58-414: (but see text) Buleites Gistl, 1848 Stenorhynchus Gould , 1838 ( non Lamarck , 1818: preoccupied ) Tremblers ( Cinclocerthia ) are a genus of perching birds in the family Mimidae that are endemic to the Lesser Antilles . They are medium-small, mostly brown or grey birds with long beaks and tails that typically are held cocked. Most recent authorities recognize two species in
116-507: A ruby-throated hummingbird . He then continued to Washington D.C. where he saw large numbers in the gardens of the Capitol. Gould attempted to return to England with live specimens, but, as he was not aware of the conditions necessary to keep them, they only lived for two months at most. The University of Glasgow , which owns a copy of Birds of Great Britain , describes John Gould as "the greatest figure in bird illustration after Audubon . Gould
174-401: A brief detour to Ceylon . While travelling he produced large quantities of coloured wash drawings in a distinctive style, which he converted later in his studio into oil and watercolour paintings, as well as prints for his books. His landscape style often shows views with strong sunlight, with intense contrasts of colour. Between 1878 and 1883, Lear spent his summers on Monte Generoso ,
232-544: A collection of birds arrived from the Himalayas , many not previously described. Gould published these birds in A Century of Birds from the Himalaya Mountains (1830–1832). The text was by Nicholas Aylward Vigors and the illustrations were drawn and lithographed by Gould's wife Elizabeth Coxen Gould . Most of Gould's work were rough sketches on paper from which other artists created the lithographic plates. This work
290-698: A journey into the Italian peninsula , travelling through the Lazio , Rome , Abruzzo , Molise , Apulia , Basilicata , Calabria and Sicily . In personal notes, together with drawings, Lear gathered his impressions on the Italian way of life, folk traditions, and the beauty of the ancient monuments. Of particular interest to Lear was the Abruzzo , which he visited in 1843, through the Marsica (Celano, Avezzano, Alba Fucens , Trasacco) and
348-538: A large scale. Sotheran's reports that Gould published the book himself, producing 750 copies, which remain sought after both as complete volumes, and as individual plates, currently varying in price from £450 – £850. The University of Glasgow records that the volumes were issued in London in 25 parts, to make the complete set, between 1863 and 1873, and each set contained 367 coloured lithographs. Gould undertook an ornithological tour of Scandinavia in 1856, in preparation for
406-721: A long decline in his health, Lear died at his villa in 1888 of heart disease , which he had since at least 1870. Lear's funeral was described as a sad, lonely affair by the wife of Dr. Hassall, Lear's physician, none of Lear's many lifelong friends being able to attend. Lear is buried in the Cemetery Foce in San Remo. On his headstone are inscribed these lines about Mount Tomohrit (in Albania) from Tennyson's poem To E.L. [Edward Lear], On His Travels in Greece : — all things fair. With such
464-454: A minor illustrator of Alfred, Lord Tennyson 's poems. As an author, he is known principally for his popular nonsense collections of poems, songs, short stories, botanical drawings, recipes and alphabets. He also composed and published twelve musical settings of Tennyson's poetry. Lear was born into a middle-class family at Holloway , North London, the penultimate of 21 children (and youngest to survive) of Ann Clark Skerrett and Jeremiah Lear,
522-477: A mother to him until her death, when he was almost 50 years of age. Lear had lifelong health problems. From the age of six, he had frequent grand mal epileptic seizures , bronchitis , asthma and, during later life, partial blindness. Lear experienced his first seizure at a fair near Highgate when with his father. The event scared and embarrassed him. He felt lifelong guilt and shame for his epileptic condition, and his adult diaries indicate that he always sensed
580-588: A mountain on the border between the Swiss canton of Ticino and the Italian region of Lombardy . His oil painting The Plains of Lombardy from Monte Generoso is in the Ashmolean Museum in Oxford . Throughout his life, he continued to paint seriously. He had a lifelong ambition to illustrate Tennyson 's poems; near the end of his life, a volume with a small number of illustrations was published. In 1842, Lear began
638-539: A pencil, such a pen. You shadow'd forth to distant men, I read and felt that I was there. The centenary of his death was marked in Britain with a set of Royal Mail stamps in 1988 and an exhibition at the Royal Academy . Lear's birthplace area is now marked with a plaque at Bowman's Mews, Islington, in London, and his bicentenary during 2012 was celebrated with a variety of events, exhibitions and lectures in venues across
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#1733085211535696-548: A position on an estate near Guildford , Surrey. In 1818, Gould Snr became foreman in the Royal Gardens of Windsor. Gould became an apprentice for 6 years under the care of J. T. Aiton, of the Royal Gardens of Windsor from the age of 14 to 20 years old. The young Gould started training as a gardener. Employed under his father at Windsor from 1818 to 1824, he was then a gardener at Ripley Castle in Yorkshire . He became an expert in
754-599: A stockbroker formerly working for the family sugar refining business. He was raised by his eldest sister, also named Ann, 21 years his senior. Jeremiah Lear ended up defaulting to the London Stock Exchange in the economic upheaval following the Napoleonic Wars. Because of the family's now more limited finances, when he was aged four, Lear and his sister were required to leave the family home, Bowmans Lodge, and live together. Ann doted on Edward and continued to act as
812-722: A strong interest in hummingbirds . He accumulated a collection of 320 species, which he exhibited at the Great Exhibition of 1851. Despite his interest, Gould had never seen a live hummingbird. In May 1857, he travelled to the United States with his second son, Charles . He arrived in New York too early in the season to see hummingbirds in that city, but on 21 May 1857, in Bartram's Gardens in Philadelphia , he finally saw his first live one,
870-399: A tree, You invidious Old Man of Aôsta?" Lear's self-description in verse, How Pleasant to know Mr. Lear, ends with this stanza , a reference to his own mortality: He reads, but he cannot speak, Spanish, He cannot abide ginger-beer: Ere the days of his pilgrimage vanish, How pleasant to know Mr. Lear! Five of Lear's limericks from
928-495: A trembling motion. This Mimidae -related article is a stub . You can help Misplaced Pages by expanding it . John Gould John Gould FRS ( / ɡ uː l d / ; 14 September 1804 – 3 February 1881 ) was an English ornithologist who published monographs on birds, illustrated by plates produced by his wife, Elizabeth Gould , and several other artists, including Edward Lear , Henry Constantine Richter , Joseph Wolf and William Matthew Hart . He has been considered
986-687: Is "the most sumptuous and costly of British bird books", whilst Wood describes it as "a magnificent work". Isabella Tree writes that it "was seen – perhaps partly because its subject was British, as the culmination of [his] ... genius". A number of animals have been named after Gould, including those in English such as the Gould's mouse . Birds named by or after Gould include: Two species of reptiles are named in his honour: Gould's monitor ( Varanus gouldii ) and Gould's hooded snake ( Parasuta gouldii ) . The Tasmanian giant freshwater crayfish ( Astacopsis gouldi)
1044-443: Is an anagram of "Earl". Lear's nonsense works are distinguished by a facility of verbal invention and a poet's delight in the sounds of words, both real and imaginary. A stuffed rhinoceros becomes a "diaphanous doorscraper". A "blue Boss-Woss" plunges into "a perpendicular, spicular, orbicular, quadrangular, circular depth of soft mud". His heroes are Quangle-Wangles, Pobbles, and Jumblies. One of his most famous verbal inventions,
1102-649: The Book of Nonsense (in the 1946 Italian translation by Carlo Izzo) were set to music for choir a cappella by Goffredo Petrassi in 1952. Edward Lear has been played in radio dramas by Andrew Sachs in The Need for Nonsense by Julia Blackburn ( BBC Radio 4 , 9 February 2009) and by Derek Jacobi in By the Coast of Coromandel by Lavinia Murray ( BBC Radio 4 , 21 December 2011). He was portrayed on television by Robert Lang in "Edward Lear: On
1160-613: The Mount Lofty range, the Murray Scrubs and Kangaroo Island , returning again to Hobart in July. He then travelled with his wife to Yarrundi. They returned home to England in May 1840. The result of the trip was The Birds of Australia (1840–48), a seven volume work which is the first comprehensive illustrated account of Australian birds. It included a total of 600 plates in seven volumes; 328 of
1218-652: The Zoological Society and from 1832 to 1836 by the Earl of Derby , who kept a private menagerie at his estate, Knowsley Hall . He was the first major bird artist to draw birds from life rather than the skins of specimens. Lear's first publication, published when he was 19 years old, was Illustrations of the Family of Psittacidae, or Parrots in 1830. One of the greatest ornithological artists of his era, he taught Elizabeth Gould whilst also contributing to John Gould 's works and
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#17330852115351276-539: The second voyage of HMS Beagle to the Zoological Society of London on 4 January 1837, the bird specimens were given to Gould for identification. He set aside his paying work and at the next meeting on 10 January reported that birds from the Galápagos Islands which Darwin had thought were blackbirds, "gross-bills" and finches were in fact "a series of ground Finches which are so peculiar" as to form "an entirely new group, containing 12 species." This story made
1334-598: The Edge of the Sand" a special episode of The Natural World, BBC2 14 April 1985. Lear's written work was used extensively in the short-lived The Tomfoolery Show , a Saturday morning cartoon that was produced by Rankin-Bass and broadcast on NBC from 1970 to 1971. A Beach Full of Shells , the 20th album by musician Al Stewart pays tribute in the song "Mr. Lear", celebrating Foss and many events from Lear's life. The largest collection by far of Edward Lear original drawings resides in
1392-569: The Pussy-Cat", but only two of the scores have survived, the music for "The Courtship of the Yonghy-Bonghy-Bò" and "The Pelican Chorus". While he never played professionally, he did perform his own nonsense songs and his settings of others' poetry at countless social gatherings, sometimes adding his own lyrics (as with the song "The Nervous Family"), and sometimes replacing serious lyrics with nursery rhymes. Lear's most fervent and painful friendship
1450-656: The Voyage of H.M.S. Beagle , edited by Charles Darwin. Elizabeth Gould illustrated all the plates for Part 3. In 1838 the Goulds sailed to Australia, intending to study the birds of that country and be the first to produce a major work on the subject. They took with them the collector John Gilbert . They arrived in Tasmania in September, making the acquaintance of the governor Sir John Franklin and his wife . Gould and Gilbert collected on
1508-482: The art of taxidermy . In 1824 he set himself up in business in London as a taxidermist. His skill helped him to become the first curator and preserver at the museum of the Zoological Society of London in 1827. Gould's position brought him into contact with the country's leading naturalists. This meant that he was often the first to see new collections of birds given to the Zoological Society of London. In 1830
1566-469: The children of his patron Edward Stanley, 13th Earl of Derby . Many other works followed. Lear's nonsense books were quite popular during his lifetime, but a rumour developed that "Edward Lear" was merely a pseudonym, and the books' true author was the man to whom Lear had dedicated the works, his patron the Earl of Derby. Promoters of this rumour offered as evidence that both men were named Edward, and that "Lear"
1624-564: The colonies, including Frederick McCoy , who was the director of the National Museum of Victoria from 1857 to 1899. These letters detail the sale of specimens, including mammals, insects, shells, and bird skins for the museum's collections, and copies of Gould's scientific publications for the museum library. Gould insisted that any species of birds that were at that time new to Western science be forwarded to him in London to be described and figured. Throughout his professional life, Gould had
1682-408: The entire set of lithographs to Gould. The books were published in a very large size, imperial folio, with magnificent coloured plates. Eventually 41 of these volumes were published, with about 3000 plates. They appeared in parts at £3 3s. a number, subscribed for in advance, and in spite of the heavy expense of preparing the plates, Gould succeeded in making his ventures pay, realising a fortune. This
1740-792: The father of bird study in Australia and the Gould League in Australia is named after him. His identification of the birds now nicknamed " Darwin's finches " played a role in the inception of Darwin's theory of evolution by natural selection . Gould's work is referenced in Charles Darwin 's book, On the Origin of Species . John Gould was born in Lyme Regis , the first son of a gardener. Both father and son probably had little education. After working on Dowager Lady Poulett's glass house, his father obtained
1798-415: The finished drawings, which were made into coloured lithographs by engraver William Hart. There were problems: the stone engraving of the snowy owl in volume I was dropped and broken at an early stage in the printing. Later issues of this plate show evidence of this damage and consequently the early issue – printed before the accident – are considered more desirable. The lithographs were hand coloured. In
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1856-454: The genus, but some split each into two species, bringing it to four species: Among other living birds, they are apparently most closely related to the pearly-eyed thrasher . Their common name comes from their peculiar behavior: if excited, they will show a much more exaggerated version of the wing-flicking also seen in other mimids such as the northern mockingbirds . The tremblers do not just flick their wings, but shake their entire bodies in
1914-440: The introduction for the work, Gould states "every sky with its varied tints and every feather of each bird were coloured by hand; and when it is considered that nearly two hundred and eighty thousand illustrations in the present work have been so treated, it will most likely cause some astonishment to those who give the subject a thought." The work has gathered critical acclaim: according to Mullens and Swann, Birds of Great Britain
1972-588: The island. In February 1839 Gould sailed to Sydney, leaving his pregnant wife with the Franklins. He travelled to his brother-in-law's station at Yarrundi, spending his time searching for bowerbirds in the Liverpool Range . In April he returned to Tasmania for the birth of his son. In May he sailed to Adelaide to meet Charles Sturt , who was preparing to lead an expedition to the Murray River . Gould collected in
2030-511: The light of the moon. Though known for his neologisms , Lear used a number of other devices in his works in order to defy reader expectations . For example, "Cold Are the Crabs" conforms to the sonnet tradition until its dramatically foreshortened last line. Today, limericks are invariably typeset as five lines. Lear's limericks, however, were published in a variety of formats; it appears that Lear wrote them in manuscript in as many lines as there
2088-550: The mode of communication of cholera . Edward Lear Edward Lear (12 May 1812 – 29 January 1888) was an English artist, illustrator, musician, author and poet, who is known mostly for his literary nonsense in poetry and prose and especially his limericks , a form he popularised. His principal areas of work as an artist were threefold: as a draughtsman employed to make illustrations of birds and animals, making coloured drawings during his journeys (which he reworked later, sometimes as plates for his travel books) and as
2146-519: The newspapers. In March, Darwin met Gould again, learning that his Galápagos "wren" was another species of finch and the mockingbirds he had labelled by island were separate species rather than just varieties, with relatives on the South American mainland. Subsequently, Gould advised that the smaller southern Rhea specimen that had been rescued from a Christmas dinner was a separate species which he named Rhea darwinii , whose territory overlapped with
2204-527: The northern rheas. Darwin had not bothered to label his finches by island, but others on the expedition had taken more care. He now sought specimens collected by captain Robert FitzRoy and crewmen. From them he was able to establish that the species were unique to islands, an important step on the inception of his theory of evolution by natural selection . Gould's work on the birds was published between 1838 and 1842 in five numbers as Part 3 of Zoology of
2262-471: The onset of a seizure in time to remove himself from public view. When Lear was about seven years old he began to show signs of depression, possibly due to the instability of his childhood. He had periods of severe melancholia which he referred to as "the Morbids". Lear was already drawing "for bread and cheese" by the time he was aged 16 and soon developed into a serious "ornithological draughtsman" employed by
2320-617: The phrase " runcible spoon", occurs in the closing lines of " The Owl and the Pussy-Cat " and is now found in many English dictionaries. They dined on mince and slices of quince , Which they ate with a runcible spoon; And hand in hand, on the edge of the sand They danced by the light of the moon, The moon, The moon, They danced by
2378-414: The piano, but he also played the accordion, flute, and small guitar. He composed music for many Romantic and Victorian poems, but was known mostly for his many musical settings of Tennyson's poetry. He published four settings in 1853, five in 1859, and three in 1860. Lear's were the only musical settings that Tennyson approved of. Lear also composed music for many of his nonsense songs, including "The Owl and
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2436-404: The plateau of Cinque Miglia ( Castel di Sangro and Alfedena), by an old sheep track of the shepherds. Lear drew a sketch of the medieval village of Albe with Mount Sirente, and described the medieval village of Celano, with the castle of Piccolomini dominating the vast plain of Lago Fucino, which was drained a few years later to promote agricultural development. At Castel di Sangro, Lear described
2494-450: The same word rather than rhyming. For the most part they are truly nonsensical and devoid of any punch line or point. They are completely free of the bawdiness with which the verse form is now associated. A typical thematic element is the presence of a callous and critical "they". An example of a typical Lear limerick: There was an Old Man of Aôsta Who possessed a large Cow, but he lost her; But they said, "Don't you see she has run up
2552-595: The species described were new to science and named by Gould. He also published A Monograph of the Macropodidae, or Family of Kangaroos (1841–1842) and the three-volume work The Mammals of Australia (1849–1861). Elizabeth died in 1841 after the birth of their eighth child, Sarah, and Gould's books subsequently used illustrations by a number of artists, including Henry Constantine Richter , William Matthew Hart and Joseph Wolf . Even after leaving Australia, John Gould corresponded with many scientists and collectors in
2610-462: The very intensity of Lear's affections may have doomed these relationships. He proposed twice to another writer, Augusta Bethell , whom he had known for a long time, when he was 26 years her senior. For companions, he relied instead on friends and correspondents, and especially, during later life, on his Albanian Souliote chef, Giorgis, a faithful friend and (as Lear complained) a thoroughly unsatisfactory chef. Another trusted companion in San Remo
2668-539: The winter stillness of the mountains and the beautiful basilica. More adventurous was the voyage to the regions of southern Italy in 1847, described in Lear's Journals of a Landscape Painter in Southern Calabria, & c . The broad Calabria section in which Lear tells his itinerary among breathtaking landscapes and often surreal characters, is thought to be among the best in his travel literature. Lear primarily played
2726-410: The work, taking with him the artist Henry Wolf who drew 57 of the plates from Gould's preparatory sketches. According to The University of Glasgow Gould's skill was in rapidly producing rough sketches from nature (a majority of the sketches were drawn from newly killed specimens) capturing the distinctiveness of each species. Gould then oversaw the process whereby his artists worked his sketches up into
2784-413: The world including an International Owl and Pussycat Day on his birth anniversary. In 1846, Lear published A Book of Nonsense , a volume of limericks which went through three editions and helped popularise the form and the genre of literary nonsense . In 1871, he published Nonsense Songs, Stories, Botany and Alphabets , which included the nonsense song " The Owl and the Pussy-Cat ", which he wrote for
2842-562: Was a busy period for Gould who also published Icones Avium in two parts containing 18 leaves of bird studies on 54 cm plates as a supplement to his previous works. No further monographs were published as in 1838 he and his wife moved to Australia to work on the Birds of Australia . Shortly after their return to England, his wife died in 1841. Elizabeth Gould completed 84 plates for Birds of Australia before her death. When Charles Darwin presented his mammal and bird specimens collected during
2900-495: Was a geological surveyor. They also had at least three daughters, although only the names of two are known, Eliza (born c. 1832) and Sarah Gould (born 1841). Elizabeth Gould died from puerperal fever after giving birth to Sarah, her eighth child. Among the publications of John Gould are: John Gould also happened to live next to the famous Broad Street pump during 1854. The pioneering epidemiologist John Snow mentions Gould and his assistant Prince in his famous publication: On
2958-466: Was compared by some to the naturalist John James Audubon . In honour of Lear's bird illustrations, Anodorhynchus leari , popular name Lear's macaw , is named after him. After his eyesight deteriorated too much to work with such precision on the fine drawings and etchings of plates used in lithography, he turned to landscape painting and travel. Among other travels, he visited Greece and Egypt during 1848–49 and toured India during 1873–75, including
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#17330852115353016-483: Was followed by four more in the next seven years, including Birds of Europe in five volumes. It was completed in 1837; Gould wrote the text, and his clerk, Edwin Prince, did the editing. The plates were drawn and lithographed by Elizabeth Coxen Gould. A few of the illustrations were made by Edward Lear as part of his Illustrations of the Family of Psittacidae in 1832. Lear, however, was in financial difficulty, and he sold
3074-725: Was his cat, Foss , who died in 1887 and was buried with some ceremony in a garden at Villa Tennyson. Lear eventually settled in San Remo , on his beloved Mediterranean coast in the 1870s at a villa he named "Villa Tennyson". Lear was known to introduce himself with a long pseudonym: "Mr Abebika kratoponoko Prizzikalo Kattefello Ablegorabalus Ableborinto phashyph" or "Chakonoton the Cozovex Dossi Fossi Sini Tomentilla Coronilla Polentilla Battledore & Shuttlecock Derry down Derry Dumps", which he based on Aldiborontiphoskyphorniostikos . After
3132-591: Was named after Gould's son Charles. Gould's sunbird , or Mrs. Gould's sunbird, ( Aethopyga gouldiae ) and the Gouldian finch ( Erythrura gouldiae ) were named after his wife. A visit to Gould in his old age provided the inspiration for John Everett Millais 's painting The Ruling Passion . The Gould League , founded in Australia in 1909, was named after him. This organisation gave many Australians their first introduction to birds, along with more general environmental and ecological education. One of its major sponsors
3190-406: Was not directly responsible for the illustrations himself, although he supervised their production closely." London booksellers Henry Sotheran Ltd describe the work as "Gould's pride and joy". Gould had already published some of the illustrations in Birds of Europe , but Birds of Great Britain represents a development of an aesthetic style in which illustrations of nests and young are added on
3248-431: Was room for beneath the picture. For the first three editions, most are typeset as, respectively, two, five, and three lines. The cover of one edition bears an entire limerick typeset in two lines: There was an Old Derry down Derry, who loved to see little folks merry; So he made them a Book, and with laughter they shook, at the fun of that Derry down Derry! In Lear's limericks, the first and last lines usually end with
3306-651: Was the Royal Australasian Ornithologists Union . In 1976, he was honoured on a postage stamp, bearing his portrait, issued by Australia Post . In 2009, a series of birds from his Birds of Australia, with paintings by H. C. Richter, were featured in another set of stamps. Gould married the painter Elizabeth Coxen (18 July 1804 – 15 August 1841) on 5 January 1829. They had at least three sons, (John) Henry Gould (1829–1855) and Franklin Gould (1839–1873) dying before him. Their youngest son, Charles Gould ,
3364-502: Was with Franklin Lushington . He met the young barrister in Malta in 1849 and toured southern Greece with him. Lear developed an infatuation for him that Lushington did not wholly reciprocate. Although they remained friends for almost forty years until Lear's death, the disparity of their feelings constantly tormented Lear. Indeed, Lear's attempts at male companionship were not always successful;
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