INTRODUCTION 



35 



finished in 1848 in seven volumes, to which five supplementary parts, 

 forming another volume, were subsequently (1851-69) added. In 1849 

 he began A Alonograph of the Trochilidx or Humming-birds, extending to 

 five volumes, the last of which appeared in 1861, and has since been 

 followed by a supplement by Dr. Sharpe, who since the author's death in 

 1881 has completed The Birds of Asia, in seven volumes (1850-83), and 

 The Birds of New Guinea, begun in 1875. A Monograph of the Odonto- 

 phorinse or Partridges of America (1844-50), and The Birds of Great Britain, 

 in five volumes (1862-73) make up the wonderful tale consisting of 

 more than forty folio volumes, and containing more than 3000 coloured 

 plates.^ The earlier of these works were illustrated by Mrs. Gould, and 

 the figures in them are fairly good ; but those in the later, except when 

 (as he occasionally did) he secured the services of Mr. Wolf, are not so 

 much to be commended. There is, it is true, a smoothness and finish 

 about them not often seen elsewhere ; but, as though to avoid the 

 exaggerations of Audubon, Gould usually adopted the tamest of attitudes 

 in which to represent his subjects, whereby expression as well as vivacity 

 is wanting. Moreover, both in drawing and in colouring there is fre- 

 quently much that is untrue to nature, so that it has not uncommonly 

 happened for them to fail in the chief object of all zoological plates, that 

 of afl^ording sure means of recognizing specimens on comparison. In 

 estimating the letterpress, which was avowedly held to be of secondary 

 importance to the plates, we must bear in mind that, to ensure the 

 success of his works, it had to be written to suit a very peculiarly com- 

 posed body of subscribers. Nevertheless a scientific character was so 

 adroitly assumed that scientific men — some of them even ornithologists — 

 have thence been led to believe the text had a scientific value, and that of 

 a high class. However it must also be remembered that, throughout the 

 whole of his career, Gould consulted the convenience of working orni- 

 thologists by almost invariably refraining from including in his folio 

 works the technical description of any new species without first pub- 

 lishing it in some journal of comparatively easy access. 



An ambitious attempt to produce in England a general series of 

 coloured plates on a large scale was Eraser's Zoologia Typica, the first 

 part of which bears date 1841-42. Others appeared at irregular inter- 

 vals until 1849, when the work, which never received the support it 

 deserved, was discontinued. The 70 plates (46 of which represent 

 Birds) composing, with some explanatory letterpress, the volume are by C. 

 Cousens and H. N. Turner, — the latter (as his publications prove) a zoologist 

 of much promise, who in 1851 died of a wound received in dissecting. 

 The chief object of the author, who had been naturalist to the Niger 

 Expedition, and curator to the Museum of the Zoological Society of 

 London, was to figure the animals contained in its gardens or described 

 in its Proceedings, which until the year 1848 were not illustrated. 



The publication of the Zoological Sketches of Mr. Wolf, from animals 



^ In 1850 Mr. F. H. Waterhouse brought out a careful pamphlet shewing The 

 Dates of Publication of some of Gould's works, and in 1893 Dr. Sharpe an Analytical 

 Index to them. It is books of this kind that place the literature of ornithology so 

 far in advance of that relating to auy other branch of zoology. 



