| Antoine Jean De. Laval — Voyage De La Louisiane |
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Voyage De La Louisiane |
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Three parts in one volume. 4to, (10 ½ x 8 inches). 16 engraved maps and plans (4 folding), 4 engraved diagrams, and 11 printed folding tables, woodcut initials and head-pieces. Contemporary sprinkled calf, spine gilt decorated in six compartments with five raised bands, gilt-lettered in one (skillfully rebacked preserving all but the head and tailcaps of the original spine). Provenance: 19th-century bookplate of Viscount Barrington. First edition. Although Sabin describes this work as "a valuable and scientific book of travels, which enters very fully into the Physical Geography, &c., of the French Dominions in Louisiana and the Valley of the Mississippi", actually the only part of this vast area seen by Laval was Isle Dauphine at the mouth of Mobile Bay where he spent most of the month of July, 1729. He does give an account by a participant of the capture of Pensacola the previous year by the French, and its recapture a few weeks later by the Spaniards. Two of the maps are of considerable interest: The folding map of Pensacola and its harbor, and the folding map of the Gulf Coast from west of the mouths of the Mississippi to Riviere de S. Martin in Florida. Howes L142; Sabin 39276; Streeter II:1178. Purchased at Christie's 18th November 1983, lot 169. |
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