SPL Hand Coloured Rare Book Collection Featuring Norman R Bobins

If you would like to get in touch, please feel free to contact: email hidden; JavaScript is required

PERELAER, Michael Theophile Hubert.
Het Kamerlid van Berkenstein in Nederlandsch - Indie.

A book on Java, very finely executed chromo lithographed plates after J.C. Rappard. Perelaer (1831 - 1901) was a decorated career soldier who first saw service in the Dutch East Indies in 1855 via the Indian Army. He attained the rank of Major and saw action throughout Borneo, The Celebes, and Java.

Published
A.W. Sijthoff - Leiden. [n.d. c 1888]
References
Bastin & Bromer 687 & 688. Bobins I 301 (4 vols)
Plates
48
Binding/Size
M=4to
Value
0-5000
Published
A.W. Sijthoff - Leiden. [n.d. c 1888]
Ref
1520

Vol 2 of 2 only. 4to. Original red linen cloth boards, richly and elaborately decorated in gilt and blind. Title to spine in gilt. Spine in need of attention, boards rubbed and worn, marbled endpapers, contents good. Forty-eight caption-less hand-coloured chromolithographs, taken after the original watercolour drawings by J.C. Rappard, an army officer and artist who spent much of his military career in Indonesia. This popular work was originally published in 1881; this later edition illustrates, most delightfully, colonial life in the Dutch East Indies during the latter half of the nineteenth century. Coloured plates in order: Java. 1. Servants are attending to an evening meal. 2. Servants polishing shoes and lighting a fire under a cooking pot. 3. Ladies and Gentlemen are sitting and conversing on a veranda. 4. A village scene. 5. Villages being rescued after a flood. 6. Holy festival in progress. 7. Men ascending a rope ladder from the sea along a cliff face. 8. A remote house in the jungle. 9. Isolated Temples (?) in fields and surrounding hills. 10. Small village beside a bay with mountains in the background. 11. A young couple and footman driving home by moonlight in their carriage. 12. Large religious temple. 13. Colonial home. 14. Opium Den? 15. Large crowd gathered to watch a 'cornered' tiger in the open air. 16. Mounted sportsmen playing a game like polo? 17. Small home set among trees and mountains. 18. A pair of small boys aloft in a structure made of bamboo on a crop by a river. 19. Rural Railway Station. 20. A large colonial (government) residence. 21. As above. 22. Trees by a river. 23. Waterfall. 24. Villagers are working in a field/crop. 25. Men and pack horses walking along a high, winding mountain path. 26. People conversing in a quiet street. 27. Men on a beach are preparing to launch a small boat into the sea. 28. Steamer pulling into a quiet bay. 29. Large Colonial Home. 30. Workers. 31. People walking along a quiet sun-dappled avenue of trees. 32. Small, almost dry creek bed. 33. Workers in a field with a buffalo pulling a small wagon. Large mountain in the distance. 34. Young girl and infant washing by a river outside their home. 35. Two small settlements are seen on a bend in a river. 36. Local workers working a furnace. 37. Small Paddle Steamer at anchor on a river. 38. Villagers 'panning' in a river. 39. A large river raft. 40. A backwater river scene. 41. Picturesque colonial housing. 42. Local cemetery in the jungle? 43. Waterfall. 44. Large local hut on stilts. 45. A colonial street scene by a river, with a ship moored. 46. Steamers and boats on a river, with a (smoking) volcano on one bank and settlements on the other. 47. Street scene among the locals in the jungle. 48. Steamer and other boats at anchor in a tranquil river setting. Smoking volcano in the background.