Illustrations of the manners, customs, and condition of the North American Indians.: With letters and notes, written during eight years of travel and adventure among the wildest and most remarkable tribes existing.

London: Chatto & Windus,, 1876. In silent and stoic dignity First edition printed in colour of Catlin's classic work, portraying numerous tribes, such as Crow, Blackfoot, Mandan, Pawnee, Comanche, and Cheyenne. Catlin was the first Western artist to picture Native Americans extensively in their territories. A young lawyer turned portraitist, George Catlin (1796-1872) set out in 1830 from his home in Pennsylvania to paint Native Americans and their way of life. Catlin's eight years among the major tribes of the Great Plains and the Rocky Mountains resulted in his "Indian Gallery", an enormous collection of artefacts and more than four hundred paintings, including portraits and scenes of tribal life. "The history and the customs of such a people", Catlin wrote, "preserved by pictorial illustrations, are themes worthy of the lifetime of one man, and nothing short of the loss of my life shall prevent me from becoming their historian" (quoted in Hassrick). Catlin's handsome book was first published with hand-coloured plates in 1841. Sabin describes it as "one of the most original, authentic, and popular works on the subject". Appendix B contains a valuable comparative vocabulary of Mandan, Blackfoot, Riccaree, Sioux, and Tuscarora. Two volumes, large octavo. Original pictorial red cloth rebacked with the original spines laid down, spines and front covers lettered in gilt, and decorated in gilt and black, endpapers renewed. With numerous chromolithograph illustrations from the author's original paintings on 180 sheets (including 3 maps, one folding). Occasional pencilled marginalia (some in blue pencil), title page of vol. I with illegible note. Extremities with minor wear or judicious repairs, cloth scuffed with scattered stains, occasional foxing or soiling. A very good copy. Hassrick 15; Howes C241; Sabin 11536. Bruce Watson, "George Catlin's Obsession", Smithsonian Magazine, Dec. 2002.