Estuarine Ornithology
McWILLIAM, John Morell. Birds of the Firth of Clyde London: H.F.G. Witherby Ltd. 1936.
8vo. Original vellum over boards, spine lettered directly in gilt; pp. 164, 10 photographic plates mounted at large on brown card with tissue guard, lithographic map by George Philip & Son, Ltd. facing p. 25; title-page printed in red and black; slight wear to spine ends; a little foxing to endpapers; nonetheless a fine copy.
First edition, one of only ten deluxe copies bound in vellum, of McWilliams’s follow-up to his Birds of the Island of Bute, describing over two hundred and fifty species in the Firth of Clyde, Ayrshire, Renfrewshire, Buteshire, Dumbartonshire, and southern Argyllshire.
The Reverend McWilliam (1883–1968), Fellow of the Royal Physical Society of Edinburgh, was the first Honorary President of the Scottish Ornithologists’ Club and was affectionately known as ‘Scotland’s Minister for Ornithology’. He was certainly well-connected, judging by the acknowledgement of the Earl of Dumfries as an ornithological colleague (p. 9). The book itself received a good write-up in Nature: ‘The house of Witherby, under the direction of a distinguished ornithologist, is justly renowned for its bird-books, both technical and popular … Mr. McWilliam’s book fills a gap among the local faunistic studies of its kind. It gives a straightforward and useful account of the occurrence of different species in the Firth of Clyde and the counties bordering it: the area, of course, includes the great sea-bird nursery of Ailsa Craig’ (138, 424 [1936]).
McWilliam draws extensively on personal observation as well as historical ornithological accounts (dating as far back as the sixteenth century) and fossil records. He also adds the histories of extinct and near-extinct species, including the Great Auk, one of which had escaped off the Firth of Clyde from a yacht whilst being transported from St Kilda to Edinburgh ‘while it was being allowed to bathe, attached by a string. There is a tradition of a Great Auk having been washed ashore at Greenock at the same time’ (no. 232, p. 137).
There follows a substantial bibliography of ornithological works pertaining to Clyde, as well as an appendix of vagrant species observed in Clyde but ‘not admitted to the ordinary British list’, including an American ruby-crowned kinglet (here the ruby-crowned wren), a flamingo (shot in 1910 and placed in the museum at Greenock), and two Abyssinian rollers.
OCLC finds five copies in the US (American Museum of Natural History, Berkeley, Field Museum, Trinity College, Yale).
Balance, p. 427.
SKU: 2124982