Grasshopper Warbler with Spread Wings on a Twig, Morris Print, 1896

An original wood engraved bird plate, colored by hand, captioned "GRASSHOPPER WARBLER." A single bird grips a slanting lichened twig with its body tilted steeply, the head low at the left and the long rounded tail raised high at the upper right. The wings are half opened and drooping. The upperparts are olive brown, closely scaled with darker feather centers, the flight feathers and tail are warm brown, and the throat and underparts are pale buff white. The twig, washed in yellow green, runs from upper left to lower right with a short forked side shoot near the top.

The caption is engraved in spaced capitals below the picture: "GRASSHOPPER WARBLER." There is no number or other lettering above the picture, and no engraver's credit within it. The Grasshopper Warbler is Locustella naevia.

This plate comes from the fourth edition of A History of British Birds by the Reverend Francis Orpen Morris (1810 to 1893), rector of Nunburnholme in Yorkshire, who wrote the text. The edition was issued in six volumes by John C. Nimmo of London, and this plate belongs to the third volume, whose title page is dated 1896 and states that the plates are colored by hand. The wood blocks for the plates of the work were engraved by Benjamin Fawcett (1808 to 1893) of Driffield in Yorkshire. Each plate combines an engraved black key block with a printed gray tint, finished by hand in watercolor.

This is an original antique print, not a modern reproduction. This item is sold unframed.