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A Gift Fit for a Prince : Notman’s Maple Box
Robert G. Wilson
McCord Museum Copy
The duplicate set, currently in the McCord Museum, contains forty original loose pages measuring 21 x 28.5 inches, plus six pages that were added to the portfolio later. On the original sheets are one mammoth plate (18 x 22 inch) of the completed Victoria Bridge, eighteen 10 x 12 inch photos mounted two to a page (mostly showing construction of the Victoria Bridge), and 270 stereoviews mounted nine to a page. The stereos are representative of the Canadian views produced by Notman prior to the visit of the Prince of Wales, and cover the areas of Canada from Riviere-du-Loup and the River Saguenay on the east to London and Niagara Falls on the west. Included in the set are 27 stereo views of the Victoria Bridge, mostly showing the construction. Most of the stereo views in the set are hand titled and numbered in ink, and with only a few exceptions, these notations match the listings in the Notman 1860 catalog.
In addition to these original cards, the McCord set includes three other mammoth plates (one view of Montreal and two duplicates of the Victoria Bridge view already mentioned) and three other sheets of stereoviews (one sheet of views in Quebec Province and two sheets of views of the Great Eastern when it visited Quebec City in July 1861). These are assumed to have been added later, since the card stock is different than the rest of the sheets, there are duplicate views, and the views of the Great Eastern are dated.
The sheets of photographs are stored in two burgundy morocco leather portfolios, one titled Canada East in gold on the outside of the cover, the other titled Canada West. Along the spine and both the inside and outside edges of each portfolio is a detailed pattern in gold. To hold the portfolios closed, each has two elaborately tooled clasps made of German silver, an alloy of copper and nickel, which have been gilded. The two portfolios are stored vertically in a box covered with bird’s-eye maple veneer. The box has handles on the ends and ornaments along all the edges and corners, which are also made of German silver. These fittings have been painted to make them look like tarnished silver. Stored in a special bracket inside the top of the box is a hand held mahogany stereo viewer. This viewer has 1 3/8 inch square lenses with six inch focal length, and is 10 3/16 inches long. The box and portfolios were made by other Montreal firms: the case by J. & W. Hilton, the silver work by R. Hendery, and the portfolios by J. Lovell.
