WANDERINGS IN WEST AFRICA From Liverpool to Fernando Po. By a F.R.G.S.

London: Tinsley Brothers, 1863. 2 volumes. First edition. With a folding map in Volume I and frontispiece plate in Volume II. 8vo, finely bound in the best antique full crushed morocco gilt by Birdsall of England, the covers with triple gilt fillet lines at the borders, the spines fully gilt with raised bands gilt decorated, compartments with elaborate panel designs in gilt incorporating corner tools and fillet lines, head and tail of spines gilt decorated, all board edges gilt, turnovers rolled, tooled and ruled in gilt, subtle marbled endleaves, t.e.g., original cloth covers and spine panels bound in at the end of each volume. x, 303; vi, 295 pp. A beautiful and very handsome set produced by one of England’s foremost and collectible binders. Some light aging at the hinges, otherwise a very fine, clean, bright and well preserved copy with virtually no evidence of use. SUCH COPIES, SO HANDSOMELY BOUND AND SIGNED BY IMPORTANT ENGLISH BINDERS ARE EXCEEDINGLY SCARCE.
Burton was appointed consul at Fernando Po in 1861 and he used his post to explore the contiguous areas of Nigeria and Sierra Leone, as well as Madeira and Tenerife. Fascinated by the high incidence of European mortality in West Africa, he believed it possible to render the region "not more unhealthy than the East or West Indies."
Burton’s publication of the book anonymously as a “Fellow of the Royal Geographic Society” ( F.R.G.S) “may have been a slap at the Royal Geographical Society , for Burton was at odds with the organization’s leadership at the time over the Nile’s sources. The acerbic dedication was ‘to the true friends of Africa- not the “Philanthropist” or Exeter Hall’.
Modern gold-mining in West Africa can be directly linked to this work. “Although it was well known that there was gold on the Gold Coast, nothing was done to develop it, and it was Burton who, in his “Wanderings in West Africa”, drew public attention again to this ancient gold-field.