GAME BIRDS AND SHOOTING SKETCHES: ILLUSTRATING THE HABITS, MODES OF CAPTURE, STAGES OF PLUMAGE AND THE HYBRIDS AND VARIETIES WHICH OCCUR AMONST THEM.

2nd Edition 1894 (1892), Henry Sotheran & Co., London. Octavo, xiii, 185 pp + 16 pp advertisements. Original light brown pictorial boards with black titles to front and facsimile of Millais’ signature. Uncut edges. Frontispiece of Thomas Bewick by Sir John Everett Millais. Illustrated with 18 full page plates, and 38 in text by the author (listed).

John Guille "Johnny" Millais (24 March 1865 – 24 March 1931), was the fourth son and seventh child of Sir John Everett Millais, the Pre-Raphaelite painter. He was a British artist, naturalist, gardener and travel writer who specialised in wildlife and flower portraiture. He travelled extensively around the world in the late Victorian period detailing wildlife often for the first time. He is noted for illustrations that are of a particularly exact nature.

In 1903 Millais co-founded the Society for the Preservation of the Wild Fauna of the Empire (SPWFE). Clearly a clubbable and convivial man, in 1909 Millais was a founder member of the Shikar Club, a sportsclub where like-minded associates could dine and discuss their passion for hunting especially big game hunting. Millais was passionate about hunting and fellow members included the famous hunters Frederick Selous (the brother of ornithologist Edmund Selous), African game hunter Arthur Henry Neumann, and explorer and hunter Frank Wallace. The club still survives and includes the Duke of Edinburgh amongst its members.

Millais is one of the most respected of British ornithologists and bird artists, producing between 1890 and 1914 a series of books on birds and other natural history subjects. In the study of ornithology he was renowned for his portraiture of wildfowl and game birds.

Condition: Lacks spine (clean edges with no fraying). Boards gently faded and or darkened. Text block firm, print bright, plates unaged. Age toning to endpapers. Previous owner's name to fep. Book protected by cellophane wrap.