1875, original Essay on New Zealand Ornithology by Walter Buller

Professionally recently bound in plain red cloth with handmade marbled endpapers. Abstract from the Transactions of the New Zealand Institute, volume 1, 1868 but this the 2nd ed of 1875. I have seen the 1865 copy of just the 1st paper for sale for $450.... Page 213 to 231. Also bound in a translation of Dr Otto Finsch’s slightly scathing review of Buller’s essay (pages 58 to 72, and Buller’s August 1868 equally scathing (ascerbic?) but superficially polite rebuttal, pages 49 to 57.

Andrew Isles Natural History books per Ross Galbreath: “Buller's and several other essays were written for the New Zealand Exhibition in Dunedin in 1865, organised and edited by James Hector and printed by Fergusson & Mitchell of Dunedin. But the printers were so slow that copies were not available until several years after the Exhibition. Few were distributed, leaving Hector with the problem of what to do with the large remaining stock. By this time he had moved to Wellington as, among other things, Manager of the new New Zealand Institute. The problem of what to do with the Essays was solved by giving them all new title pages and binding sets of them into the first volume of the "Transactions and Proceedings of the New Zealand Institute" for 1868, published in 1869. This restricted the print run of this volume of the Transactions to 500 and it was soon exhausted and had to be reprinted in 1875 [= this version + bonuses]

The majority of copies as bound into the Transactions are Fergusson and Mitchell's printed sheets, but with a substituted title page reading simply "On the ornithology of New Zealand, by Walter Buller, Esq., F.L.S.".

Clean, tight and very tidy copy of a scarce early New Zealand ornithological spat

No pick ups.