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Catalogue
73
Voyages
& Travels
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41.
CONDAMINE, [CHARLES-MARIE] DE LA. Relation abrégée
d'un Voyage fait dans l'Intérieur de l'Amérique Meridionale
Depuis la Côte de la Mer du Sud, jusqu'aux Côtes du
Brésil & de la Guyane, en descendant La Rivière
des Amazones. Maestricht, Jean-Edmé Dufour & Philippe
Roux, 1778 [Francfort am Mein, J. J. Kessler, 1779]. $1,250
8vo; 3 ff, pp. xvi, 379, 1 folding engraved map; 1 folding engraved
plate. This edition includes the Lettre à Madame *** sur
l'Emeute Populaire... and the Pièces Justificatifs. Contemporary
continental marbled paper over cardboard; binding somewhat worn;
one small inkspot in margin of p. 1, otherwise the text is clean
and tight, although a few signatures are uniformly age-browned.
While the first editions of these works [1745 & 1746] were paginated
separately, this one is paginated consecutively. An interesting
collation, with two title-pages, one for the Maestricht edition
of 1778 and one for the Frankfurt edition of 1779, both of which
were issued from the same sheets; the title-pages are also identical
but for the imprint and date.
Hill, p. 169 (no plate); Medina BHA: 3371 note; Borba de Moraes,
p. 446: "This .... edition is more difficult to find than the
Paris [first edition, 1745] one."; Sabin 38485; vide Cox II,
p. 272; not in Polak. This expedition, sent out by the French Academy
of Sciences to measure one exact degree in order to determine the
size of the globe, took its measurements at the equatorial line
near Quito. Several members of the expedition, which had included
La Condamine, Bouguer, Godin, and others, did not return to France
but remained in South America; among these was the surgeon of the
expedition, Semiergues, whose romantic involvement with a woman
in Cuencas, and his subsequent death there, is told in the Lettre...sur
l'Emeute Populaire. Besides the notable scientific importance of
this expedition is the fact that La Condamine, returning to France
from Brazil, relates in this journal his voyage down the Amazon
from its source to Para.
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42. CRANTZ, DAVID. The History of Greenland: Containing a
Description of the Country, and its Inhabitants: and Particularly,
A Relation of the Mission, carried on for above these Thirty Years
by the Unitas Fratrum, at New Herrnuth and Lichtenfels, in that
Country. London, Printed for the Brethren's Society for the Furtherance
of the Gospel among the Heathen: and sold by J. Dodsley,..., 1767.
Two volumes. First edition in English. $2,250
8vo; 2ff, pp.lix, [1], 405, [1]; f, pp.497, [1] (Errata); with 9
plates of copper-engravings, including two folding maps; later half-leather
and marbled paper over boards; the Contents (pp. xxxv-xxxviii) are
bound between pp. 476-477 of the Index; marginal dampstaining in
both volumes; a very good set.
Sabin 17417 (calling for 5 maps and plates only); Cox II:18; ESTC
T144569. The original edition of the work appeared in German at
Barby in 1765, under the title, Historie von Grönland. This
English edition was translated by Gambold from the Dutch edition,
published earlier in 1767 in Amsterdam. Dibdin provides his highest
recommendation of the translation in his Lit. Comp., "As to
Greenland, may I not rest satisfied with the exclusive recommendation
of the translation by the pious and learned Gambold, from the High
Dutch of old Crantz, in 1767." (cf.Sabin) As for the work itself,
it drew admiration from contemporaries such as Dr. Samuel Johnson
who declared that "very few books had ever affected him so
deeply, and that the man who did not relish the first part was no
philosopher, and he who did not enjoy the second part, no Christian."
(cf.Cox). Published just after Egede's work on Greenland, this work
provides details which cannot be found in the earlier narratives,
such as the description of the seals, certain aspects of the island's
natural history, the life and customs of the Greenlanders, the history
of their settlement, and the mission work of the Church of the Unitas
Fratrum.
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Very Scarce First Edition
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43. CRESPEL, R.P. EMMANUEL. Voiages du R.P. Emmanuel Crespel,
dans le Canada et son Naufrage en revenant en France. Mis au Jour
par le Sr. Louis Crespel son Frere. A Francfort sur le Meyn, 1742.
First edition. $6,250
Small 8vo; pp. [10], pp. [iii]-x, (11)-158. Contemporary mottled
calf, rebacked long ago, with original spine laid down; lacks final
leaf of dedication; some soiling and few small tears to prelims;
neat woodcut bookplate, and unobtrusive blind-emboss on title-page;
a good copy of this series of eight letters, initialled by Louis
Crespel at tail of p. [11].
Howes C880; vide TPL (reprint of 1884); Sabin 17476; JCB I:704:
"A narrative of much interest"; Gagnon II:540; Dionne
II:430; JFB C-711; Streeter Sale I:122; this edition not in Lande
nor in Cox. This important sequel to the earlier relations of Sagard,
Le Clercq, etc. has much valuable information on Anticosti, Quebec,
Niagara and Eastern Canada in general. Crespel, a Recollet, served
as priest at Fort Richelieu (now Sorel, Que.) for two years, from
1726-28, following which he went as chaplain with the forces sent
to fight the Fox Indians in the area of the Great Lakes. He returned
to Montreal, but shortly thereafter returned to the Great Lakes
region and specifically to Forts Niagara, Frontenac and Saint Frederic
(Youngstown, N.Y., Kingston, Ont. and Crown Point, N.Y.). He was
then recalled to France, but was involved in a shipwreck of the
coast of Anticosti and, although many of the men were lost, Crespel
and a few companions survived the winter on the northern shore of
the island and eventually reached help at Mingan. After a short
stay in Paris, he returned to Canada and spent the rest of his life
in Quebec. The story of his travels and shipwreck were written in
letter form to his brother, and became an immediate success. His
descriptions of the expedition against the Fox Indians, the country
in which he travelled, the customs of the Indians, the shipwreck,
and the terrain of Anticosti in which he survived, found a wide
audience and were soon reprinted and translated many times. This
work was reprinted in Quebec in 1884, but the first edition is extremely
scarce.
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44.
DE LONG, GEORGE W. The Voyage of the Jeannette; the ship
and ice journals of George W. De Long... edited by his wife, Emma
De Long. Boston and New York, Houghton Mifflin, 1884. Two volumes.
First American edition. $450
Tall thick 8vo; pp. xii, 440; pp. xii, 441-911; 2 steel-engraved
portraits. 1 tinted lithograph, 13 wood-engraved plates, 41 vignettes
in the text, 24 maps, charts and diagrams (3 folding, 1 double-page,
1 in rear pocket of vol. I; original brown cloth stamped in black
and gilt; gilt decorations and lettering on spines; contemporary
name on front free endpaper; corners and heel of vol. I spine little
worn; overall, a very good, bright copy.
Arctic Biblio. 3839: "Edited by Emma De Long, widow of the
author, based on De Long's private papers, the editor's own recollections
and notes, and on public and private testimony from survivors of
the expedition." This expedition was made under the authority
of the U.S. Navy Dept.; it sailed from San Francisco on July 8th,
1879, called at a number of places in the Bering Sea, and went adrift
in the ice near Herald Island in November of 1879, where it was
crushed by the ice and subsequently sank. Thirty-three men left
the ship, of whom twenty-five reached the Lena Delta; of these,
twelve, including De Long, perished.
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45.
DE WINDT, HARRY. Through the Gold-Fields of Alaska to Bering
Straits. London, Chatto & Windus, 1898. First edition. $175
8vo; pp. [4], viii, 312, 32 (Publisher's catalogue); frontispiece
portrait and numerous photographic illustrations; large folding
coloured map; little light, sporadic foxing; original blue cloth
binding very good and bright; t.e.g.; gilt decoration on front cover;
spine gilt-lettered.
Arctic Bib. 3939; Ricks 83; Tourville 1286; Wickersham 2702. The
author travelled from Juneau to the Klondike, by way of the Chilkoot
Pass and Lake LaBarge. Thereafter he made his way down the Yukon
River to St. Michael. Included also is his account of his two-month
stay with the Tchuktchis. The folding map shows the gold fields
of the Yukon.
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