Audubon Aquatint Pied Oyster Catcher

AUDUBON, John James (1785 - 1851).
Pied Oyster Catcher, Plate 223.
Aquatint engraving with original hand color.
London: Robert Havell, 1827-1838.
25 1/2” x 38 3/8” sheet.
Comparable: Arader Galleries, 2018 - $2,500.
"Shy, vigilant, and ever on the alert, the Oyster-catcher walks with a certain appearance of dignity, greatly enhanced by its handsome plumage and remarkable bill. If you stop to watch it, that instant it sounds a loud shrill note of alarm; and should you advance farther towards it, when it has neither nest nor young, off it flies quite out of sight. Few birds, indeed, are more difficult to be approached, and the only means of studying its habits I found to be the use of an excellent telescope, with which I could trace its motions when at the distance of a quarter of a mile, and pursuing its avocations without apprehensions of danger." - Audubon's Ornithological Biography.