Large quarto. iv, [2], 142pp, [1]. With an engraved frontispiece, a further 12 engraved plates, numerous engraved illustrations in the text, and five terminal leaves of publisher's advertisements. Original publisher's decorative navy cloth, stamped in gilt and blind, A.E.G. Rubbed and marked, spine dulled. Armorial bookplate of Charles R. C. Hilbert to FEP, later inked ownership inscription of Henry Williamson to recto of FFEP, marginal worm-tracks to terminal gathering.

A greatly enlarged edition of naturalist and journalist William Bernard Tegetmeier's (1816-1912) standard monograph on the natural history, habits, food, and treatment of various species of pheasants, initially published in 1873. An enthusiastic breeder of poultry and pigeons, Tegetmeier notably introduced Charles Darwin to the institutions of the fancy and answered correspondence as part of Darwin's research into domestic birds which informed both the Origin of Species (1859) and Variation of Animals and Plants under Domestication (1868).

Provenance: Henry Williamson (1895-1977), novelist and writer on natural history and the English countryside, is predominantly remembered as the author of Tarka the Otter (1927) for which he won the Hawthornden Prize.