Its holdings also include numerous illustrated works from as early as the 15th century, including Konrad Gessner's Historia animalium, Maria Sibylla Merian's Insects of Surinam, Edward Lear's Psittacidae or Parrots, and a double elephant folio of John James Audubon's The Birds of America.

The shop's two partners, Roberta Huber and Linda Kramer, import current books from Taiwan, Hong Kong, Japan and other Asian countries, and flush out rarities as well: for instance, "Chinese Painting From the Shanghai Museum," an elephant folio published in 1957 and now priced at $1,400.

At 28 cm high the Dover edition is nearly half the size of the 47 cm of the elephant folio sized Towse edition and much smaller than the 36 cm of the original edition.

Other terms for book size have developed, an elephant folio being up to 23 inches tall, an Atlas folio 25 inches, and a double elephant folio 50 inches tall.

Audubon's famous elephant folio editions of "Birds of America" and miniature books like "book in a locket," printed in Glasgow around 1895, come to mind.

"With a group of period prints," he said, "you can build a scale that carries a wall even though you can't afford a big painting or an elephant folio Audubon."

The set piece is what is known as the double elephant folio of "The Birds of America," an 1861 chromolithograph version of the hand-colored behemoth that was originally published by Audubon in England (1826-39).

The borders of the elephant folio are complete paintings in themselves.

In 1851 Henry George Bohn put out an edition, from the original plates in a handsome elephant folio, with coarser sketches-commonly known as the "Suppressed Plates"-being published in a separate volume.