444 AUDUBON, THE NATURALIST 
issued in parts, from 1831 to 1835, and was intended as 
a further companion to Jameson’s text for all who could 
afford that expensive form of illustration. By a curious 
coincidence Audubon’s Ornithological Biography (vol. 
i), Jameson’s edition of Wilson and Bonaparte (vol. i), 
and Brown’s Illustrations (pt. i), were all noticed on 
the same page of the London Literary Gazette for 
April 9, 1831. “This day is published,” so reads the 
taining 5 colored plates; 22 inches long by 17 inches broad, being con- 
sidered more than double the size of the original work.” The first number 
of this work was reviewed in the London Literary Gazette for October 8, 
1831, when it was said that in it were represented 25 birds, 13 forest trees, 
and 12 insects; the completed work would comprehend “all the forest 
trees of America, with their fruits, together with the principal insects 
of the country,” as well as all the birds that had been discovered up to 
the time of issue. 
Brown’s piratical work must have had a very limited circulation, 
since it is now so rare that not even the British Museum possesses a 
copy, and, so far as known, it is not found in any public library of the 
United States. I was told at Wheldon’s, the London shop devoted to 
works on natural history, that but two copies had ever been handled, and 
that they commanded a high price. The work was originally sold at 
£26. The only copy known to me is in the library of the Zodlogical Society 
in London, from which the present citation is made; on one of its fly-leaves 
is written this note: “I have seen the wrapper of No. 1 of this work. 
It is dated 1831. There is no information as to its contents. C. Davis 
Sanborn. 22.5.05.” This copy was referred to by Dr. Theodore Gill; see 
The Osprey, vol. v, pp. 31 and 109 (Washington, 1900 and 1901). Dr. Walter 
Faxon has traced two other copies, one formerly in possession of Professor 
Alfred Newton, and another, but very imperfect set, in a private library 
at Tarrytown, New York. According to Faxon, a single brown paper wrap- 
per preserved in the Tarrytown copy bears a full printed title, which differs, 
however, from that which was subsequently engraved for the completed 
work; for fuller citation, see “A Rare Work on American Ornithology,” 
The Auk, vol. xx (1903), pp. 236-241. 
Mr. Ruthven Deane has written me that several years ago he secured in 
New York a fragment of this work, consisting of the paper wrappers of 
four Parts, Nos. 1-4, the last three of which contained five plates each; 
there were in addition 10 scattered plates, making 25 plates in: all; the 
price of “21 Shillings” is printed on each of the wrappers, which also bear 
the date “1831,” but no titles. 
Another pirated work, Illustrations of the Genera of Birds, by the 
same author, was begun in 1845, but met with even less success, and was 
never completed; this was taken from A List of the Genera of Birds, pub- 
lished in 1840 by George Robert Gray, and according to Alfred Newton 
(A Dictionary of Birds, London, 1896, p. 30, note) was “discreditable to all 
concerned with it.” 
