First Fleet artwork collection

Bird in profile, facing to the left. It is depicted perched on a stump which is set on a green to yellow base, against a plain background. The bill is open to display the inside of the mouth and the tongue. The head and underparts are predominantly off-white overlaid with grey horizontal striations, except for a pale orange patch under the eye and round the neck, and a black crown and stripe around the neck. The back is blue-grey mottled with brown and dark grey. The wings and tail are pale orange-brown with black markings. The drawing is framed by a pencil border and annotated in ink and pencil.

• Port Jackson Painter]
• The drawing is annotated in ink at lower left "Two thirds the Natural size Musquito Hawk, July".
• The drawing is unsigned and undated.
• The drawing is inscribed in ink at top right with the number "219.". 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 "Banded Goatsucker Syn. Sup. ii. 262 pl 136". This has been copied in ink at lower left, "Banded Goatsucker. Latham Syn. Sup. ii. 262 pl 136.". The page reference is to Latham's Second Supplement to the General Synopsis of Birds (1802).
• This bird was more recently identified as the Owlet-Nightjar, Aegotheles cristatus in Hindwood K. A. (1970).
• The drawing is annotated in pencil at top "Lambert Drawing. I. 66.", and in ink at lower right "vol-1-66 Latham". "Latham" appears to be in error for Lambert. 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 is attached to the mount alongside the drawing at lower right. It is inscribed in pencil "Note Vol.-1-66 refers to Lambert Drawings". (See note above.)
• 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 12294
• 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).