These sketches, undated, were formerly attributed in our Archives to Andrew Elvins. They are in fact lithographs of observational skecthes by Warren De la Rue from 1856 April 20, as can be found in Camille Flammarion, La Planète Mars et ses conditions d'habitabilité, synthèse générale de toutes les observations..., vol. I (Paris: Gauthier-Villars et fils, 1892), p. 128, fig. 76, and p. 129, fig. 77, among other places. They were entered into the Album of the Toronto Astronomical and Physical Society in the 1890s (likely during the first half of that decade). The album, a gift from Charles Sparling in 1892, was commissioned as a physical repository for

"...the Astronomical drawings, plates and views belonging to the Society"

(Transactions of the Astronomical and Physical Society of Toronto, for the Year 1892, Including Third Annual Report [Toronto: Rowsell & Hutchison, Printers to the Society, 1893], pp. 68-69—report of the meeting of 1892 October 18).

The De la Rue Mars drawings in the Album of the Toronto Astronomical and Physical Society were most likley cut from copies of the lithographs, either those prepared by S. Russell, which De la Rue distributed to fellow members of the Royal Astronomical Society (London), or the version included in De la Rue's Improved Indelible Diary and Memordanum Book for 1861. For purposes of comparison the former can be viewed here, and here (these are from the British Museum set). Cutting prints, drawings, and manuscript images for pasting into albums was a common Victorian practice, and oftern invovled dismembering books—even valuable manuscripts!

De la Rue's present astronomical fame is due to his achievements as a pioneering astrophotographer, but it mustn't be forgotten that he also excelled as an observational astronomical artist.

Lithographs after Warren De la Rue.