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GOULD, John.
The Mammals of Australia.
[Bound with:] A Monograph of the Macropodidae or Family of Kangaroos. London: by the Author, August 1841-May 1842.
Publisher: London: Taylor and Francis for the Author, [May 1845-May] 1863
Stock code: 60966
Price: £150,000 Currency Conversion
First edition, together with the Monograph on Kangaroos. Gould's interest in Australia was piqued by specimens sent back by his wife's brothers who had settled there. He soon realized that "the 'natural productions' of the country were untapped" (ODNB) and set out there in 1838, spending 18 months in the country. "It was not until I arrived in Australia, and found myself surrounded by objects as strange as if I had been transported to another planet, that I conceived the idea of devoting a portion of my attention to the mammalian class of its extraordinary fauna." (Preface). In his Analytical Index to Gould's works, his long-time assistant, R. Bowdler Sharpe described the Mammals as "One of the most important works ever attempted by Gould." He had known "that this work was never going to be remunerative on the same scale as his ornithological ones, but his motive was purely as a contribution to science - for which, on reflection, he thought he might have deserved more praise." Here it is bound with his uncompleted monograph on the kangaroo, which was abandoned by Gould after two of the projected three parts had appeared. He gave the lack of accurate specimens as the main reason for discontinuing the project, and no title-page or index were ever issued. Fifteen of the plates were subsequently reprinted in the Mammals, two of them with minor revisions, but the other fifteen plates were completely redrawn for the later work. The Mammals was issued, as with all Gould's great natural history monographs, in parts. The first appeared on 1 May 1845 and the final 13th part on 1 May 1863. Each of the first 12 included 15 plates, a cleverly balanced mixture of the exciting with the more prosaic, each of them accompanied by descriptive text, the final part was made up of just two plates, but provided the preliminary titles, text and indices. As with all of Gould's publications the completed work is a sumptuous production, which contributed much to the history, documentation and illustration of Australia's numerous unique species, all too many of which are now sadly extinct. This copy in excellent contemporary condition.
3 volumes folio (555 × 365 mm). Contemporary green half morocco on matching pebble-grained boards by Blunson & Co., spines divided into in seven compartments with raised bands, the bands flanked by fillets in gilt and blind, titles gilt to the second and fourth, large centrally-placed flower-spray tool to the others, top edges gilt, the others uncut, marbled endpapers. The first-named with 182 fine hand-coloured lithographic plates, most heightened with gum-arabic, by Gould himself and Henry Constantine Richter, printed by Hullmandel & Walton; the 2 original parts of the Kangaroos - all published - bound in at the rear of Volume III, with 30 similar plates by H.C. Richter after Richter and Gould, printed by Hullmandel, original upper wraps bound in, 2-page subscriber's list bound in. Spines very lightly sunned, and a little rubbed and with some minor restoration to the joints, heads and tails; light marginal browning and occasional trivial finger-soiling in the margins of the plates; wraps to the Kangaroos slightly soiled, and with the ink stamps of the London Institution, mounted on paper.
