An illustration from George Dawson Rowley‘s Ornithological miscellany v.2 (1877), captioned “Mother Carey and her chickens.” According to Wikipedia, Mother Carey is a personification of the dangers of the sea. Storm Petrels, birds thought by sailors to be harbingers of storms, are sometimes referred to as “Mother Carey’s chickens”.
The full text is available here.
For #NationalBirdDay, we’re highlighting Daniel Elliot’s The new and heretofore unfigured species of the birds of North America (1869).
Elliot, who was an ornithologist and a founder of American Museum of Natural History , provided text. The beautiful illustrations were by Elliot himself, as well as Joseph Wolf, Edwin Sheppard and others. It includes species not previously found in works by either Alexander Wilson or John James Audubon
Find our copy in @biodivlibrary : https://s.si.edu/2LmpSHI
Mockingbirds battle a snake in this especially action-packed illustration from John Audubon’s The birds of America, from drawings made in the United States and their territories
