Non-fiction

Australia – Magic Lantern Slide Set – c1905.

Produced by W. Butcher & sons, London (1870-1906) under the brand name Primus. Sold as a set of eight in cardboard box with Lantern Lecture Reading notes. Complete.

Standard magic lantern glass size 3.5 inch by 3.5 inch. All images square with rounded corners, original black mounting tape along edges. Very bright colouring, super condition apart from a crack in one slide.

The slides comprise

Government House Melbourne
Sydney Harbour – Well before the bridge and heavily treed.
Gold Mining Past and Present
Sheep Shearing
Richmond River [Northern NSW]
In the Bush
A Kangaroo Hunt
Australian Aborigines

There is much more about these images than observed at first glance.

The image of aborigines includes an inset of a proud Murray River Warrior which is clearly derived from a photograph taken in 1880 by Samuel White Sweet. Resplendent in a possum skin coat holding a fighting waddy and decorated malcarra (shield) and string bag the subject cuts a proud figure. Maggs are currently selling a collection including the photograph – eye watering $.

The kangaroo hunt is rather gruesome particularly the practice of cutting the tendon.

The gold mining slide is super albeit cracked with an inset image of the old time cradle against the powerful mechanised image of Ballarat mines.

The accompanying words are fairly comprehensive and interesting but of the period so anti C’s beware.

Australia as it was seen over 100 years ago.

$270.00

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Sent Forth a Dove [Discovery of the Duyfken] – James Henderson

In 1606 the Dutch India Company ship the Duyfken came upon the Cape York Peninsula. The author reconstructs the fascinating adventure of this little ship and tells of the building of the replica.

The Duyfken appeared at the Hobart Wooden Boat Festival in 2023.We hope it returns in 2025. Voyager photograph of the vessel in the River Derwent shown here.

A softcover, large octavo, 218 pages, heavily and nicely illustrated. Published by the University of Western Australia in 1999. A super copy.

The Duyfken started it all as a Dove would

$30.00

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African Silences – Peter Matthiessen

A super narrative that combines a West African wildlife trip of 1978 {Gambia, Ivory Coast etc} with a Forest Elephant Survey in the broader Congo Basin {Gabon, Congo, Zaire, Kenya} in 1980.

Published by Random House, New York in 1991. Octavo, 225 pages, end paper maps of the travels. Very good condition, good dust jacket over an elaborate binding with quarter green cloth and parchment like paper with delightful embossed pygmy elephant motif.

The author is a great writer {author of the Snow Leopard etc} but as usual he forgot to take his camera. This is a disappointment considering his subject matter and the search for the elusive pygmy elephant.

The second adventure dominates the book and they both contain good detail of the goings on surrounding the trip – the scariest light aircraft experiences imaginable. The Forest Elephant survey was truly important because at that time the poachers had moved into the jungle and were taking large numbers of elephant down for the ivory – the rate was predicted to be fatal to the elephant without a proper scientific census on number – still not sure.

Matthiessen in Africa searching for the pygmy elephants – good content -

$30.00

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Lucien Dechaineux 1869-1957 [Tasmanian Artist] – A Retrospective

Florent Vincent Emile Lucien Dechaineaux was an inspiring Belgian born artist who found his place and home in Tasmania.

Published by the Centre for the Arts Gallery, University of Tasmania, where an exhibition of the artists work was held in September 1986.

Card covered large size 53 pages with many examples of the artists work, some in colour. Scarce and in very good condition.

Dechaineux was 15 years only when his family emigrated to Australia. Family failures in fruit growing and gold mining saw Lucien end up at the Sydney Technical College. His first foray into art was house painting, but it was not long before his talent shone through. He married a Tasmanian girl and moved to the Apple Isle where he blossomed as an artist and educator.

Lucien Dechaineux a Tasmanian artist we should see more of ..

$30.00

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Terre Napoleon – Australia Through French Eyes 1800-1804 – Susan Hunt and Paul Carter.

This is the upmarket hardcover version of this beautiful book published by the Historic Houses Trust of New South Wales in association with Hordern House – hence the quality.

Introduction by subject super expert Jacqueline Bonnemains of the Le Harve Museum where much of the great artwork from the early French expeditions resides.

Largish quarto, 148 pages, illustrated throughout from the Baudin voyage, many in illuminating colour. A very good if not fine copy in a fine dust jacket.

Baudin presented and described so well ..

$60.00

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New Light on the Discovery of Australia as revealed by the Journal of Captain Don Diego de Prado y Tovar

We had mislaid this book – but now it’s found.

Published in London by Henry Stevens, Son and Stiles, 1930. First edition, 262 pages, full page map, 2 fold out maps, 2 pages facsimile copy of pages of Prado’s Relacion, 2 large Prado fold out maps in pocket at rear.

A sequel to Clement Markham’s work on Quiros and compiled from historical records since found.

The opening paragraph sets the scene “ the recovery of the long-lost manuscript Relacion of Captain Don Diego de Prado y Tovar, who accompanied Pedro Fernandez de Quiros on his famous voyage of exploration in the South Seas in 1605-6, is undoubtedly the most important “find” of virgin historical material made in modern times. It furnished us for the first time with a detailed account of the discovery of Torres Strait and Northmost Australia, made during the continuation of the voyage to Manila by Prado and Torres after the parting of the ships at Espiritu Santo, whence Quiros returned to America””

Maps include Cornelius de Jode’s Speculum Orbis Terrae of 1593, folding map of Wytfliet’s Descriptionis Ptolemaicae Augmentum 1597 Facsimiles of Four Prado Maps (in one) and a Sketch Map of the Voyage of Prado and Torres deduced from dates, latitudes etc.

Fundamental re discovery of Australia … good maps

$140.00

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Australia – Magic Lantern Slide Set – c1905.

Sent Forth a Dove [Discovery of the Duyfken] – James Henderson

African Silences – Peter Matthiessen

Lucien Dechaineux 1869-1957 [Tasmanian Artist] – A Retrospective

Terre Napoleon – Australia Through French Eyes 1800-1804 – Susan Hunt and Paul Carter.

New Light on the Discovery of Australia as revealed by the Journal of Captain Don Diego de Prado y Tovar

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