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[email protected] www.williamreesecompany.com Bulletin 41 Original Works of American Art Beautiful French Album of Watercolors of Lepidoptera After Abbot 1. [After Abbot, John]: [ALBUM OF WATERCOLOR DRAWINGS OF BUTTERFLIES AND MOTHS AFTER ABBOT, TITLED IN MANUSCRIPT:] HISTOIRE NATURELLE DES LÉPIDOPTÈRES LES PLUS RARES DE GÉORGIE D’APRÈS LES OBSERVATIONS DE M. JEAN ABBOT. IMPRIMÉ À LONDRES EN 1797. [France. 1800-1830]. Manuscript title within a red ruled border, 2pp. manuscript index in rear. Forty pen-and-ink and watercolor drawings, each captioned in red ink, recto only on 40 sheets of wove paper (watermarked Horne). Oblong octavo. Con- temporary half black morocco and blue boards, yellow endpapers. Lacks front free endpaper. Very good. John Abbot was one of the most important Ameri- can natural history artists and his illustrations are amongst the finest ever made. Born in Lon- don in 1751, Abbot sailed for Virginia in July 1773, with orders for both actual specimens and drawings of the local insects. For the next two years he continued to collect and paint, sending home three insect collections, although only one arrived safely. The loss of these two valuable collections at sea together with the worry over political unrest in Virginia led Abbot to move to Georgia. He settled in St. George Parish (later Burke County), Georgia in December 1775. Abbot traveled widely throughout Georgia devoting his time to the study of the natural flora and fauna.