Asiatic Birds: Fifty-Four Specimens Selected from 'The Birds of Asia'

London: Henry Sotheran and Company, 1890. First edition.. Light foxing to the frontis matter only, all the fine hand-colored plates are bright and clean, a tight copy in near fine condition.. Pp. (vi), 54 hand-colored lithographed plates by J. Gould and W. Hart, heightened with gum Arabic. Each plate is accompanied by a descriptive leaf of text by Gould. Green one-half morocco by Sotheran over green cloth, spine and upper cover lettered in gilt and with gilt decorations and gilt panel lines, lg. folio (550 x 355mm, 21.7 x 14 inches). This handsome volume will be found to convey a very good idea of the great extent and variety of Asiatic Ornithology as it includes examples of both the larger and more splendid birds and the smaller and more common birds found in 'The Birds of Asia.' It also puts some of the most beautiful specimens of Gould’s artistic skill within the reach of the general public, since all of his works are now out of print (item no. 337 in Henry Sotheran Book Catalogue of January 13, 1905). The bird plates included from 'The Birds of Asia' follow: Sumatran Kingfisher, Hombron’s Kingfisher, Lindsay’s Kingfisher, Walden’s Actinodura, Flame-Fronted Flower-Pecker, Eastern Goldfinch, Emerald Cuckoo, Amethystine Cuckoo, Negros Yellow-Faced Woodpecker, Hairy-Browed Cuckoo, Yellow-Throated Dicaeum, Red-Collared Dicaeum, Red-Collared Dicaeum, Rosy Finch, Rosy-Winged Finch, Lineated Pheasant, Sonnerat’s Jungle-Fowl, Black-Chinned Garrulax, Javan Heart-Spotted Woodpecker, Heart-Spotted Woodpecker, Hartlaub’s Heart-Spotted Woodpecker, Curled-Crested Cuckoo, Yarkand Tit, Bulwer’s Pheasant, Chestnut-Tailed Lobed Pheasant, Red-Necked Mountain-Finch, Bligh’s Whisting-Thrush, Philippine Oriole, Elegant Tit, Oxus Pheasant, Shaw’s Pheasant, Red-Backed Pitta, Cearulean Pitta, Hooded Pitta, Gurney’s Pitta, Steere’s Pitta, Ussher’s Pitta, Biddulph’s Podoces, Henderson’s Podoces, Dingy Podoces, Pander’s Podoces, Grey-Breasted Pteruthius, Darwin’s Pucras Pheasant, Cinereous Bullfinch, Crimson-Winged Finch, Steere’s Broadbill, Naga Nuthatch, Hume’s Starling, Sardinian Starling, Anderson’s Suthora, Munipur Suthora, Allied Trochalopteron, Cinereous Trochalopteron, Variegated Trochalopteron, and White-Eyebrowed Trochalopteron. "This work, of which only a limited edition has been printed, is published as an example both of the ornithology of the Asiatic Continent, and of Gould's inimitable contributions to the illustration of Natural History" (from the Preface of ‘Asiatic Birds’). No ownership marks.