Travel
Contact Jonathan Harrison, Alex Day, Andrea Mazzocchi or Katherine Thorn
We stock Western books in European languages, generally – but not exclusively – published before circa 1850. We are especially interested in early travel accounts – from the late fifteenth to the eighteenth centuries – in all areas beyond Europe.
Geographical regions in which we have tended to specialise include the Pacific and its surrounding countries – South America, the Northwest Coast of America, Japan, China, the maritime regions of Asia, including the Philippines and Indonesia, and Australia. Books on Africa, the polar regions, manuscripts and separately published maps are also handled.-
FINÉ, Oronce.
Opere di Orontio Fineo … divise in cinque parti, arimetica, geometria, cosmografia, e orivoli, tradotte da...
Venice, Francesco Franceschi, 1587.
First Italian edition of the works of Finé. Among the most influential scientific scholars of the sixteenth century, over three decades at the Collège Royale Oronce Finé (1494–1555) made considerable contributions to various branches of mathematics, from geometry and arithmetic to astronomy...
£2750
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FISHER, George.
The instructor: or, young man’s best companion…to which is added the family’s best companion…
London, for A. Bettesworth and C. Hitch, [not before 1735].
Second edition, (first, 1727). ‘Volumes entitled The Young Man’s companion exist in many versions and go back to the 1680s when William Mather produced the first of them. They are compendiums of useful information, intended for self-improvement. They concentrate on English, Mathematics, including...
£850
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FLEMING, Peter.
Brazilian Adventure.
London: Queen Anne Press, 2010.
First edition thus, no. 120 of 150 copies. 'In April 1932 Fleming answered an advertisement in the agony column of The Times, which led him to take part in a crack-brained and amateurish expedition to the hinterland of Brazil, ostensibly to look for Colonel P.H. Fawcett, a missing explorer....
£125
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FLEMING, Peter.
News from Tartary: A Journey from Peking to Kashmir.
London: Queen Anne Press, 2010.
First edition thus, no. 120 of 150 copies. Fleming had first travelled to China in 1931 and returned in 1933 as the Special Correspondent of The Times, to cover the war between the nationalists and the communists; 'After reaching Mukden (Shenyang) in Manchuria and taking part in a sortie...
£125
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FLORENT DE SALES (pseud.).
Vrai systême du monde physique et moral.
[Switzerland,] 1797.
Only edition, rare, of this utopia, the identity of whose author, and even of whose printer, remains unknown.
£2500
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FORBES, James David.
Travels through the Alps ... New edition revised and annotated by W.A.B. Coolidge ... With portrait, new maps,...
London, Adam and Charles Black, 1900.
A handsome edition of four of Forbes’s chief writings relating to his Alpine travels, from the library of Guido Rey (1861–1935), the distinguished Italian Alpinist, writer and photographer.
£450
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FORD, Richard (and Ian ROBERTSON, editor).
A hand-book for travellers in Spain, and readers at home. Describing the...
[Arundel and London,] Centaur Press, [1966].
Richard Ford’s classic Hand-book for travellers in Spain, with an introduction by Ian Robertson and a revised index.
£120
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FOREST, BISSON FRERES, &c.
A collection of eight albumen prints (or salt and albumen collages) from mammoth-plate negatives...
France, 1864-5.
An exceptional series of oversize prints commissioned by the Compagnie de Chemins de Fer de l‘Ouest to commemorate the construction of a series of new bridges completed 1861–1864, including the metal bridge at Orival, later destroyed in the Franco-Prussian War, and the oblique stone bridge of...
£30000
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FOSTER, John Leslie.
An essay on the principle of commercial exchanges, and more particularly of the exchange between Great Britain...
London, J. Hatchard, 1804.
First edition of a contemporary response to the Irish Currency Report of 1804 written by the Irish-born judge John L. Foster. The 1804 Irish Currency Report was a direct precursor to the more famous Bullion Report of 1810. Indeed, the former ‘…contains a large part of the doctrine later incorporated...
£2250
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[FRENCH REVOLUTIONARY WARS.]
Lo Stato Pontificio agli altri incliti co-stati d’Italia.
[S.l.,] 1797.
Anonymous anti-French pamphlet, which saw a number of printings in 1796 and 1797, and calls for a general insurrection against the French in Italy. The pamphlet draws very heavily, albeit without any acknowledgment of its debt, on Francesco Gusta’s 1794 Saggio critico sulle cruciate,...
£450
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[FULIGNATI, Giuntino (pseud.
for Tommaso BUONI?)]. Della famosissima compagnia della lesina. Dialogo, capitoli, e ragionamenti....
Vicenza, Giorgio Greco, 1601.
Scarce humorous dystopia of indigence, first edition thus: the first to include a section specifically directed at women. Styled as the statutes and histories of a fictitious society, the ‘Company of Stinginess’, founded to promote thrift in an age of economic depression and scarcity, made its debut...
£800
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GALIER, W.H.
A visit to Blestland.
London, George Robertson & co., 1896.
First edition of this novel of utopian socialism which lambasts capitalism and religion. Blestland is a republican workers’ paradise located on a different planet which reveals how the divisions of earth can be abolished: by limiting ‘the enormous power for evil which capital can wield’....
£280
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GALLICO, Paul.
An archive of thirty-four scrapbooks compiled by Gallico.
1928–1972.
A lovingly and meticulously compiled archive of the writing career of the novelist Paul Gallico. The scrapbooks are arranged chronologically and by book/film with letters, telegrams, publicity materials, photographs and ephemera neatly intermingled with copies of reviews and reactions from local,...
£5500
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GARDINER, John Smallman.
The Art and the Pleasures of Hare-Hunting. In six Letters to a Person of Quality …
London: Printed by R. Griffith … 1750.
First edition, scarce, an eloquent and amusing account of hare-hunting, the first monograph on the subject in English, comprising letters on the superiority of hare-hunting to fox-hunting (less dangerous, less laborious), on the best types of dogs, of trailing and starting hares, etc. Gardiner’s letter...
£1250
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GAY, John, and Gordon ROSS (illustrator).
Rural Sports, together with the Birth of the Squire and the Hound and the...
New York, William Edwin Rudge, 1930.
Limited edition, numbered 94 of 200 copies for sale, signed by the artist. A handsome edition with hand-coloured illustrations by the sporting watercolourist Gordon Ross (1873–1946).
£160
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GEE, Joshua.
The trade and navigation of Great-Britain considered: shewing that the surest way for a nation to increase in riches,...
London, A. Bettesworth, C. Hitch … and S. Birt, 1738.
Fourth edition of Gee’s most important work, first published in 1729. Written at a time of declining exports, decaying agriculture and high unemployment Trade and navigation discusses foreign trade with strong protectionist tendencies. Gee is keen to improve trade with the North American colonies,...
£450
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[GELENIUS, Sigismund (editor).]
Notitia utraque, dignitatum, cum orientis, tum occidentis, ultra arcadii honoriique tempora,...
Lyons, [Jacques du Creux for] Jean de Gabiano, 1608.
An expanded edition, illustrated on almost every leaf, of an anonymous fifth-century description of the Roman Empire.
£875
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GONZALES DE MENDOZA, Juan.
The Historie of the Great and Mighty Kingdome of China, and the Situation thereof: together with the...
London, Printed by J. Wolfe for Edward White, 1588[/9].
First edition in English, rare, of the first significant European study of China, ‘one of the outstanding “best-sellers” of the sixteenth century’ (Boxer). A publication of enormous influence on Elizabethan conceptions of China, it also contained much information on the Spanish Americas. ...
£50000
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[GREAT BRITAIN: PARLIAMENT].
[Drop-head title:] ‘An act for repealing the several duties of customs and excise, and granting...
London, Charles Eyre and Andrew Strahan, 1787.
Rare first edition of the consolidation act that revolutionised British handling of customs and excise and the problem of smuggling, in line with Adam Smith’s 1776 recommendations.
£2750
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GRIFFIS, William Elliot.
Corea the Hermit Nation.
London: W.H. Allen & Co., 1882.
First British edition. The American orientalist, minister and writer Griffis (1843-1928) was educated at Rutgers University and travelled to Japan in 1870, in the early years of the Meiji period, when Japan was beginning to engage with the West. After four years teaching in Japan, Griffis returned to...
£350