| Louis Armand, Baron de Lahonton — New Voyages to North America |
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New Voyages to North America |
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2 volumes, 8vo., (7 6/8 x 5 6/8 inches). Engraved frontispiece in each volume and one folding engraved map and 3 folding plates, 11 engraved plates (lacking 3 plates); extra-illustrated with 12 folding engraved plates of the Mediterranean and ships by "Toms" (?William Henry Toms), woodcut tailpieces (light spotting throughout, one map with slight creasing and short tears at edges, plate illustrating Beavers bound in two separate halves, one plate with short tear, H5 and Bb8 with short tears touching text). Contemporary mottled calf gilt, boards with gilt double-fillet borders, spines gilt in compartments, gilt calf lettering-pieces in two, red-speckled edges (extremities a little rubbed and chipped, cracking on spines causing superficial losses, skilfully rebacked, retaining original spines). Provenance: The 18th-century bookplates of Sir Edward Blackett, 3rd Bart, Captain R.N. (d.1756), and inscriptions on the front paste-downs. Second English edition, first published in English in 1703. Both Howes and Sabin call for 20 plates (despite the title-page's erroneous statement that the work is illustrated with 'Twenty-Three Maps and Cuts'). Lahontan came to New France in 1683 as captain of a regiment which he led in expeditions against the Iroquois: "Between the fifteenth and sixteenth year of my Age I went to Canada, and there took care to keep up a constant Correspondence by Letters with an old Relation Tis these very letters that make the greatest part of the first Volum. They contain an account of all that pass'd between the English, the Frebch, the Iroquese, and the other Savage Nations, from the year 1683 to 1694" (Lahontan "Preface"). Lahontan west in 1687 with Duluth and was given command of Fort St. Joseph on the St. Clair River. In 1688 he travelled further west by the Fox-Wisconsin portage and reached the upper Mississippi. In all Lahontan spent twenty years in the colony fighting the Iroquois and his work is considered "one of the best early works on the subject" (Streeter Sale). Howes 25; Sabin 38645. Purchased at Christie's 23 September 2004, lot 121. |
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