Album of the kings &​ queens of Victoria

[Melbourne : compiled and published by H. Perkins & Co., The Gift Depot, c.1880]. Duodecimo, pink papered boards with gilt-stamped lettering and ornament, cloth spine; containing folding concertina of [12] panels with lithographic illustrations after Kruger’s photographic portraits of surviving leaders of Aboriginal tribes of Victoria, originally taken at various times between around 1866 and 1878; the rear paste-down with the original printed yellow sheet laid in, with a short essay titled The Kings and​ Queens of Victoria : The Australian Aboriginal; a fine example of this rare and visually striking publication, in fine condition. One of at least three variant bindings, the others we have handled being bound in tortoiseshell or blue cloth.

The subjects are captioned ‘King David, Warrnambool Tribe’; ‘Gellibrand, Colac Tribe’; ‘Queen Mary, Ballarat Tribe’; ‘King William, Mount Cole Tribe’; ‘Queen Eliza, Yarra Tribe’, ‘King Tom, Derrinallum Tribe’; ‘Mia Mia and Royal Family’; ‘King Billy and his two wives’; ‘Queen Rose, Ballarat Tribe’, ‘Tom William, Echuca Tribe’; ‘Barker and son Heron, Bacchus Marsh Tribe’, ‘Dick, Goulburn Tribe’.

From the brief essay by the publisher on the rear pastedown:

‘… like the aborigines of Tasmania which have become an extinct race, those of Victoria (which now number about 700) are so rapidly disappearing that at no very distant date they will have an existence in history only.‘

Ferguson 5809 (misdescribed)