The Story of the House of Cassell
From the time when "Picturesque Europe" was sumptuously begun and carried out in 1876, the Cassell catalogue has contained many important topographical works. The "Picturesque" series, describing in turn Europe, America, Canada, the Mediterranean, and Australia, employed many famous artists, writers, and travellers, and was on a high level of illustration and production.
"Picturesque Australasia," begun in 1888, was smaller in format, less sumptuous in style and less exclusively scenic in character than the other works; it was not, indeed, regarded as belonging to the series. Scenery, however, received due attention, and artists were sent out to provide drawings. The editor was the late Prof. E. E. Morris, of Melbourne University, a brother of Sir Malcolm Morris. His numerous contributions were among the best in the work, but he was ably supported by a large band of the most graphic writers on Australasia, among them Mary Gaunt, who has since won fame as author and traveller. The work was a mine of valuable information bearing upon Australasia, past and present, and deserved more than the moderate measure of success which it realized.
"Countries of the World," "The Story of Africa and its Explorers," and "Cities of the World," may be bracketed with "Picturesque Australasia" rather than with the "Picturesque Europe" series in that they relied for interest at least as much upon the text as upon the illustrations. The first and second were the work of Dr. Robert Brown, whose name appears among the contributors to "The Picturesque Mediterranean"; the third, in four volumes, was written by Edwin Hodder, afterwards the authorized biographer of the seventh Earl of Shaftesbury. In this group of books may be placed "Egypt: Descriptive, Historical and Picturesque," translated from the German of Ebers by Clara Bell, with notes by Dr. Samuel Birch, of the British Museum. It was embellished with reduplications of the original illustrations, and made a very handsome volume.
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