The Birds of Australia ... A Descriptive Account of the Life and Characteristic Habits of over Seven Hundred Species. 6 vols. bound in 3.

This is a rare or used book from the Berkelouw Rare Books Department.

Melbourne: Charles Stuart & Co. 1890-1891. Folio. Later qtr. calf. Spines gilt and with raised bands. Complete with all 303 full-page coloured chromo-lithographic plates accompanying descriptive text and protective tissue-guards. An unusually fine handsomely bound set showing some occasional foxing mostly confined to the text only. NOTE: Ornithologist and artist Gracius Joseph Broinowski (1837-1913) was born in Poland and went to Munich University arriving in Australia in about 1857. He travelled widely around Victoria New South Wales and Queensland finding work here and there and painting landscapes and scenes of various towns. In 1880 he settled in Sydney and taught painting to private pupils and at colleges lecturing on art and exhibiting at various showings of the Royal Art Society. His big break came when he was commissioned by the Department of Public Instruction of NSW to supply them with pictures of Australian birds and mammals. These pictures were hung in schools around the state as well as being collated and published as Birds and Mammals of Australia. He went on to publish The Cockatoos and Nestors of Australia and New Zealand in 1888 but his greatest work was completed while farming at Campbelltown New South Wales between 1887 and 1891. The Birds of Australia in six volumes includes 300 illustrations and notes on some 700 species illustrating the artist's commitment to fauna conservation.