Background:

These colorful prints are from the First Edition of a guide to the Birds of North America published in the late 1800s by the State of Pennsylvania.  The illustrations are based on those in the small edition of "Audobon's Birds of America".  Most of the smaller birds portrayed are two-thirds or one-half of their natural size. Ironically, the author's note that this will enable the prints to be acquired by the general public at far less than "ten to twenty-five dollars per plate of the originals"!