The Avifauna of Laysan and the Neighbouring Islands: with a Complete History to Date of the Birds of the Hawaiian Possessions.

London: R.H.Porter, 1893-1900, 2 vols, folio, (380 x 280 mm). later red half morocco, pp[2], xx, xiv, 226; 227-320, 21 pp. With 55 hand-coloured lithographed plates most after J.G. Keulemans, 20 collotype and 8 monochrome plates, with Errata slip and ‘Notice (from the author) slip, original pink printed wrappers bound in.

A LANDMARK STUDY OF THE BIRDS OF THE HAWAIIAN ISLANDS. Limited to 250 copies. Originally issued in 3 parts, Rothschild’s treatise was one of the first illustrated accounts of Hawaiian birds, alongside Wilson and Evans’ Aves Hawaiienses (1890-99). The work included fifteen new species and several others which are now extinct.This monograph is based on the collecting activities of Henry Palmer, who was engaged by Rothschild to procure all the known resident land birds and most of the sea-birds. Fifteen species were entirely new to science, and several birds new to the islands. Extracts from Palmer’s diary on Laysan Island and a summary of his stay in the Sandwich Islands form part of this work, and one of the plates is a lithographed portrait of the ornithologist among the Frigate birds on Laysan Island. Most of the hand-coloured plates are after original watercolours by the prolific John Gerrard Keulemans (1842-1912), perhaps the finest bird illustrator of the period.

Ayer/Zimmer p 532;Fine Bird Books p 135; Wood p 543.