Natural History

The Sea Lark – Thomas Helm – First Edition 1957

A first edition published by George Harrap, London in 1957. Octavo, 222 pages, with end paper maps and illustrations from photographs taken during the voyages. Still has the scarce dust jacket albeit a bit chipped and repaired to top of spine. Otherwise a pretty good clean copy.

Helm, ex US navy, set off with his mate, Ed Booth into the Caribbean and Central America in the 47 foot schooner Sea Lark. Adventures ensue and not just at sea hence the image of a jaguar on a sailing book.

Written in a an usual story telling style … makes it quiet a treat.

Caribbean sailing Adventures with variety

$25.00

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Great White-Crested Cockatoo – Greene – 1884

Original wood cut engraving of a beautiful Cockatoo from Parrots in Captivity published in London in 1884. It inhabits the rainforests of the Moluccas . He is a relative of the Sulphur Crested Cockatoo. The male and female are almost identical.

Greene’s delightful work comprising wood-engraved plates printed by Benjamin Fawcett after drawings by A.F. Lydon. The prints are hand finished with delicate highlighting in gum arabic that makes the breast feathers shimmer in a most unusual way.

Benjamin Fawcett was one of the great colour printers of the 19th century. He pioneered a system of wood block engraving from multiple blocks that resulted in vivid finely coloured works. Fawcett had an association of some 50 years with Francis Orpen Morris to produce many beautiful works on birds. Greene’s Parrots in Captivity is an authoritative and studious work. The engravings are the finest of all the illustrations of parrots from the period.

Price $90.00 unframed and matted as shown. Very good condition. Mat dimensions 37cm by 29cm … cream textured mat board with french gold line. Archival materials.
Nice Cockatoo from the Eastern Regions of Indonesia

$90.00

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Choice Garden Flowers (With Twelve Beautiful Hand Coloured Plates) – James Andrews 1847

Full title … Choice Garden Flowers their Cultivation and General Treatment in All Seasons”

A first edition published by Houlston and Wright, London in 1847. Book not dated but some plates are. Scarce included in the Library at Kew.

Octavo, with twelve striking hand coloured lithographed plates of “Choice Flowers”’ including roses, acacia, rhododendron, crocus, petunia, ranunculus etc.

Original brown cloth covered boards with gilt device to front. A little loss to head of spine, all page pages gilt. A super copy for the delightful plates alone.

Andrews a Fellow of the Horticultural Society one of the great flower illustrators of his day. He exhibited at the Royal Academy in 1868. He also did portraits and a number are included in the National Portrait Gallery, London.

Scarce well executed botanical collection

$240.00

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Fifth Archbold Expedition to New Guinea 1956-1957 – Brass

Results of the Archbold Expeditions No 79. Summary of the Fifth Archbold Expedition to New Guinea (1956-1957)

The Bulletin of the American Museum of Natural History, New York. Published 1959. Quarto, soft cover with standard blue wrapper, 69 pages plus illustrations from photographs at the end with an annotated map showing the locations explored. Very good copy.

Richard Archbold (1907-1976), American zoologist, was from a wealthy background. He attended Columbia University but never finished his formal training. Before WWII he funded three substantial expeditions to New Guinea. One of the members of his team was the Toowoomba born Leonard Brass (1900-1971) a brilliant botanist. After the War the expeditions resumed with three further expeditions completed in New Guinea under the leadership of Brass. This is the “Summary” of the Fourth Expedition – 1953. Before the War Brass had moved to Canada and then the USA where he became a citizen, working closely with Archbold. He was a curator of the Archbald Collection housed and the American Museum of Natural History.

In this the Fifth Expedition, Brass and his team are in the island groups to the east … Normanby, Fergusson, Misima, Sudest and Rossel (in the Louisade Archipelago), Woodlark Island and Kiriwina in the Trobriands. On the mainland the conducted specimen collections at Moruna near Samarai and near Milne and Modewa Bay.

Brass’s reports are written in a very readable style and whilst containing the scientific information expected (they collected close to 80,000 specimens) his general narrative of the trekking and observations along the way are very enjoyable. At Misima references are made to the glimpse of early gold … if only they had known …

Fundamental New Guinea record – Fifth Archbold – out in the Islands.

$60.00

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Fourth Archbold Expedition to New Guinea 1953 – Brass

Results of the Archbold Expeditions No 75. Summary of the Fourth Archbold Expedition to New Guinea (1953)

The Bulletin of the American Museum of Natural History, New York. Published 1956. Quarto, soft cover with standard blue wrapper, 152 pages illustrated from photographs with an annotated sketch map of the locations explored. Distinguished anthropologist Brain J Egloff’s copy. Wrappers a little aged, internally very good.

Richard Archbold (1907-1976), American zoologist, was from a wealthy background. He attended Columbia University but never finished his formal training. Before WWII he funded three substantial expeditions to New Guinea. One of the members of his team was the Toowoomba born Leonard Brass (1900-1971) a brilliant botanist. After the War the expeditions resumed with three further expeditions completed in New Guinea under the leadership of Brass. This is the “Summary” of the Fourth Expedition – 1953. Before the War Brass had moved to Canada and then the USA where he became a citizen, working closely with Archbold. He was a curator of the Archbald Collection housed and the American Museum of Natural History.

Brian Egloff has had an inspiring career, assisting the National Museum of PNG, Port Arthur in Tasmania and the preservation and restoration of the Tam Ting Caves in Laos. He has published several interesting books … our choice being “The Bones of the Ancestors – The Ambum Stone” which centres on a 3,000-year-old New Guinea artefact that made its way to Australia.

In this the Fourth Expedition, Brass and his team are in the far eastern parts of Papua around the Cape Vogel Peninsula. Between Collingwood Bay and the central range at Mt Dayman and out to Goodenough Island in the D’Entrecasteaux Group and parts of Ferguson Island. Brass’s reports are written in a very readable style and whilst containing the scientific information expected (they collected close to 90,000 specimens) his general narrative of the trekking and observations along the way are very enjoyable.

Fundamental New Guinea record – Fourth Archbold

$50.00

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Around Cape Horn to Honolulu on the Bark “Amy Turner” – L.V. Briggs

Around Cape Horn to Honolulu on the Bark “Amy Turner”

Originally published in 1926 this classic sailing account is reprinted here by the Macdonald Maritime History Series, London in 1974.

Octavo, 186 pages, top edge blue, with images from photographs, charts, diagrams and embellishments as per the original. End paper maps. Bound in quarter morocco, gilt line and blue sailing ship motif clothe covered boards. Dust jacket torn to top, and tape mended. A paper wave at the bottom as if it has stood onboard for a time but nothing offensive.

The author Vernon Briggs was only sixteen at the time he left Boston for Honolulu. His observations and penmanship mature well beyond his years. Part journal part narrative Briggs learns sea skills fast and is also a keen observer of his surroundings and the abundance of natural history along the way … including the Amy Turner cockroaches!

Prized narrative onboard the Amy Turner.

$25.00

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The Sea Lark – Thomas Helm – First Edition 1957

Great White-Crested Cockatoo – Greene – 1884

Choice Garden Flowers (With Twelve Beautiful Hand Coloured Plates) – James Andrews 1847

Fifth Archbold Expedition to New Guinea 1956-1957 – Brass

Fourth Archbold Expedition to New Guinea 1953 – Brass

Around Cape Horn to Honolulu on the Bark “Amy Turner” – L.V. Briggs

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