antiquarian bookseller - Peter Harrington

Peter Harrington Antiquarian Bookseller
131.PHIPPS, Constantine
John.
A Voyage towards The North
Pole undertaken by His Majesty’s
command 1773.
London: printed by W. Bowyer and J. Nichols, for J. Nourse,
1774 [22966] £3750
4to. Contemporary calf, rebacked. With 3 folding maps, 12
folding plates and 11 folding tables. Some typical but mild
browning to some plates, an occasional but pervasive damp
stain to top of some gutters, sometime bumped at top of spine
causing a little bruising to that portion of the text block, still
a good copy.
FIRST EDITION. Phipps, the second Baron Mulgrave
(1744–1792), entered the navy in 1760. He got his first
taste of northern waters with a visit to Newfoundland
in 1766 with his old schoolfriend Joseph Banks. After
Daines Barrington had suggested to the Royal Society the
possibility that in the open sea the Arctic Ocean might
be largely free of ice, Phipps obtained the king’s sanction
and sailed for the North Pole with two ships. Among the
crews were the Nigerian author Olaudah Equiano and a
young Horatio Nelson as midshipman. The latter’s famous
encounter with a polar bear occurred on this voyage. Phipps
was the first to describe the polar bear as a species distinct
from other bears and gave it the name Ursus maritimus.
The expedition marks an important stage in the progress
from exploration to research: much of the book is taken up
with detailed appendices on its scientific work.
Howgego P82.
132.PORTLOCK, Nathaniel.
A Voyage Round the World; but
more particularly to the North-West
Coast of America: performed in
1785, 1786, 1787, and 1788, in the
King George and Queen Charlotte,
Captains Portlock and Dixon.
London, Stockdale and Goulding, 1789 [11268] £3500
4to (297 × 221 mm). Skilfully bound to period style in tree
calf, red morocco label, spine richly gilt in compartments,
covers with a metope and pentaglyph roll in gilt, marbled
endpapers. With engraved portrait frontispiece of Portlock by
Mazell after Dodd, large folding map of northwest America,
5 folding charts, 5 plates of birds, 5 plates of views, 2 plates
of artefacts from the Sandwich Islands, portrait of Tyaana (an
Atoui chieftain). Large folding map torn at folds (without loss),
some foxing, some offsetting from plates to text, one or two
repairs to paper. A good tall copy.
FIRST EDITION of Portlock’s interesting circumnavigation,
the principal, and successful, object of which was
the opening of the fur trade in northwest America.
Expedition leader Portlock sailed with Captain Dixon as
co-commander; their two ships sailed part of the way
independently. Though often confused, the published
accounts of the two captains are also independent of
each other: “the present account is also important for
the supplementary details added to the geographical
explorations of Captain Cook. Portlock’s vivid encounters
with the American Indians and the Russians serve
to broaden the perspective provided by the William
Beresford/George Dixon account” (Hill). Portlock appends
some native vocabularies to his account of the American
Indians. Portlock also discovered Portlock’s Harbour,
visited Hawaii three times, gave a good account of the
Bengal vessel of Captain John Meares, and sailed home by
way of Macao and St Helena. Two years later he served as
commander of the second vessel of the second breadfruit
voyage of Captain Bligh.
Hill 1376; Howgego P141; NMM catalogue, Voyages & Travel, 141; Sabin
64389; for Dixon’s account see item 109 above.
133.POWERS, Mabel
(Yehsennohwehs).
The Indian as Peacemaker.
Fleming H. Revell Company, New York, 1932 [36954] £750
224pp. Frontispiece and five other plates. Small inked
ownership inscription to the upper board, otherwise very
good in the original pale grey cloth in slightly worn dustjacket,
sunned at the spine.
Lengthy inscription to Mrs. Cora Shippes Anthony to
the front free endpaper dated “Moon of Lengthening
Days” 1936. Envelope mounted on the front pastedown
containing two small flyers for the book, Mrs. Anthony’s
business card (she was a piano instructor in Williamsport,
PA), and a typed postcard signed by Powers apologising
for the delay in mailing off this copy of the book, and
enquiring about the possibilities of speaking engagements
in the Williamsport area.
THE FIRST GENERAL
DESCRIPTION OF FLORIDA IN
ENGLISH
134.ROBERTS, William.
An Account of the First Discovery,
and Natural History of Florida. With
a Particular Detail of the Several
Expeditions and Descents made on
that Coast. Collected from the Best
Authorities by … Illustrated by a
General Map, and some Particular
Plans, together with a Geographical
Description of that Country by T.
Jeffreys, Geographer to His Majesty.
London, T. Jeffreys, 1763 [39498] £12,500
4to. (270 × 218mm). Well-executed recent Cambridge
Catalogue 57: Travel Section 3: The Americas, Greenland and the Arctic
panelled calf, red morocco label, spine gilt in compartments
Folding frontispiece map of Florida, colony coloured yellow in
outline, folding plans of Pensacola, Bay of St. Joseph’s, Bahia
del Espiritu Santu, St. Augustin, the Island and Bay of Mobile,
and an engraved view of Pensacola. Light browning, scattered
foxing, but overall a very good copy.
FIRST EDITION. After belonging alternately to France and
Spain, Florida was finally ceded to England in exchange
for Cuba in the Treaty of Paris which concluded the Seven
Years’ War. Roberts published in response to the newly
awakened interest in the area and makes claims for the
“English as the first discoverers of this continent” in 1496,
crediting Sebastian Cabot in the service of Henry VII.
Perhaps more accurate and germane are the observations,
accompanied by the plan of Mobile, of Captain Thomas
Robinson who visited the colony in 1754. “The first general
description of the two new British colonies [Florida and
Louisiana East of the Mississippi] and adjacent areas”
(Servies).
Howes R348; Sabin 71926; Servies 436.
135.ROOSEVELT, Theodore.
Through the Brazilian Wilderness.
Charles Scribner’s Sons, New York, 1914 [39522] £3850
8vo. Publisher’s brown cloth, title gilt to spine and upper board,
top edge gilt, others untrimmed. Photogravure frontispiece
and 48 half-tone plates, one folding and 2 full-page maps.
Endpapers browned, a little light marginal browning, else
very good.
FIRST EDITION, PRESENTATION COPY, inscribed, “To Dr.
Bellinger with the best wishes of Thoedore Roosevelt,
Dec. 6th 1917” on the front free endpaper. The account
of Roosevelt’s “zoogeographic reconnaissance” with the
Brazilian explorer Rondon to discover if the Rio da Dúvida
(“River of Doubt”), flowed into the Amazon. Traversing
some of the most dangerous territory of Amazonia, the
party was successful and the river was renamed Rio
Roosevelt, sometimes Rio Teodoro, in his honour.