Elliot, Daniel Giraud “Sharp-Tailed Grouse”

Daniel Giraud Elliot.  “Sharp-Tailed Grouse.”  From Monograph of the Tetraoninae, or Family of the Grouse.

New York: Daniel Giraud Elliot, 1865.  12 3/8 x 20 ¼ (image).  Lithograph by Bowen.  Original hand color.  Very faint mat burn in margins not affecting image.  Else, very good condition. 

This beautiful image of a grouse is from one of Daniel Giraud Elliot’s great natural history monographs.  Elliot (1835-1915) was an American Zoologist and one of the founders of the American Museum of Natural History in New York.  Elliot published a series of color-plate books on birds and animals and commissioned natural history artists Joseph Wolf and Joseph Smit who also worked for John Gould.  Elliot’s other publications are A Monograph of the Paradiseidae or Birds of Paradise (1873), A Monograph of the Felidae or Family of Cats (1878) and Review of the Primates (1913).  Prints from this series are considered to be the finest issued by Elliot with each bird depicted in its natural habitat.  Sacheverell Sitwell, in his volume, Fine Bird Books, considers these prints to be “the equal in every way to any work by Gould.” p.53.