A Narrative of Voyages and Travels, in the Northern and Southern Hemispheres: Comprising Three Voyages Round the World; Together together with a voyage of survey and discovery, in the Pacific Ocean and oriental islands.
Boston: Printed by E G House for the Author, 1817.
Price: $1,500.00
About the item
First edition. Portrait frontispiece of Delano and 2 plates (portrait of Abba Thulle; folding map of "Pitcairns Island". 598, [1] pp. 1 vols. 8vo. Contemporary calf. Ownership signature of "Jospeh Spear, Georges Island, Boston Harbour 1819" on lower flyleaf. Binding broken, stained, etc. In brown cloth drop box. Ferguson 672; Howes D-233; Sabin 19349; Shaw & Shoemaker 40635; Forbes 463; New Hill 463.
Item #217696
"An account by an American of his three voyages to various parts of the Pacific between 1790 and 1807. He called at Van Diemen's Land and engaged in sealing in Bass Strait, of which he gives a description (pp 427-72)." Ferguson
The author made three important Pacific Voyages: the first (1790-1792) to Canton on the ship Massachusetts; the second (1799-1802) on the Perseverance and the Pilgrim. He made stops at the Hawaiian Islands on two of these voyages. The narrative is of great importance for its text (pp. 111-151) concerning Bligh and the Bounty and Pitcairn Island, part of which appears nowhr=ere else. An early map of Pitcairn Island is included." Forbes
"This narrative may have been written in collaboration with Horace Holley, who was probabaly the author of the appended biographical sketch of Delano, described as 'written by a friend' (p. 577-598)" Hill.
The sourcebook for Herman Melville's Benito Cereno.
