Travel
Contact Jonathan Harrison, Alex Day or Andrea Mazzocchi
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.-
KOTZEBUE, Otto von.
A voyage of discovery into the South Sea and Beering’s Straits, for the purpose of exploring a north-east...
London, Longman, Hurst, Rees, Orme, and Brown, 1821.
First edition in English, translated from the German edition of the same year, of Kotzebue’s classic voyage; ‘a prized edition’ (Hill).
£3000
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LAET, Joannes de, editor.
De imperio Magni Mogolis sive India vera commentarius e variis auctoribus congestus …
Leiden, ‘ex officina Elzeviriana’, 1631.
Pocket-sized Elzevir edition (one of two issued in the same year) of this work on India and the Mughal Empire compiled by the Dutch geographer Joannes de Laet (1581–1649), this copy, exceptionally, in its original drab boards.
£950
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LAWRENCE, Thomas Edward.
The Mint. A Day-Book of the R.A.F. Depot between August and December 1922 with Later Notes, by 352087...
London: The Alden Press for Jonathan Cape, 1955.
First British edition, the trade issue. 'One of Lawrence’s avowed purposes in joining the RAF, though not the only one, was to write of the ranks from the inside. He began immediately making notes when he enlisted in 1922. With his dismissal in January 1923, because of unfavourable publicity,...
£120
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LEE, Edwin.
The Principal Baths of Germany [– The Baths of Nassau Baden and the adjacent Districts; – The Baths of central...
London, Whittaker & Cp., Paris, Galignani & Cp., and Frankfurt & Wiesbaden, Charles Jugel 1840 [– 1841].
First edition, scarce, of Edwin Lee’s two-volume survey of palliative bathing spots in Germany, including an appendix on the ‘Cold Water Cure’, a combination of induced sweating and cold-water therapy ‘of late very much in vogue’ (appendix).
£350
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LELAND, John.
The Itinerary of John Leland, in or about the Years 1535-1543. Edited by Lucy Toulmin Smith, with a Foreword by Thomas...
London, Centaur Press Ltd, 1964.
The authoritative edition of Leland’s Itinerary, a monument of English bibliography and antiquarian research. The Itinerary comprises the notes of the antiquary John Leland (c. 1503–1552) on his journeys through England and Wales during the dissolution of the monasteries. According...
£50
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[LE MERCIER DE LA RIVIÈRE, Pierre Paul].
Die glückliche Nation, oder der Staat von Felizien. Ein Muster der vollkommensten Freyheit...
Leipzig, Voss, 1794.
Very rare first German edition of Le Mercier de la Rivière’s physiocratic utopia L’heureuse nation, ou Relation du gouvernement des Féliciens, which had first appeared in French in 1792.
£1250
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LÉVI-STRAUSS, Claude.
The Tupí-Cawahíb.
Washington, United States Government Printing Office, 1948.
A set of offprints of four articles by Lévi-Strauss from the Smithsonian’s Handbook of South American Indians, inscribed by the author. In each article Claude Lévy-Strauss (1908–2009) provides an illustrated introduction to an Amazonian group, recording their history, social and political...
£300
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LEWIS, Wyndham.
Filibusters in Barbary (Record of a Visit to the Sous).
London, Grayson & Grayson, [1932].
First edition, scarce in the dust-jacket, ‘an account of his travels which Lewis had written after a holiday with his wife in French Morocco and the Spanish Sahara. The book … emerged as one of the liveliest travel-books of the time. Like all of Lewis’s writing, it was quirky and opinionated,...
£500
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LIVINGSTONE, David.
Explorations dans l’intérieur de l’Afrique Australe et voyages à travers le continent de Saint-Paul de...
Paris: Imprimerie de Ch. Lahure et Cie for Librairie de L. Hachette et Cie, 1859.
First appearance in French of Livingstone’s Missionary Travels and Researches in Southern Africa (1857), describing his early years in the region and the first of his three great expeditions across the continent: ‘Livingstone’s services to African geography during thirty years are almost...
£250
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LIVINGSTONE, David.
Missionary Travels and Researches in South Africa; including a Sketch of sixteen Years’ Residence in the...
London, John Murray, 1857.
First edition. ‘Livingstone’s services to African geography during thirty years are almost unequalled; he covered about a third of the continent from the Cape to the Equator and from the Atlantic to the Indian Ocean. He made three great expeditions; in 1853-6 (described in this book),...
£500
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[LOQUET, Marie-Françoise].
Voyage de Sophie et d’Eulalie, au Palais du vrai bonheur; ouvrage pour servir de guide dans les voies...
Paris, Charles-Pierre Berton, 1781.
First edition of this rare utopian voyage to the Palace of True Happiness, written by a woman for a readership of women, our copy with the eighteenth-century ownership inscription of a female reader.
£1500
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[MAISTRE, Xavier de.]
Voyage autour de ma chambre par M. le Chev. X*** *** O. A. S. D. S. M. S. [Officier au service de Sa Majesté...
Turin, 1794 [Lausanne, Isaac Hignou, 1795].
First edition, rare, of the celebrated fantasy novel Voyage around my Room, a parody of the grand travel narrative tradition, written by Xavier de Maistre (1763–1852), a Savoyard officer in the army of the Kingdom of Piedmont–Sardinia, during the forty-two days he spent in solitary confinement...
£2800
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[MAP.]
Henan quansheng yutu 河南全省輿圖 [‘Map of the whole province of Henan’].
[China, c. 1835.]
Extremely rare map of the province of Henan, produced in China. We have been unable to trace this map in the Library of Congress.
£1800
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[MAP.]
Karte von Ost-China. Hankau.
[Berlin,] Kartographische Abtheilung der Köngl. Preuss. Landes-Aufnahme, 1904.
A map from the Royal Prussian Land Survey’s renowned 1:1,000,000 series, which was published between 1901 and 1912.
£550
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[MAPS.]
‘Carte du Vicariat Apost. de Péking & Tche-ly Nord’.
[China], 1896.
Two handsome maps providing a snapshot of the region around modern Beijing and the Bohai Sea encompassed within the Vicariate Apostolic of Northern Chi-Li and the Vicariate Apostolic of Southwestern Chi-Li in 1896, showing towns, missionary residences, roads, railways, rivers and lakes, and part...
£1800
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McWILLIAM, James Ormiston.
Medical History of the Expedition to the Niger during the Years 1841-2. Comprising an Account of the...
London: C. Adlard for John Churchill, 1843.
First edition. A classic treatise on the Niger region and the yellow fever written by the Scottish doctor James Ormiston McWilliam, the hero of a government expedition exploring the region and its commercial opportunities, and explicitly aimed at suppressing the slave trade. When the yellow fever...
£600
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MENDES PINTO, Fernão.
The Voyages and Adventures of Fernand Mendez Pinto, a Portugal: during his travels for the space of one...
London, Printed by J. Macock, for Henry Cripps, and Lodowick Lloyd … 1653.
First edition in English, translated by Henry Cogan, of a travel best-seller, first published posthumously in 1614; there were nineteen editions in six languages by the end of the century, ‘rivalling the popularity of Cervantes’ Don Quixote. It is, in fact, an exotic and imaginative...
£6500
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MENNIE, Donald.
Glimpses of China. A Series of Vandyck photogravures illustrating Chinese life and surroundings. Shanghai, A. S.
Watson & Co. Ltd, [1920?].
First edition, scarce, with thirty images taken across China. Some of the captions are descriptive, but others, in keeping with the pictorialist aspects of Mennie’s photographic practice, are poetic – “Where peace and calm contentment dwell serene”, “Some dim pavilion where my lady dreams”...
£1200
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[MISSIONARIES.]
Shopping list of Christian texts, signed ‘Joseph Ly’. [with:] Receipt issued by a financial office (Shou Shan...
[China, c. 1850.]
A shopping list of Chinese Christian texts ordered by the Catholic vicar general of Canton. The works include two sets of the Shengjing zhijie 聖經直解, a translation of Gospel readings from the Mass by Manuel Dias the Younger (1574–1659); thirty sets of the Rike cuoyao 日課撮要,...
£1500
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M’LEOD, John.
Voyage of His Majesty’s Ship Alceste, along the coast of Corea, to the Island of Lewchew; with an account of...
London, John Murray, 1818.
Second edition (first 1817), with five handsome aquatints, of this account of the voyage of the Alceste to China with Lord Amherst’s embassy, by the ship’s surgeon M’Leod.
£275