Ocelot or Leopard Cat from The Viviparous Quadrupeds of North America

New York: John James Audubon, 1842. Hand-colored lithograph by J. T. Bowen of Philadelphia after a drawing from nature by Audubon. Sheet: (21 3/16 x 27 3/8 inches). A charming image of an ocelot eyeing a catfish from Audubon's Quadrupeds, the greatest 19th-century work of natural history illustration produced in America.

This fine plate of the American big cat is from the Imperial folio edition of Audubon's The Viviparous Quadrupeds of North America, produced entirely in the United States. The production of the Quadrupeds was begun by Audubon and his sons at about the same time as the commercially-successful octavo edition of The Birds of America. Unlike the double-elephant folio, the Quadrupeds was produced entirely in the United States. Reese notes, "by 1843 the Audubon family business was a well-oiled machine, involving John James, his two sons, and various in-laws and friends. The octavo Birds was still in production when J. T. Bowen began to produce the plates for the elephant folio edition of the Quadrupeds, the largest successful color-plate book project of 19th-century America. It took the family five years to publish 150 plates in thirty parts. The massive project was a commercial success, thanks to the close management of Victor. There were about three hundred subscribers." [Reese]

Bennett, p.5. Reese, Stamped With A National Character 36. Sabin 2367. Wood, p.209.