Sciences naturelles

1831 · 54248 — Philadelphia: Stoddart and Atherton 1831. Second edition. Three octavo volumes 22cm. Contemporary marbled calf with leather spine labels; engraved extra-title present in each volume; xvi7-362;330;264pp; engraved frontispiece v.1 and 48 inserted leaves of plates; text illus. Faint scattered foxing to text but plates generally clean; bindings exhibit moderate external aging and wear with small losses to leather at spine ends and corners. A complete structurally sound Good or better set. Early ownership signature of a Benj. Webb Jr. on endpaper and extra-title of v.1.<br /> <br /> A quite presentable set of Godman's treatise on the mammals of North America including some ethnographic notes on Native Americans and a lengthy discussion of the fossil record with special attention given to the Giant Mastodon. Much of the third volume is devoted to a description of the American whale fishery. Godman 1794-1830 was trained as a physician and was for some time the director of the Philadelphia Anatomical Rooms a private medical college where he achieved considerable renown as an anatomist. American Natural History described as "the first systematic treatise on the subject" DAB was first published in Philadelphia from 1826-1828; two "Second Editions" appeared in 1831 this one under the Stoddart & Atherton imprint and another by Key & Mielkie. Sabin and Imprints Bruntjen & Bruntjen note only the latter but OCLC records suggest that the two editions are collected with equivalent frequency. Neither Sabin nor Imprints supply a plate count for the Second Edition but our copy conforms to that at the Smithsonian Institution the only OCLC member institution to provide a collation. SABIN 27663. B&B 7271. Stoddart and Atherton unknown