled through Greece, Asia Minor, Egypt, Arabia and Palestine, returning to Paris in 1549, where a full account of the journey was published in 1553. Besides the narrative of his travels he wrote several scientific works of considerable value. Perhaps taking his working methods from his former mentor Cordus, Belon published the Histoire naturelle des estranges poissons in 1551, followed by De arboribus coniferis and De aquatilibus in 1553, and then the present work in 1555.

The cost of publishing this first edition was shared by two Parisian publishers: Guillaume Cavellet and Gilles Corrozet. There are therefore two issues of the first edition, but with neither taking precedence: the present example was published by Corrozet, with the Heart-Rose device on the titles (a visual pun on his name: coeur rose).

The present example has obviously had a distinguished past: the Lindsey and the Seymour families were both important families in the 16th century. The colouring is exceptionally fine and remarkably accurate and, apart from any aesthetic considerations, would have added greatly to the value of the work as a reference. Hand-coloured copies of this work are not unknown, but they are very rarely found on the market.

Anker 9; Ellis/Mengel 221; Mortimer French 50; Nissen IVB 86; Ronsil 189; Wood p.230; Zimmer p.52.

#21990$30,000.00
 
 
BELON, Pierre (1517-1564)

L'Histoire de la nature des oyseaux, avec leurs descriptions, & naifs portaicts retirez du naturel: escrite en sept livres

Paris: [colophon: imprime ... par Benoist Prevost] On les vend en la grand salle du Palais, en la boutique de Gilles Corrozet, 1555. 7 parts in one volume, folio (13 3/8 x 8 5/8 inches). General title-page with integral large woodcut printer's device, 6 divisional titles with similar smaller devices. Woodcut portrait of Belon on the verso of the general title, 2 large woodcuts offering a comparison of the skeletons of a human and a bird, 158 woodcuts of individual birds, numerous uncoloured woodcut headpieces and initials (some historiated). Contemporary calf, covers elaborately panelled in blind with fillets and decorative roll tools, spine in five compartments with raised bands, fore-margin with contemporary manuscript title "P. BE / LON / L.HIS /TOIRE / DES / OISEA / UX." (Expert repairs to spine).

First edition of one of the most important natural history books of the Renaissance and "one of the earliest books dealing entirely with birds" (Zimmer).

In this work Belon attempted to match the names of birds used by Aristotle and Pliny with the species then in France. He was a pioneer of comparative anatomy, illustrating and describing the homologies of human and avian skeletons. L'Histoire de la nature des oyseaux was also one of the first ornithological compendiums to be based, at least in part, on field observations, and many of the woodcut bird portraits were taken from actual specimens. In the Preface, Belon acknowledges the work of artist Pierre Goudet, but evidently a number of artists contributed to the work, with some of the cuts signed with an arrow, a Lorraine cross, a white cross in a black lozenge, or unsigned.

Pierre Belon du Mans studied medicine in Paris, where he took the degree of doctor before becoming a pupil of the brilliant botanist Valerius Cordus at Wittenberg, with whom he travelled throughout Germany. Cordus died of malaria in Italy in 1544, and Belon, on his return to France, came under the patronage of François de Tournon. De Tournon provided him with the means that allowed Belon in 1546 to undertake a wide-ranging journey, apparently of scientific intent. He travelled through Greece, Asia Minor, Egypt, Arabia and Palestine, returning to Paris in 1549, where a full account of the journey was published in 1553. Besides the narrative of his travels he wrote several scientific works of considerable value. Perhaps taking his working methods from his former mentor Cordus, Belon published the Histoire naturelle des estranges poissons in 1551, followed by De arboribus coniferis and De aquatilibus in 1553, and then the present work in 1555.

The cost of publishing this first edition was shared by two Parisian publishers: Guillaume Cavellet and Gilles Corrozet. There are therefore two issues of the first edition, but with neither taking precedence: the present example was published by Corrozet, with the Heart-Rose device on the titles (a visual pun on his name: coeur rose).

Anker 9; Ellis/Mengel 221; Mortimer French 50; Nissen IVB 86; Ronsil 189; Wood p.230; Zimmer p.52.

#21971$15,000.00
 
 
BONAPARTE, Charles Lucian (1803-1857)

American Ornithology; or, the Natural History of Birds inhabiting the United States, not given by Wilson.

Philadelphia: Samuel Augustus Mitchell [vol I]; Carey, Lea & Carey [vols II & III]; Carey & Lea [vol IV], 1825-1828-1828-1833. 4 volumes, folio (15 x 12 inches). 27 hand-colored engraved plates by Alexander Lawson (11 after Titian R. Peale, 15 after A. Rider, and 1 after J.J. Audubon and A. Rider). Extra-illustrated with 5 uncoloured engraved plates in vol. IV. (Usual paper toning in vol. IV, minor offsetting in vols. II-IV, short repaired tear to an uncoloured plate in vol. IV). 19th-century black half morocco over green cloth-covered boards, the spine in six compartments with raised bands, lettered in the second and fourth, the compartments bordered in gilt with double fillets, marbled endpapers, top edge gilt. Provenance: Juliette Clary (inscribed by Bonaparte on the vol. I title, "Offert par l'auteur a sa Cousine Juliette").

A very fine set of the first edition, first issue of this important American ornithological work, inscribed by Prince Bonaparte to his cousin and with additional uncoloured states of the plates in volume four.

Bonaparte's important continuation of Wilson's American Ornithology describes 60 birds not in the original work. "A love for the same department of natural science, and a desire to complete the vast enterprise so far advanced by Wilson's labors, has induced us to undertake the present work," Bonaparte writes in the preface, "in order to illustrate what premature death prevented him from accomplishing, as well as the discoveries subsequently made in the feathered tribes of these States."

"The work which had been performed by Wilson's hands alone now gave employment to several individuals. Titian R., the fourth son of Charles Wilson Peale, not only collected many of the birds figured while on the Long expedition, vvhich were credited to Thomas Say, who originally described them in footnotes scattered through the report; or in a subsequent private trip to Florida during the winter and spring of 1825, under the patronage of Bonaparte; but also drew the figures engraved for the first, and two plates for the fourth and last volume. A German emigrant by the name of Alexander Rider, of whom little is known beyond that he was a miniature painter in 1813, and a portrait and historical painter in 1818, was responsible for the remainder of the drawings with the exception of the two figures of plate 4 of volume I..." (Frank L. Burns, On Alexander Wilson).

That plate, the Great Crow Blackbird, is notable as being the first book appearance of any engraving after John James Audubon. Perhaps the most influential artist involved with the work, however, was Bonaparte's master engraver Alexander Lawson, arguably the most talented ornithological engraver in America at that time.

Three issues of the first edition of Wilson's continuation have been identified. This fine set is comprised of the rare first issue of vol. 1 (with the Mitchell imprint and containing the first issue of plate 6 in that volume (see Ellis/Mengel) and with first issues of volumes two through four (published by Carey & Lea and printed by William Brown). Carey & Lea later reissued the first volume, with their own imprint, after purchasing the rights to the publication from Mitchell in 1828. The third issue includes volumes reprinted by T.K. and P.G. Collins (with their imprint replacing that of William Brown) for Carey & Lea with unchanged dates on the titles but actually printed in about 1835 after the completion of the final volume.

We are aware of the existence of only one other inscribed set of Bonaparte's Ornithology to have appeared on the market in the last 30 years, inscribed to the Count Charles de Chatillon.

Anker 47; Bennett 16; Coues 1:609; Ellis/Mengel 312a-b; Fine Bird Books (1990) p. 78; Nissen IVB 116; Sabin 6264; Wood 247; Zimmer p.64.

#22742$15,000.00
 
 
BRASHER, Rex (1869-1960)

Birds and Trees of North America...Done in Chickadee Valley, near Kent, Connecticut

Kent, Connecticut: Rex Brasher Associates, 1930. Volume 11 only (of 12), oblong folio (12 x 17 1/2 inches). 74 photogravure plates by the Meriden Gravure Company after Brasher, hand-coloured by Brasher using an airbrush and the pochoir process, each mounted on a cloth guard at inner margin, numerous vignettes and decorative initials. Title page signed by Brasher. Original half leather gilt, over masonite boards, the upper cover with three-colour blocked design below the author and title blocked in gilt, by Brewer Cantelmo Co. Inc. of New York.

A fine repesentative volume from this extraordinary work on the native birds and trees of North America, limited to 100 copies, by "the greatest bird painter of all time" (John Burroughs). This volume from set number 87, signed by the author

The present volume concentrates on the warblers and includes 59 plates of the family. In addition there are images of a wagtail; two pipits; a dipper and 11 thrashers.

The work marked the completion of a project that Brasher had begun in 1878: he determined to paint all of the birds of North America from life. With this is mind, he started bird painting seriously when he was about 16 but none of his early work survives as he grew dissatisfied and twice destroyed all his extant works. He finally mastered his chosen medium through the help and advice of Louis Agassiz Fuertes, whom he met in 1907 in the American Museum of Natural History. Brasher's chosen goal required him to study and record the birds in their natural habitat wherever possible. This meant numerous field trips, all of which he financed himself by various means; he worked on a fishing boat to allow him to study sea-birds, and many of his other trips were paid for by betting on the horses (a spectacular $ 10,000. win paid for an extended trip to the Midwest, the Smokies and the Gulf Coast). He travelled by train and on foot for many months at a time, pausing only to mail home his notes and drawings. On his return he would work up the paintings in his New York apartment.

In 1911 Brasher bought a 150-acre farm which he called Chickadee Valley, near Kent, Connecticut, and it was here that much of the preliminary work for The Birds and Trees ... was carried out. By 1924 he considered that he had completed the task that he had set for himself 47 years earlier, but, not content with this monumental achievement, he now set himself the additional task of publishing his paintings with a suitable text. He discovered that it was going to be too expensive to reproduce the paintings using colour-printing, so settled on having the Meriden Gravure Company produce black and white photogravure prints. These were then coloured by hand using an unusual combination of stencils and airbrush. His niece Marie helped him with the text which was printed by the New Milford Times. The various components were assembled in a suitably renovated barn on the farm. The original intention had been to publish 500 sets at $ 200. per volume. By October 1929 when the first volume was sent out, 97 subscriptions had been received. The stock market crash followed shortly afterwards and the print-run was reduced to 100, but even this represents a huge achievement by Brasher: in four years he hand-coloured in the region of 90,000 prints. "Mr. Brasher's loving care bestowed in each hand-coloured plate is in the tradition of a hundred years earlier...Brasher's Birds and Trees belongs in a special category that is unique. Brasher had not written a great deal but his pages are interlarded with poetic imagery, often printed in contrasting italic or manuscript-style type....His work stands apart on the sideline of time, not to be judged with his contemporaries, nor indeed to be criticized. It is simply Rex Brasher" (Yale/Ripley).

"Rex Brasher's records of the birds of North America was encyclopedic...Audubon, who did not go to the Far West, and Fuertes, who had to concentrate on work as an illustrator, had painted only about 400 species and subspecies. Brasher worked from a checklist of the American Ornithologists' Union, generally regarded as virtually complete. He painted from life birds now extinct, such as the heath hen, passenger pigeon, [Carolina perroquet] and Eskimo curlew. Naturalists called Brasher's work 'the most complete pictorial reference to the birds of North America.' Time Magazine, comparing Brasher with Audubon and Fuertes, said: 'Rex Brasher alone had simultaneously the time, the ability, the monumental persistence, and the hard-headed fidelity to do all.' Brasher told an interviewer that he had always hated steady work, and took jobs only because he had to. He said his prime goal had been accuracy...He could not conceive of a world without bird song, without their colour and beauty" (Doris E. Cook, The Monumental Life-Work of Rex Brasher , p. 14)

Nissen IVB 134; Wood 254; Yale/Ripley 39

#23117$3,750.00
 
 
CASSIN, John (1813-1869)

Illustrations of the Birds of California, Texas, Oregon, British and Russian America. Intended to contain descriptions and figures of all North American birds not given by former American authors, and a general synopsis of North American Ornithology

Philadelphia: J.B. Lippincott & Co., 1862. Quarto (10 3/8 x 6 7/8 inches). 50 hand-coloured lithographs, printed by J.T. Bowen of Philadelphia, 18 after George G. White, 32 drawn on stone by William E. Hitchcock. EXTRA-ILLUSTRATED with 5 hand-coloured lithographed plates (viz., Mexican Jay, Californian Woodpecker, Black-Crested Chicka-dee, Massena Partridge, and Ground Wren), printed by Rosenthal after Henry L. Stephens, and corresponding 15 leaves of text, from the so-called Cancelled Fasciculus, i.e. an 1852 illustrated work that is said to have been suppressed by Cassin. Twentieth-century purple morocco gilt, covers with decorative border of fillets and roll tools, the spine in six compartments with raised bands, lettered in the second and fourth, the others with repeat decoration in gilt, g.e.

A fine copy of the second edition of Cassin's additions to Audubon, extra-illustrated with very rare plates and text from Cassin's aborted publication which preceded it.

Cassin intended his work to supplement that of Audubon and had originally suggested to Audubon's sons a plan for extending the octavo edition of The Birds of America. However, disagreements concerning credit to Cassin on the title page sank the scheme, and Cassin proceeded with his own publication. Cassin used the same lithographer as the Audubons, J.T. Bowen of Philadelphia, to produce the beautiful plates of American birds, consisting entirely of western species that Audubon had never observed. Cassin was a trained scientist as well as careful artist and observer, and his work took American ornithology to a new level of technical competence, becoming the first American bird book to use trinomial nomenclature.

The extra plates and text included in this set are from an aborted edition of Cassin's work published in 1852. The titled wrapper of that work (not present here, but extant on a copy at the Library of the Academy of Natural Sciences of Philadelphia) reveals that it was intended as a supplement to Audubon's Birds of America, and was to be published in thirty monthly parts. Perhaps because of his inability to come to terms with the Audubon sons, Cassin here credits the artist Henry L. Stevens with joint authorship of the proposed work. The plates were printed by the well-known Philadelphia lithographic firm of Rosenthal, a firm which had worked closely with Stevens on his The Comic History of the Human Race, and on the plates after Alfred Jacob Miller in The Hunter-Naturalist, (both published in 1851). This publication, however, did not continue beyond these five plates and fifteen leaves of text and the aforementioned copy at the Academy of Natural Sciences is inscribed by Cassin "suppressed number." In a 1901 issue of The Auk, William J. Fox of the Academy of Natural Sciences of Philadelphia, describes the publication in some detail: "The pages are numbered at the bottom, each species separately, i.e., the text relating to the Mexican Jay is numbered 1-4, and the synopsis of the genus Parus, 1-5. In the [first edition of Cassin] six pages are devoted to the Mexican Jay, while the synopsis of the genus Parus is reduced to four, showing that the text was considerably changed in this issue. It is not likely that the fasciculus under consideration was cancelled as unsatisfactory, at least as far as the plates are concerned, as they are superior to those of the later work, and were drawn and lithographed by Henry L. Stevens; those in the later work (1853-55) were drawn by Geo. G. White and Wm. E. Hitchcock, and lithographed, printed and colored by J.T. Bowen. The earlier plates, five in all, are not numbered ... It is evident that this 'suppressed number' must be cited as a separate work, distinct from Cassin's 'Illustrations, etc.' (1853-55), as it differs in so many respects from it, and has a joint authorship." In the end, it is unknown why Cassin switched from Stevens to White and Hitchcock, abandoned this fascicle and reissued the plates and text. However, the presence of the plates and text from both works in this copy, bound in next to each other, provide an interesting comparison between the two projects.

We have never seen another copy of Cassin's Illustrations bound with these plates, nor copies of the aborted publication being sold separately. OCLC cites but 4 institutional copies of the suppressed number (Smithsonian, University of Kansas, Library Company of Philadelphia, and Harvard). An important and beautiful work on American ornithology, made even more spectacular by the inclusion of these extra, and very rare, plates.

Anker 92; Bennett p.21; Cowan p.110; Lada-Mocarski 144; McGrath p.85; Nissen IVB 173; Reese Stamped with a National Character 42; Sabin 11369; Zimmer p.124. Cf. William J. Fox, "The So-Called Cancelled Fasciculus of Cassin's Illustrations" in The Auk, Vol. XVIII, (1901), pp. 291-192.

#21973$17,500.00
 
 
CORY, Charles Barney (1857-1921)

Beautiful and Curious Birds of the World

Boston: published by the author for the subscribers, October 1880-1883. 7 original parts, folio (27 x 21 inches). Letterpress title (verso blank), dedication to Joel Asaph Allen (verso blank), contents leaf (verso blank), preface leaf (verso blank), 20 text leaves. 18 lithographed plates only (of 20, 12 hand-colored) by Joseph Smit and others. (Lacking from part I: "Ptilorus paradiseaus" [Rifle Bird of Paradise]; from part II: Cicinnurus regius [King Bird of Paradise]). Unbound as issued within cloth-backed publisher's paper-covered boards, the upper covers with titling and uncoloured lithographic vignette, within a single modern brown cloth four-fold chemise, all within a modern brown morocco-backed brown cloth box, the spine in seven compartments with raised bands, lettered in the second and third compartments, the others with repeat decoration in gilt.

An almost complete copy of a "very rare book" (Bennett), limited to 200 copies. In excellent condition, with beautiful plates on a grand scale including some of Smit's finest work. Only one copy of this work (also incomplete) is listed as having sold at auction in the past twenty-five years.

"In writing the present work I have striven to bring together some of the wonderful examples of the ornithological world, and to illustrate them in such a manner that others besides naturalists may become acquainted with the beautiful forms of bird life which inhabit our globe" (Preface). Given Cory's stated aim it is unsurprising that he has concentrated on the most spectacular bird family of all: the Birds of Paradise and their relatives the Lyre Birds and the Spotted Bower bird. Twelve of the twenty plates are from this group. The other eight include two of the best known extinct bird species: the Dodo and the Great Auk (also included amongst the extinct species is the Labrador Duck). The remaining depict many unusual species, with images of the Kiwi, the Ruff, the California Condor, the Black-headed Plover, and the Sacred Ibis.

Bennett p. 28; BM(NH) I, p. 387; Fine Bird Books (1990), p. 87; McGrath p. 59; Wood 30; Nissen IVB 205; Nissen SVB 109; Zimmer p.137.

#20208$27,500.00
 
 
CRADOCK, Marmaduke (1660-1717)

[A set of four ornithological prints]

London: Josephus Sympson, 1741. Large folio (16 1/2 x 20 5/16 inches). Without text (as issued). 4 copper-engraved plates by Josephus Sympson after Marmaduke Cradock, window-mounted within a modern cloth box, leather lettering-piece.

A fine lively series featuring at least 16 different species of birds.

Cradock was born at Somerton, near Ilchester, in Somerset in about 1660. He was apprenticed to a house painter in London, but at the end of the apprenticeship turned to painting animals, birds and still life. His success with private patrons was limited and, in the main, he produced pictures for dealers. The DNB describes his work for Josephus Sympson as being `very spirited' and notes that it was not until after his death that the 'merits of his pictures were recognised, and they rose in value'. Walpole praised some of his work, and examples are included in Lord Derby's famous collection at Knowsley and the Yale Centre for British Art.
The subjects of the plates are as follows:
1. A kestrel (?) carries off a chick, whilst a cock and hen and their four remaining chicks take flight, looking on are a pea-hen (?) and a barn owl, whilst a wren and a tit squabble on a roof nearby.
2. A cock pheasant stands guard on a stump, a juvenile pheasant makes off with an ear of corn, at a stream close by two kingfishers perch, on the banks of the stream a family of ducks (a drake, the female and 4 ducklings) feed, above them a third kingfisher flies off, in the background a duck sits on her nest.
3. A pigeon stands on a block of masonry, watched by a tit, a robin and a second pigeon, a short-tailed parrot perches on a nearby branch, above a pair of lapwings.
4. A woodpecker returns to the nest-hole to be greeted by its mate, on a nearby branch three sparrows perch, to the right of them are a pair of swallows and a fourth sparrow preening itself.

#3547$6,000.00
 
 
DUPERREY, Louis-Isidore (1786-1865) - Alphonse PRÉVOST, Jean-Gabriel PRÊTRE, Antoine-Germain BÉVALET (1779-1850) and others (artists)

Voyage autour du Monde, exécuté par ordre du Roi, sur la corvette de Sa Majesté, la Coquille, pendant les années 1822, 1823, 1824 et 1825 .... Histoire naturelle, Zoologie. Atlas

Paris: Arthus Bertrand, 1826. folio (18 7/8 x 13 inches). 6pp. of letterpress 'tables des planches" on 4 leaves, otherwise engraved throughout: title, 157 plates (155 hand-coloured, two printed in sepia) by Countant after Prévost, Prêtre, Bévalet and others, extra-illustrated with a printed upper and plain lower wrapper from the original parts. Nineteenth century green morocco gilt, covers with wide decorative border expertly re-backed to style, spine gilt in compartments with full raised bands, lettered gilt marbled endpapers.

A fine copy of the zoology atlas of plates from "one of the major French Pacific voyages of the nineteenth century" (Hill)

The present volume contains the complete set of the zoological plates from the expedition's official report. The plates include 38 of fish, 53 of mammals, marsupials and birds (including 44 of birds), 16 of mollusks, 5 of crustaceans, 22 of Insects and 7 of reptiles.

The voyage, led by Duperrey, concentrated on the exploration of the Pacific. He had "already circumnavigated the globe under Freycinet. Dumont d'Urville, who would later lead his own expeditions in the Pacific, was Duperrey's second-in-command, Réné Lesson was the naturalist on the voyage. The Coquille called at Brazil, the Falkland Islands, Concepciõn, Callao, and Payta. The Pacific islands visited were the Tuamotu Archipelago, Tahiti and the Society Islands, Tonga, Rotuma, the Gilbert and Caroline Islands, and the Bismarck Archipelago. Australia was visited twice, and explorations made of New Zealand and the Maoris were of particular significance. Vast quantities of ethnographic and scientific data were collected. Before returning to Marseilles, Java, Mauritius, and Ascension were visited" (Hill pp.180-181).

Anker 288; Borba de Moraes p.276; Ferguson 1069; Fine Bird Books (1990) p.93; Hill (2004) 517; Hocken 42; Nissen IVB 42; Nissen BBI 560; Nissen ZBI 1210; Sabin 21353; Stafleu & Cowan TL2 1578; Whittel 218

#20364$30,000.00
 
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