Digitally restored 19th c. Victorian botanical illustration of Bulrush / ? Scirpus or Schoenoplectus & Common Flax / Linum usitatissimum. See note

Digitally restored hand-coloured image of 31 double page engravings from 5th Edition copy of 'The Instructive Picture Book: or, Lessons From the Vegetable World' by Charlotte Yonge (1823-1901). The illustrations were the creation of Robert M. Stark (1815-1873); a fellow of the Botanical and Royal Physical Societies. So on both accounts this book is out of copyright, with this Edition published around the 1860s. - Original plates have variable foxing (yellow-orange toning) of the pages, so the whites have been pushed and a little yellow-orange saturation removed. But not enough to alter other colours. Unsightly blobs, stains, spattered ink have been digitally removed, with real problem areas of the foxed image surrounds rebuilt from other cleaner sections of the image page. Original pages are approx. 12x15 inches in size. The patina / texture of paper pulp grains are just visible in the blank areas, which gives the rather off-white appearance. - So what you have here is probably best viewed as being an intermediate stage rather than for use as presented, though could be. Let me explain my thinking... - (1) a yellow-orange tint could be added to image surrounds to make a more controlled 'faux' old page with the plant looking more healthy than in the original. (Option 2) Flood fill outer area with 100% white, but keep paper pulp patina in leaf & flower areas to give separation from pure solid white outer area. (Option 3) Convert into a grey-scale, and tint or not.