Haarlem, Erven Bohn, 1849. 4to (28.0 x 23.3 cm). Title page with two engraved vignettes. iv, 86 pp.; ten lithographed plates, of which eight in original hand-colouring, and two plain, as intended. Original speckled boards.

A very rare work, and perhaps a novelty, being the first paper dealing with the exactness and artistic interpretation of natural history objects, here explained on the basis of examples drawn by the author, the German (later Dutch) vertebrate zoologist Hermann Schlegel (1804-1884), who was an accomplished illustrator himself. The coloured plates depicts a nocturnal mammal, the Javanese slow loris, a song bird (little bunting), a turtle ( Emys diardii), seen from two sides, three lizards, two fish (on two plates), a flowering plant (the tufted air plant, Guzmania tricolor, a Bromelia), and a new species of dragonfly ( Libellula selysii) as well as a microscopic (here highly enlarged) collembolid. The second fish plate is given as an example of how NOT to draw a scientific illustration. In the Teylers Museum Newsletter of November 2004 a small passage refers to this particular work by Schlegel: "In the Netherlands Herman Schlegel wrote in 1845 in his " Verhandelingen" on the rules which do apply to Natural History drawings. The artist should not be tempted to please the viewer. The drawings are in the first place aids to Natural History. Some artistic liberties are, however, necessary, but true to nature has to be a severe claim. As an example Schlegel himself published here some of his drawings such as the beautiful Stenops Kukang, a tree-mammal from Java (Indonesia). Uncut, with widest possible margins. The British Museum of Natural History catalogue errs in quoting ten coloured plates. Titel page with a repair, one tissue-guard partly torn, and an old library stamp in the text; the plates, however, fine. Cat. BM(NH), p. 1838. Not in Landwehr.