Audubon, John James and Rev. John Bachman

The viviparous quadrupeds of North America. By John James Audubon, F.R.S., &c., &c. and the Rev. John Bachman, D.D., &c., &c. Vol. I. [-Vol. II, Vol. III].

New York: John James Audubon, 1846–1854. First edition.

Quarto: (10 ½” x 7 1/8”, 267mm x 182mm).
Vol. I: binder’s blank, A⁴ B⁴ 2–49⁴ 50⁴(–₄50), binder’s blank [$1 signed]. 203 leaves, pp. i–v (half-title, blank, title, copyright, introduction) vi–xii (7pp. introduction) xiii xiv (2pp. table of contents) [2] (table of Genera, blank) 1 2–389 [1] blank.
Vol. II: binder’s blank, π² (–π1) 1–35⁴ 36⁴ 37–38⁴ ₂19⁴ 40–42⁴, binder’s blank [$1 signed]. 169 leaves, pp. [2] (title, copyright) 1 2–334 [2] (list of subscribers, blank).
Vol. III: binder’s blank, π⁴ 1–43⁴ 44⁴(–₄44), binder’s blank [$1 signed]. 179 leaves, pp. [2] (half-title, blank) i–iii (title, copyright, table of contents) iv–v (2pp. table of contents) [1] (blank) 1 2–348 [2] (table of Genera, blank). With two hand-colored lithographed plates.

Royal Folio: (27 7/16” x 21 3/16”, 694mm x 539mm).
Vol. I: binder’s blank, π², binder’s blank. 2 leaves, pp. [4] (title, blank, contents, blank). With 50 hand-colored lithographed plates.
Vol. II: binder’s blank, π², binder’s blank. 2 leaves, pp. [4] (title, blank, contents, blank). with 50 hand-colored lithographed plates.
Vol. III: binder’s blank, π², binder’s blank. 2 leaves, pp. [4] (title, blank, contents, blank). with 50 hand-colored lithographed plates.
With 152 hand-colored lithographed plates in toto.

Bound in modern half green morocco over marbled boards. On the spine, 5 raised bands. Title gilt to second panel, author and number gilt to third. All edges of the text-block gilt.

Text Volumes: lightly worn at the joints and extremities. In vol. I, pale foxing from ₁39–₃41 (11 leaves) and loss to the fore-edge of ₄39. Title leaf of vol. II torn along gutter. Bookseller’s stamp of H. Sotheran Piccadilly London to front pastedowns. Bookplate of J. Kenneth Doutt Memorial Library partially obscuring the bookplate of Carnegie Museum to the front pastedown in vol. I and fully obscuring in vol. II & III. Carnegie Museum bookplates completed in ink manuscript with the bookseller and purchase date, “H. Sotheran & Co. January 9^th, 1915.” “Doutt Library” inscribed in graphite to the title-page of each volume. With two hand-colored lithographed plates — the Mountain Brook Mink and the Jackall fox — in vol. III.

Plate volumes: Offsetting to the guards, foxing to the preliminary pages, and sporadic pale foxing to select plates. Preliminary pages of each volume creased vertically. Bookplates of Carnegie Museum with the bookseller and purchase date completed in ink manuscript, “H. Sotheran & Co. January 9^th, 1915,” to the front pastedown of each volume. Binder’s stamp reading “Bound by Clyde 9 Newman St” to the verso of the first free endpaper of each volume.

At the age of 58, John James Audubon (1785–1851) — the consummate woodsman and naturalist — embarked on his first journey across the Rocky Mountains to the Great Plains, seeking mammals to illustrate for this ambitious project following his vast and expensive Birds of America (1827–1838, octavo edition 1840–1844). Audubon failed to obtain government funding for what he called his “Great Western Journey.” Undeterred and believing in the scientific value and commercial promise of The Quadrupeds, Audubon decided to finance the expedition himself. He sought collaboration with The Rev. John Bachman (1790–1874), a Lutheran Pastor who had studied quadrupeds from his youth and was recognized as an authority among naturalists in the United States. Bachman was not keen on the trip, and Audubon himself conceded the hardships that it would entail. In a letter to Charles Bonaparte in February of 1843, he wrote: “To render [the Quadrupeds] more complete, I will leave the comforts of my home and beloved family, bound to the Rocky Mountains… I cannot tell how long I may be absent, but look to return loaded up with knowledge, new and abundant specimens on the shot and not from stuffed museums’ moth-eaten remains. I am told that I am too old to undertake such a long and arduous journey, but I reply that having the will, I will no doubt safely bear or even surmount the difficulties.”

Audubon departed from St. Louis in April 1843, traveling up the Missouri River with a group that included trappers, gentleman naturalists, and several Native Americans who had come to the city for trade. En route, Audubon delighted in sharing his work. During one of his impromptu showcases, Edward Harris (a naturalist on the expedition), recounted that one onlooker fled shocked from Audubon’s plate of woodchucks, exclaiming they were surely alive. After traveling some thousand miles, the group arrived on the prairie, a haven of wildlife where elk, deer, bears, wolves, and vast herds of buffalo roamed free, ripe for observation. Upon returning home, however, Audubon’s health began to deteriorate, and he left the illustrations of smaller animals for his son, John Woodhouse Audubon, to complete.

Ultimately, just over half of the quadrupeds were illustrated by John James himself, with the remainder completed by John Woodhouse. The backgrounds were finished by his youngest son, Victor Gifford Audubon, who saw the book through the press. It took the Audubon family five years to finalize and publish all 150 plates for the folio edition, which was later supplemented by 6 plates. As with the Birds, the large-format Viviparous Quadrupeds was limited in circulation due to the cost, with the result that the Audubons issued a royal octavo edition in the years following.

J. Kenneth Doutt was the curator of mammals at the Carnegie Museum throughout the 1930s. In 1938, Doutt set out on a harrowing 9-month journey in pursuit of North America’s first fresh water seal, rumored to inhabit Labrador. Their intrepid spirit paid off, as they discovered Phoca vitulina mellonae at a land-locked lake in Quebec.

Nissen (ZBI) 162; Reese 36; Sabin 2367.

Cataloged by G.R. Murdock

Item #GRM0050

Price: $575,000