Search Results: Titles starting with A from Hordern House Rare Books

London, 1784. Engraving, 253 x 533 mm. to plate mark, paper size 290 x 540 mm.; a little light old creasing at right side; in fine condition. Rare proof impression of one of the most atmospheric views made by Webber to illustrate Cook's third voyage: the St Peter and Paul ostrog as seen during the expedition's first visit to Avacha Bay. This wonderful panorama of St Peter and St Paul, with Cook's ships at anchor in the bay, would later appear as plate 74 in the atlas to the official account of the third voyage. Webber's image depicts the small Kamchatkan settlement with its inhabitants fishing in front of their distinctive dwellings, all in an untouched landscape with wooded coastline and distant snow-covered mountains. It offers an arcadian vision of the place wildly at variance with what it would become: modern Petropavlovsk-Kamchatsky, now a major commercial port and the home of Russia's nuclear submarine fleet. It was at St Peter and St Paul that the battered vessels called in late April 1779,… Read More

Sydney: 19 June, 1852. Old folds; very good.. Bifolium ALS, 280 x 220 mm., address panel with stamps and postal marks, crimson wax seal largely intact, Unusual autograph letter, recording the sale of "wines and fruit" brought in from Cape Town on the Cremona in 1852. As the writer notes to their colleagues in London, R. Hovil & Sons, they are able to send net proceeds of almost 500 pounds sterling, an impressive figure. Levick & Piper were an important Sydney retailer, initially on George Street, but later at Pitt Street opposite the old Union Bank, selling everything from mouse-traps to iron-mongery. The company also did a roaring trade in food and wine, importing from all around the world (and developing a relationship with Cape Town in the process). There is presumably a connection with the 1830s firm of Levick & Younger (of George Street), but the Levick & Piper association dates from January 1849, when James and Joseph Levick went into partnership with Frederick Piper. The firm continued with a… Read More

London: 6 December, 1838. Single sheet, wove paper, 23 x 18.5 cm.; some wear along the old folds, but in excellent condition. A fascinating manuscript document, thanking Mitchell for his gift to Queen Victoria of his 'Work on Australia, and a Set of his Maps'. The letter is dated December 1838 (that is, slightly prior to the actual publication of Three Expeditions into the Interior of Australia), and is undoubtedly a significant document relating to Mitchell's fervent desire to be knighted: the Australian Dictionary of Biography notes that during this period Mitchell was in London, where he was much occupied with 'a long correspondence with the Colonial Office to obtain a knighthood.' Lingering doubts about some of his earlier actions delayed the process, but he was duly given the award in 1839. The letter reads: 'Sir Henry Wheatley presents his compliments to Major Mitchell, and begs to acknowledge the receipt of his letter of November 30, accompanied with a copy of his Work on Australia, and a Set… Read More

[Sydney or Scotland]: 21 August, 1829. Old folds.. Three-page ALS in a neat but unfinished hand, 228 x 185 mm., original red wax seal, stamp for the Sydney post office but not otherwise marked, very good. A charming and rather rare example of a woman writing from Sydney in the 1820s. The letter was written to Janet Ranken, the wife of the important Bathurst pastoralist and settler George, one of the first to take up land in the region. On George Ranken see a long entry in the Australian Dictionary of Biography, and the 1916 memoir The Rankens of Bathurst. The only mystery about the letter is whether it was written in Scotland (where it is probably likely that Mrs Hutchison was still living) or Sydney (the sealed letter has only one postal stamp, for Sydney): was Janet Ranken's mother also an immigrant to New South Wales? The letter was written to her daughter Janet "Jenny" Ranken Hutchison, who had then been living in Bathurst for several years, having married the pastoralist George Ranken in May… Read More

On board, 1822. Single-page letter on single folded sheet, 255 x 195 mm., address panel, slightly torn where originally opened at red wax seal; very good. An intriguing letter sent from on board Hyacinthe de Bougainville's command the Thétis to Monsieur Bajot, who is noted as being the editor of the Annales Maritimes published by the Ministry of the Marine in Paris. Louis-Marie Bajot was associated with the Ministry for most of his life, and was the driving force behind the publication of the Annales Maritimes, an important annual that published the latest news of naval affairs and regulations, together with long articles and notes on voyages and other maritime matters. The naval officer André-Antoine-Émilien Gay, baron de Taradel, writes that though he is a subscriber, he finds that he is missing the recent volumes; he has just embarked on the Thétis and expects to sail shortly, just at the moment when he might conceivably profit from having the volumes to hand. The Annales Maritimes, first… Read More

Leiden: Van D. Noothoven Van Goor, 1860. In good condition.. Single printed leaf, 440 x 310 mm., simply handcoloured. Scarce news-sheet publication for Dutch children. One of a long series (this is number 78), this is devoted to information about Java, with a map and three views including one of the governor-general's Palace in Batavia. .

London: T. Cadell, Jun. and W. Davies, 1802. Very good condition in handsome later bindings.. Two volumes, quarto, [the first volume, 1798]: two charts, 18 plates and four textual vignettes, the vignettes most unusually repeated on additional folding plates, a fine thick paper issue bound with the half-title, [the second volume, 1802]: one chart, five plates (three with original hand-colouring) and four textual vignettes (two with hand-colouring), bound with the half-title; a most attractive set in beautiful full tree-calf bindings by Aquarius, gilt, double spine labels, speckled edges. A beautiful and special set of this classic First Fleet book, in superb condition. This is an exceptionally handsome copy of the first edition of the complete work, published as two separate volumes four years apart. The first volume is from a very rare issue on thick paper with the engraved vignettes that appear in the text also bound in as separately printed engravings on fold-out sheets. Collins had arrived with… Read More

London: John Murray, 1818. Two volumes, octavo, large folding map, engraved frontispiece of Mariner in Tongan dress, three leaves of native music; an attractive set in contemporary handsome green half calf, spine gilt with red labels. Second edition of Martin's important account of William Mariner's four years in Tonga between 1806 and 1810. Martin's account of Tonga - Cook's "Friendly Isles" - was first published in London in 1817; this second revised edition was issued the following year and contains a large folding map of the Tongan archipelago not present in the first edition. This detailed and finely engraved map shows outlying reefs and notes the exact point where Mariner was wrecked off the island of Lefooga (present day Lifuka in the Haapa'i group). The work is based on the life of William Mariner, who sailed on the Port au Prince, a privateer which attacked Spanish vessels in the Pacific. They landed at the Hapai Islands in Tonga in 1806, were attacked after a quarrel, and the ship was burnt… Read More

London: W. Strahan & T. Cadell, 1773. With some mostly inoffensive browning, as often.. Three volumes, quarto, with 28 charts and 24 engraved plates (many folding); contemporary calf, well rebacked at some time; an excellent tall copy with some leaves untrimmed. Second edition of the official account of Cook's first voyage, printed in the same year as the first edition and preferred, since it is complete with the chart of the Strait of Magellan and the List of Plates, and contains new information in the form of a new preface. The primary purpose of Cook's voyage in Endeavour was the observation of the transit of Venus from Tahiti, which would enable the distance between the earth and the sun to be calculated, but Cook was also commissioned to search for "Terra Australis", the great hypothetical southern continent supposed to exist as a balance to the northern land mass. The Endeavour voyage would result in the discovery of the Society Islands, the circumnavigation of New Zealand, and the charting of… Read More

Sydney: Thomas Richards, 1874. A little spotting, rubbed. A good copy. Octavo; with bookplate and neat perforated stamps of the Sydney Mechanic's School of Arts; in contemporary half red morocco. Sydney-printed facsimile and translation of the earliest "derivative" printing of a Quirós Memorial. Following the presentation Memorials (see previous item), a few so-called "derivative" editions appeared in Spain, editions by private printers based on the "Eighth Memorial" that Quirós had presented to the King in 1609. The first of these derivative editions was published in Pamplona in 1610: the facsimile published here is based on the Mitchell Library's copy, with an introductory essay by William Duncan. It was this Eighth Memorial that, after being printed unofficially in three editions in Spain, was translated and published in numerous editions overseas, abridged and anthologised. Virtually all of the later versions of Quirós are ultimately descended from the 1609 Memorial, including the early… Read More

London: J. Nichols for T. Cadell, 1787. Octavo, [2], iii, [2], v-xxviii, 454, [2]pp. Folding plate and four folding maps. Contemporary calf, backstrip gilt with red label. Joints cracked but sound. Very good copy. Third edition. "This was the first edition to contain the important supplement "A Comparative View of the Russian Discoveries with those made by Captains Cook and Clerke" as an integral part of the text. (it had also been printed separately in quarto in 1787)" (Howell). The maps and plate are the same as the first two editions. . Provenance: Bookplate of John Hooper and his ink signature dated 1824.

London: (W.Bulmer and Co), 1799. Very good.. Quarto, folding plate, 24 pp.; new wrappers. Investigating Lord Bessborough's unusual dog, as arranged by Joseph Banks, Sir Everard Home discusses hermaphroditism in all manner of animals including man, referring to anatomists such as Hunter, Baron Haller, and Cheselden, and making ample use of the famous Hunterian anatomical collections: he had acted for a while as assistant to his brother-in-law the surgeon John Hunter, whose collection of more than thirteen thousand anatomical specimens now forms the basis of the Hunterian Museum at the Royal College of Surgeons in London. With a sang-froid shocking today, Sir Everard even discusses the purchase of a woman from the Dominicans in the West Indies by General Melville. But the key purpose of the essay is to discuss Lord Bessborough's dog, whose sex organs are displayed on the folding plate: "A favourite dog of Lord Bessborough's, which had lived in the family for many years, was observed to have no teats,… Read More

London: J. Nichols for T. Cadell, 1780. Quarto, xxii, 344, [13, index] pp. Folding plate, four folding maps. Contemporary calf scuffed and tips worn, rebacked retaining the original gilt backstrip with black label, hinges strengthened with cloth. Internally fresh and clean. First edition. This is an important source on Russian exploration and expansion into the Northern Pacific, and the attempt to open trade with Alaska and the Aleutian Islands. Coxe, who travelled to Russia as tutor to the Earl of Pembroke's son, took advantage of his stay to collect, compare, and translate journals of voyages subsequent to that of Bering and Tschirikoff in 1741. He collected maps at St. Petersburg, consulted with authorities, and included several narratives "never before given to the public", directing the "curious and inquisitive reader" to compare them to Cook's then unpublished journals. The second part, on Siberia, largely taken from works by Muller and Pallas, includes an interesting account of a… Read More

London: Printed by J. Nichols, for T. Cadell, 1780. Quarto, xxiii, 344, (13, index) (2, ads.)pp. With four folding maps and a folding plate. Contemporary calf, gilt backstrip, red label, joints cracked but sound. Second and best edition. This is an important source on Russian exploration and expansion into the Northern Pacific, and the attempt to open trade with Alaska and the Aleutian Islands. Coxe, who travelled to Russia as tutor to the Earl of Pembroke's son, took advantage of his stay to collect, compare, and translate journals of voyages subsequent to that of Bering and Tschirikoff in 1741. He collected maps at St. Petersburg, consulted with authorities, and included several narratives "never before given to the public", directing the "curious and inquisitive reader" to compare them to Cook's then unpublished journals. Coxe 'also succeeded in securing additional material (for instance the narrative and maps of Krenitzin and Levashev's 'secret' expedition, the first official Russian government… Read More

London: Sam. Smith and Benj. Walford, 1694. Octavo, with one (of two) folding maps (missing the "Chart of the Western and Southern Oceans"), a folding table and 19 engraved plates, seven of them folding; modern antique-style speckled calf. First edition: 'The editor of this work is believed to be Sir Tancred Robinson. In his lengthy Introduction, he speaks of explorations towards the South Terra Incognita, suggests that the Dutch had made great discoveries there which they had never divulged, and also speaks of Ferdinand Magellan, Pedro Fernándes de Quirós, Sir Francis Drake, and others who had sailed the South Seas' (Hill). The editor laments 'that the English nation have not sent with their Navigators, some skilful Painters, Naturalists, and Merchanists, under publick Stipends and Encouragement as the Dutch and French have done...'. Of Tasman's voyage he exclaims: '... 'tis the Discovery of a new World, not yet known to the English. 'Tis probable by Abel Jansen Tasman's Navigation, that New… Read More

London: John Murray, 1818. Quarto, 2 p.l., [vii]-xv, [1] plate list, 222, cxxx, [72]. With a frontispiece and seven plates all colour lithographs by Havell, two uncoloured plates, and five maps (three folding). Modern quarter blue morocco lettered in gilt, by Zaehnsdorf (1962). A very fine untrimmed copy, partially unopened, with Hall's clipped signature at the front. First edition of one of the earliest accounts of Korea by a European. Hall captained the sloop Lyra which, with the Alceste, brought the Amherst Embassy to China. He made a voyage to Korea and to the island of Loo-Choo (present day Okinawa). "Korea had been sketchily explored by Europeans, but it was not until the Alceste and Lyra expedition of 1816-17, under Captains Murray Maxwell and Basil Hall, that detailed information was obtained about the Ryukyus" (Hill). The substantial appendices include charts, tables of observations, a meteorological journal, an abstract of the Lyra's voyage, a geological memorandum, and a glossary and… Read More

London: A. Strahan, 1802. Some foxing in one gathering.. Quarto, xxvi, (1, errata), 332, 58 (Appendix) pp. With a large folding map before the title page, and 14 engraved plates. A clean crisp copy entirely uncut and partially unopened in antique-style boards, paper backstrip lettered in black. First and only edition in English of the Englishman Sauer's full account of the Billings voyage, on which he travelled as secretary to the Captain: the classic description of the Aleutian Islands. This was the last of the major Russian surveys of the eastern coast of Siberia, and accomplished a great deal of geographical research. They visited Kodiak, Montague Island and Prince William Sound, and saw Mount St. Elias. Billings's naval career had started under Cook: he sailed as an able-bodied seaman on the Discovery, transferring on Cook's death to the Resolution. His voyage included a revisiting of Kamchatka where Captain Clerke, who had taken over the command of the third voyage after Cook's death, had been… Read More

London: R. Wilkinson, 1 January, 1794. A fine copy.. Engraved map, 265 x 338mm., handcoloured, mounted. A marvellous map, the companion to Wilkinson's map of the east coast of Australia. This map of South-East Asia is designed to show the islands between Canton at top left and the Torres Strait in the bottom right, giving an overview of the waters which in the 1790s were seeing the beginnings of what would become the established China/India to New Holland trade, with its famous waterways such as the Straits of Sunda and Malacca, and the Sulu Sea. In fact, as an overview of this burgeoning trade, the map could scarcely be bettered. The map was originally included in Robert Wilkinson's A General Atlas, being A Collection of Maps of the World (1794). .

London: John Baskett, 1720. Small folio, 8 pp. including armorial title, text pp. 451-455), some browning and offsetting, but very good; disbound. Rare: with the same short-title as the Transportation Act of 1718, this is the first significant amendment of that Act, giving details of the institution of transportation and relating some new additions to the types of crime punishable, 'whereas the laws in being have not yet proved effectual to the suppression of Robbery, Burglary and other Felonies...'. This Act gives more concrete information regarding the ways in which anyone convicted of the type of crime by which 'they may be sent or transported to any of His Majesties Colonies or Plantations in America' is to be treated, including details on their status while pending transportation, and the penalties due to any person who seeks to assist or rescue these felons. The Act also renews the death penalty for anyone convicted of transportation who returns to Britain without lawful cause. .

London: Thomas Baskett, 1750. Very good.. Folio, pp. [661]-672 pp. including armorial title; stitch-sewn, evidence of having been disbound at some time. An interesting 1750 Act of Parliament relating to the port of Whitby, just as it was on the cusp of becoming one of the great shipbuilding ports, where famous Australian and Pacific vessels including Cook's Endeavour and First Fleet ships the Golden Grove and the Fishburn were constructed. This Act was instrumental in the repairing of the harbour at Whitby, and instituted a series of works which were paid for by the bustling coal trade. The harbour's central importance to Cook's career in particular is well known, as it was while working out of Whitby that the great mariner established his credentials and also became enamoured of the sea-going properties of Whitby colliers. .