THE MISSION: or, Scenes In Africa. Written for young people (Collection of British Authors. Vol. 84)

Leipzig: Bernhard Tauchnitz, 1845. 1st edition, thus. Leather. Very Good. 1st edition, thus, Copyright edition (1st Continental Edition). A Very Good copy. 12mo., 286 pp.illustrated with an engraved map frontispiece. Bound in quarter red leather and marbled paper boards, with title and volume on the five compartment spine in gilt. All edges marbled. Yellow end papers. Moderate shelf wear, mostly at the tips. Spine darkened, with wear along the joints. Text pages lightly age-toning, with occasional spots of foxing and browning. Hinges very strong.
Captain Frederick Marryat (1792 - 1848) was a Royal Navy officer, a novelist, and an acquaintance of Charles Dickens. He is noted today as an early pioneer of nautical fiction, particularly for his semi-autobiographical novel Mr Midshipman Easy (1836). He is remembered also for his children's novel The Children of the New Forest (1847), and for a widely used system of maritime flag signalling known as Marryat's Code. Christian Bernhard Tauchnitz, German publisher, paid the English authors for the works his company published, and agreed to limit their sales of English-language books to the European continent. In 1841, Tauchnitz started his English-language editions, with the series "Collection Of British Authors". Although Tauchnitz's editions were authorized, and listed as the 'Copyright Edition', they were not protected from copyright infringement and he could offer no such protection to the authors he paid.