American Wild Flowers in their Native Haunts. With Twenty Plates of Plants, Carefuly Colored After Nature; and Landscape Views of Their Localities, from Drawings on the Spot, by E. Whitfield

New York: Appleton, 1845. First edition. Full Morocco. Very good condition. Roy. 8vo, letterpress & 20 hand-colored lithographs by Edwin Whitfield, lith. of Lewis and Brown of New York. Not only is this a most charming book, illustrating native American flowers pictured with Hudson River, Pennsylvania & New Jersey landscapes behind, but an interesting work in the transition between hand-coloring and color lithographic printing. The book includes both processes, representing color printing during a transition period moving towards mass-produced chromolithographic technology.
"What makes this book interesting is the fact that the plates show some touches of color printing; Lewis and Brown is one of the very early firms to produce chromolithographic illustrations for books" - McGrath. McGRATH, pp.45, 89.
The text includes a number of articles of interst: "Elfin Exile", an American fairy tale; a chapter on the Croton Aqueduct, "one of the grandest & most imposing results ever produced by human skill & enterprise..."; a Metowac legend (native American legend); a chapter on Pollipell's Island, now Bannerman's Island just north of Cold Spring NY. Many of the views are of the Hudson River region, and include the city of Hudson, Otsego Lake, Fort Montgomery, near Verplanck's Point, Poughkeepsie, the entrance of the Highlands near Garrison, Albany, Staten Island, Constitution Island opposite West Point, Fishkill Creek and Harlem. Pennsylvania & New Jersey views include Wyoming Valley, Buttermilk Creek, Tioga, Cattawissa, Nineveh, Juniata & Passaic Falls. All edges gilt. A very nice copy overall. Bound in period green blind stamped morocco with raised bands Extremely clean internally. Printed in pencil by a delicate hand is the name "Sallie P. Howard Nov 12th 1844" interesting as the books published date is printed as 1845. A secondary inscription was entered in ink and dated 1960.