French Circumnavigation
Voyage autour du Monde pendant les Années 1790, 1791, et 1792 … précédé d’une introduction historique; auquel on à joint des Recherches sur les Terres Australes de Drake, et un examen critique du Voyage de Roggeween: Par C.P. Claret Fleurieu.
Paris: de L'Imprimerie de la République, an VI - an VIII [1798-1800].
First edition, octavo issue (Atlas volume is vol. IV of the quarto issue). With folding tables, 16 folding maps in atlas volume. [4], viii, cci, 294; vii, 529; viii, 474; viii, 494; vii, 559; viii, 158 pp. 6 vols. 8vo (Atlas 4to). French Circumnavigation. Half green morocco and marbled boards, spines gilt, t.e.g. by E. Hering & Muller (signed at foot of spine of vol. I). Overall about very good, some traces of wear to extremities, front joint of vol. I tender, vols. IV & V with traces of damp to some pages, repair to lower board of vol. V. Atlas volume in recent quarter green morocco, preserving bookplate of William Beebe Sabin 24751 & 44491; Hill 612; Howgego M 43; Lada-Mocarski 54; O'Reilly & Reitman, Tahiti, 618 OCLC: 43229498. Item #264605
Substantial account of the 1790-1792 circumnavigation by French creole Etienne Marchand (1755-1793), who sailed from Marseilles in the Solide, round Cape Horn to make landfall in the Marquesas, which he explored and claimed for France. The Solide bought furs from Indians on the north American coast in the vicinity of the Queen Charlotte Islands, crossed the Pacific via the Sandwich Islands and the Marianas, and reached Macao. Machand headed for the Île de France (Mauritius), where he had previously arranged to draw money, which proved to be unavailable following the fall of the French monarchy. He returned to a France in the throes of revolutionary tumult; Marchand dies in 1793 and Charles Claret, comte de Fleuriel, another member of the Solide party, edited the material from this “pioneering commercial expedition.” Howgego also notes, “Unfortunately, [Marchand’s] voyage coincide with changes in the régime in France, with the result that this contributions to French imperialism were largely ignored.”
This is the octavo issue of the publication; the atlas is in quarto format (also published as vol. IV of the quarto issue, as in the present copy).
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