Barralet, John James after Wilson, Alexander “The Trapper’s return”

John James Barallet after Alexander Wilson.  “The Trapper’s return.” 

From The Port Folio.  February, 1810.  Etching by S. Seymour and engraving by G. Murray.  4 1/8 x 6 1/2.  Very good condition.  

The Port Folio was a new type of American magazine, “Devoted to Useful Science, the Liberal Arts, Legitimate Criticism, and Polite Literature.”   It was a product of the new century, appearing first in January 1801.  It began as a weekly issue until 1809, when it became monthly until its demise at the end of 1827.  As with the many magazines that followed it, The Port Folio included numerous illustrations, including this unusual image of an American frontier cabin after a sketch by Alexander Wilson.  Wilson (1766-1813) is best known as the ‘father of American ornithology,’ but he was also a poet and landscape artist.  In 1804, Wilson and two companions traveled through the American backwoods on a grand excursion to Niagara Falls.  This trip was celebrated in Wilson’s paean to American nature, “The Foresters: a poem, descriptive of a journey to the Falls of Niagara in the autumn of 1804,” which appeared in the Port Folio from June 1809 through March 1810.  This poem was accompanied by engravings after Wilson showing scenes and events from the trip.  This engraving shows a backwoods cabin at which Wilson stopped.  It is a fascinating, first-hand image of a scene not often depicted.