MATHEWS, Gregory Macalister (1870-1949). The Birds of Australia [--The Birds of Norfolk & Lord Howe Islands and the Australasian South Polar Quadrant with Additions to "The Birds of Australia"]. London: Witherby & Co. [vol. I, pt 1-vol. VIII, part 4 and 'Supplement' 1] and H.F. & G. Witherby [vol. VIII, pt 5-vol. XII, pt. 10, 'Supplement' 2-5, and Norfolk & Lord Howe Islands ], 1910-1936.
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MATHEWS, Gregory Macalister (1870-1949). The Birds of Australia [--The Birds of Norfolk & Lord Howe Islands and the Australasian South Polar Quadrant with Additions to "The Birds of Australia"]. London: Witherby & Co. [vol. I, pt 1-vol. VIII, part 4 and 'Supplement' 1] and H.F. & G. Witherby [vol. VIII, pt 5-vol. XII, pt. 10, 'Supplement' 2-5, and Norfolk & Lord Howe Islands ], 1910-1936.

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MATHEWS, Gregory Macalister (1870-1949). The Birds of Australia [--The Birds of Norfolk & Lord Howe Islands and the Australasian South Polar Quadrant with Additions to "The Birds of Australia"]. London: Witherby & Co. [vol. I, pt 1-vol. VIII, part 4 and 'Supplement' 1] and H.F. & G. Witherby [vol. VIII, pt 5-vol. XII, pt. 10, 'Supplement' 2-5, and Norfolk & Lord Howe Islands ], 1910-1936.

82 parts [including the Supplements to both works] bound in 13 volumes, 4° (355 x 255mm) and 2 duplicate index volumes, 4° (328 x 241mm). 678 hand-coloured lithographic plates by and after J.G. Keulemans, H. Grönvold, R. Green, H. Goodchild, and G.E. Lodge, some heightened with gum arabic, and 26 half-tone plates. Illustrations, some full-page. 2 printed slips with 'Cancellation Note' and note about introduction and index, and cancelled pp. 183-184 at the end of vol. I, printed slip with note about introduction and index at the end of vol. II, printed instructions to the binder slips for pt ii of the supplement at the end of vol. X and for pts iv and v of the supplement at the end of vol. XII. Errata slip tipped onto p. xii of The Birds of Norfolk. Half-titles and titles printed in red and black. (Some variable light spotting, occasional light browning or offsetting from plates onto text.) The Birds of Australia and Norfolk & Lord Howe Islands uniformly bound in crushed green morocco gilt, boards panelled with gilt rules, central gilt emu tools on upper boards, gilt turn-ins, spines gilt in compartments and lettered in 2, gilt edges, original printed wrappers to all parts bound in (lightly rubbed at extremities, occasional light scuffing, some fading on spines); index volumes bound in half green morocco gilt, top edges gilt (extremities lightly rubbed). Provenance: G.M. MATHEWS ('Birds of Australia' bookplates, ownership inscription and blind-stamped address on half-titles of vols I-X and index vols, pencilled inscription on vol. I half-title 'Si monumentum requiris circumspice here it is'; gift to:) -- SIR SAMUEL HORDERN (1876-1956, and by descent).

FIRST EDITION, NO. 1 OF AN EDITION LIMITED TO 225 COPIES. THE AUTHOR'S OWN ANNOTATED SET OF 'THE LATEST AND MOST COMPREHENSIVE SYSTEMATIC TREATISE ON AUSTRALIAN BIRDS' (Wood). Mathews' monumental conspectus of Australian avifauna was based on John Gould's The Birds of Australia (London: 1840-1869), and illustrates some 100 species not given by Gould; the 5-part supplement comprises a 'Check List of the Birds of Australia' in 3 parts, and a 'Bibliography of the Birds of Australia' in 2 parts. The Birds of Norfolk & Lord Howe Islands and its supplement extend the range of the original work, and also include additions to it: 'this Supplement and my Birds of Norfolk & Lord Howe Islands, etc., are really a Supplement to my Birds of Australia. I thought it better not to call them such; nevertheless, no copy of the Birds of Australia can be called complete without these volumes, containing as they do so many coloured figures of purely Australian Birds' (A Supplement to the Birds of Norfolk & Lord Howe Islands p. ix). This set was bound for Mathews, with the intention that it should be a working copy, and a duplicate set of the prefaces, lists of content and indices from The Birds of Australia and Norfolk & Lord Howe Islands (printed on various paper stocks, some probably proof sheets) has been bound up separately, presumably to facilitate the use of the work. The set is extensively annotated throughout by Mathews in pencil on both the text and some of the plates, and some leaves also have excised letterpress pasted onto margins, and a number of loose leaves are also inserted, bearing either typed or manuscript notes, by Mathews and his correspondents and collaborators. The annotations supply additional references to ornithological literature, further information on physical and other characteristics of the species, and correct errors in the text, as do the loosely-inserted sheets. An exception is a one-page typed letter signed from Frederic H. Kennard to Mathews dated 24 May 1932, in the introduction to the 'Bibliography' (where Mathews gives biographical sketches of C.D. Sherborn and C.W. Richmond who assisted him), which informs Mathews of Richmond's death: 'an eminent ornithologist, and a genial gentleman, and, as you will doubtless remember, the founder with your, McAttee's and my assistance, of that pleasant aggregation known as the "Appleton Club"'. This set was given by Mathews to his friend Sir Samuel Hordern, the celebrated Australian breeder of pigeons and stock, and President of the Royal Agricultural Society of New South Wales. Anker 328; Nissen IVB 605; Whittell pp.490-492; Wood p.454; Zimmer pp.419-421 (publication not completed).

Also included in the lot and from the library of Sir Samuel Hordern and his family are: a pen-and-ink and watercolour drawing of a [?]Southern Cassowary finished in gum arabic (sheet 344 x 247mm); G.M. Mathews and Tom Iredale's A Manual of the Birds of Australia (London: H.F. & G. Witherby, 1921, vol. I (all published), FIRST EDITION); G.M. Mathews and E.J.L. Hallstrom's Notes on the Order Procellariiformes (Canberra: The Verity Hewitt Bookshop, 1943, FIRST EDITION. INSCRIBED PRESENTATION COPY; G.M. Mathews' A Working List of Australian Birds (Sydney: the author, 1946, FIRST EDITION). (19)
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