Hooper Swan, Bewick's Swan, Polish Swan. Antique print c1864.

by Fawcett, Benjamin

Swans found in Britain - with heads compared c1864.

Original colour-printed woodblock (chromozylograph) by Benjamin Fawcett (1803-1903), for British Game Birds & Wildfowl by Beverly Robinson Morris, Esquire, M.D. Published in London c.1864 by Groombridge & Sons. (Beverly Morris was the younger brother of Reverend Francis Orpen Morris (1810-1893), who founded the Royal Society for the Protection of Birds.) 

Benjamin Fawcett and his talented employee Alexander Francis Lydon (1836-1917) produced some of the finest colour-printed illustrations ever. Contemporaries declared Fawcett to be "the finest of Victorian colour-printers". Fawcett devised a technique, colour-printing on the end grain of the finest imported Turkish boxwood, seasoned and prepared for carving; he meticulously produced his own inks and watercolours by grinding minerals and mixing powders with water; and he only printed on the finest quality paper available.

Plate size is 245 x 305mm (9 5/8 x 12 inches).