PRESSED FERNS. – [Mary ANN ARMSTRONG.] New Zealand Ferns. [Dunedin: n.p.: circa 1870’s.] Folio (304 x 252mm.) 56 botanical specimens mounted recto only on stiff card leaves, captioned in manuscript hand, maker’s label to front pastedown in the name ‘C.C. Armstrong’. (Some offsetting to verso, toning.) Contemporary black half morocco (extremities heavily rubbed, hinges weakened and lower cover detached). Note: Mary Ann Armstrong was a British-born botanical fern artist. Her work, while being an example of the 19th century decorative arts, was also exhibited at International and inter-colonial exhibitions in the 1880’s. The blending of the artistic and the scientific is shown in her use of mounted moss as a grounding for her specimens.