Lot 185: FITZGERALD, Robert Desmond (1830-1892).Australian Orchids.Sydney: Thomas Richards, 1875-1894.

FITZGERALD, Robert Desmond (1830-1892). Australian Orchids. Sydney: Thomas Richards, 1875-1894. 12 parts in one volume, 2° (478 x 325 mm). Title, dedication, synopses and introduction to volume I, half-titles to parts 1-7, one uncolored lithographic plate, 118 hand-colored lithographic plates, 10 double-page, 115 printed on thick tinted paper all by A. J. Stopps or Fitzgerald after Fitzgerald. (Title, some text and about 13 plates spotted.) Early 20th-century half pigskin, spine in six compartments with raised bands, lettered in gilt in the second and third, top edges gilt (some light soiling and scuffing). FIRST EDITION OF ONE OF THE EARLIEST STUDIES OF AUSTRALIAN ORCHIDS. "COMPLETE COPIES OF THIS BOOK ARE NOW VERY RARE" (Stafleu). Fitzgerald was a deputy surveyor-general in New South Wales, and a botanical artist, who came to Sydney from Ireland in 1856. His drawings and studies came to the attention of the government of New South Wales, who undertook publication of the work at the Government Printer's. The lithographer Arthur J. Stopps was an employee of the Lands Department. When Fitzgerald died in 1892, the government paid for the continued publication of the work, with Stopps completing the lithography from Fitzgerald's drawings, and the descriptive text supplied by Henry Deane, a botanist and engineer-in-chief of railways in the region, from Fitzgerald's notes and his own botanical observations. Stafleu & Cowan 1799; Nissen BBI 633; Great Flower Books p. 56.