Lot n° 131
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HARRIS, William Cornwallis Captain - Lot 131
HARRIS, William Cornwallis Captain
Portraits of the Game and Wild Animals of Southern Africa
London, W. Pickering for the Proprietor, 1840
A FINE COPY OF A SUPERB BOOK ON THE WILDLIFE OF SOUTHERN AFRICA BY THE PEN AND BRUSH OF A GREAT HUNTER: CAPTAIN WILLIAM HARRIS
ORIGINAL EDITION, FIRST STATE, with list of subscribers on 2 leaves
folio (527 x 365mm)
CONDITION: printed on Colombier paper with the 30 lithographic culs-de-lampe by Howard reserved for the first state depicting skulls, animal skins or trophies, and with the two titles dated 1840. The work was published in five editions from 1840 to 1842, either in first state on Colombier paper with lithographic culs-de-lampe, or on Imperial paper without culs-de-lampe.
ILLUSTRATION: first title with a large lithographed vignette and 30 lithographs numbered I-XXX engraved by F. Howard to the design of W. C. Cornwallis, all IMPROVED AT THE TIME WITH BRILLIANT COLOR, applied by hand, using gum arabic.
IMITATION BINDING. Green morocco spine with corners, gilded decoration, double fillet on the boards, richly decorated ribbed spine, gilded edges.
Minimal and rare spotting on a few plates (XXII, XXIV, XXVII, XXIX), slight restoration to the outer margin of the first title without any damage to the text, pale wetness to the outer edge of the first few leaves, new endpapers, protective leaves in front of the plates, a perfectly established copy.
Captain William Cornwallis Harris (1807-1848), an officer in the Indian Army, was sent to the Cape for two years, in 1835-1837, to restore his health. After discussions with Dr. Andrew Smith, he and Richard Williamson embarked on a long-distance hunting expedition, particularly for elephants. He set off from Algoa Bay, up the Orange River and headed northeast into the country of the famous Moselikatze, chief of the Matabele. Harris got on famously well with him, and returned by another, hitherto unknown route. He recorded his observations in his book (Narrative of an Expedition in South Africa), published in Bombay in 1838 and then, in 1840, in London, with the addition of beautiful lithographs. In 1841, Harris was sent to open trade relations with the ancient Christian kingdom of Shoa (or Shwa), in northern Ethiopia, which Rimbaud would visit forty years later. Such was his success that he was ennobled in 1844.
BIBLIOGRAPHY: Abbey Travel 355 -- Nissen ZBI 1843 -- Schwerdt I, p. 231 -- S. Mendelssohn, South African Bibliography, I, p. 688: "one of the most important and valuable of the large folio works on South African fauna".
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