First Fleet artwork collection

Bird in profile, with body facing to the right and head turned to the left. It is perched on a branch against a plain background. The bird is predominantly grey, darker on the face around the bill, which is black. The wing and tail feathers are a darker grey and overlaid with darker hatched lines, with white highlights at the tips. The drawing is framed by a pencil border and annotated in ink and pencil.

• Thomas Watling]
• The drawing is annotated in ink at bottom, in brown ink, "This representation is about one quarter the size of the Bird the drawing was taken from, and the only one yet seen. I had the skin, therefore the Iris is doubtfull, however the general likeness is very good."
• The drawing is inscribed in ink at top right with the number "60.". This refers to the catalogue list compiled by John Latham c. 1801 which was acquired with the drawings, and is filed with them at the end of the Watling Drawings series.
• The drawing is annotated in pencil at top centre "Variable Crow Sup. 2-117.", and at top right "Non-Dist". This has been copied in brown ink at bottom, "Variable Crow, Lathams Syn Sup 2 p 117.". The page reference is to Latham's Second Supplement to the General Synopsis of Birds (1802).
• The drawing is signed beneath the branch "Thos. Watling, delt.", but is undated.
• This bird was more recently identified as the Grey Currawong, Strepera versicolor in Hindwood K. A. (1970).
• The drawing is annotated in pencil at top centre "Lambert Drawing I. 51". This refers to a related set of drawings from the collections of the 13th Earl of Derby, held in the Library at Knowsley Hall, Lancashire.
• A separate label attached to the mount to the lower right of the drawing is inscribed in pencil "Type".
• The author of this catalogue record is Suzanne Stenning.
• By permission of the trustees of the Natural History Museum (London)
• Two sets of transparencies held in the Natural History Museum (London) Zoology Library and Picture Library: Picture Library reference number 12143
• James Lee of Kensington : purchased ; 1902
• Data sheet available
• Latham, John. Supplement II to the General Synopsis of Birds. London: Leigh, Sotheby, 1802.
• Hindwood K. A. 'The "Watling" drawings with incidental notes on the "Lambert" and the "Latham" drawings', Proceedings of the Royal Zoological Society of New South Wales for the years 1968-69 (1970).