There is little doubt that those collectors who have devoted their energies during the past twenty-five years to the collecting of books on Africa, especially the South, will prove at no very distant date to have been wise in their purchases. Just as early Americana are so eagerly bought by our neighbours across the Atlantic at immense prices, far and away out of all proportion to their intrinsic worth as literature or history, so will the day come when those of our kin whose fathers sought a home in the 'great dark continent' will go to any length to procure works which deal with the early history of that newer world; and this will be the case, perhaps even sooner, with our Australasian friends.
The early books on Australia are most interesting. Besides Governor Phillip's 'Voyage to Botany Bay' (1789) and his Letters therefrom (1791) there are such compilations as John Callander's version of the Comte de Tournay's 'Terra Australis Cognita,' or Voyages to the Southern Hemisphere during the Sixteenth, Seventeenth, and Eighteenth Centuries, three octavo volumes published at Edinburgh between 1766 and 1768. Then there is Admiral Hunter's 'Historical Journal of the Transactions at Port Jackson and Norfolk Island' (1793).[75] Hunter sailed with the first fleet in 1787 under Arthur Phillip, the first governor of Botany Bay, as second in command of H.M.S. Sirius, and afterwards became governor-general of New South Wales in succession to Phillip. His journal gives a very valuable account of the early days of the Colony. Barrington's, Mitchell's, and Sturt's handsome volumes, all with fine plates, are still to be had for shillings. They seem a very good investment.
Books on the South Seas have a peculiar interest, for the subject at once conjures up the name of the immortal Captain Cook; and the accounts of his remarkable voyages between 1768 and 1779 are perhaps the most eagerly sought for of all books on Polynesia. The first voyage of discovery in which the great explorer took part was in the years 1768 to 1771. His ship, the Endeavour, was accompanied in the first part of the voyage by the Dolphin and Swallow; and an account of the Endeavour's voyage was published surreptitiously in 1771 by, it is said, certain of the petty officers of Cook's vessel.[76] But the compilation of an authentic account of the voyage, from the rough notes and diaries, was entrusted to Dr. Hawkesworth, and was published in 1773 in three quarto volumes. From this task Hawkesworth gleaned £6000, and although we are told that the book 'was read with an avidity proportioned to the novelty of the adventures which it recorded,' yet the compiler so far offended against the canons of good taste as to cause considerable offence. Cook gained such credit for his intrepidity that he was promptly promoted from lieutenant to commander.
A second expedition was soon planned, and in 1772 the Resolution and the Adventure set sail, the former returning to England in 1775. The results of this voyage were drawn up by Captain Cook himself, and published in 1777 in two quarto volumes. In 1776 he sailed once more in the Resolution, but was destined never to return, for on St. Valentine's Day, 1779, he met his death at the hands of the natives of Hawaii. The expedition returned the next year, and the official account of it was published in 1784, in three quarto volumes, of which the first two were from the pen of Cook, the third volume being written by James King. The following year a second edition appeared, also in three quarto volumes. All these works have maps, charts, and folding plates, which are sometimes bound up separately into folio volumes. A few of these somewhat crude plates were engraved by Bartolozzi. Admiral James Burney's 'Chronological History of Voyages and Discoveries in the South Sea,' was published in five quarto volumes between 1803 and 1817. The author was one of Cook's officers, and the diary of the last voyage which he sailed in company with the great navigator is still (1921) in manuscript. His account of the death of Captain Cook, however, was published in the 'Cornhill Magazine' so lately as November 1914.
During the first half of the nineteenth century many handsome works upon these subjects issued from the press. For the most part they are sumptuous books, many of them having coloured plates and sometimes folding ones. They were published chiefly for subscribers at prices ranging from two guineas to fifteen; and during the last few years they have risen considerably in price. Until the decline of the coloured engraving in the 'fifties of last century they were legion in number, both quartos and octavos, and many are still to be had for a few shillings. But a study of booksellers' catalogues alone will give you an idea of their prices and values. Needless to say, works upon voyages, travels, and explorations issued in the seventeenth and eighteenth centuries are becoming increasingly scarce and valuable.
Here a word of warning. Before you purchase any of these illustrated volumes, make sure (by referring to a bibliography or standard collation if possible) that it is intact. Frequently a plate or a map is missing, and sometimes an unscrupulous seller will go so far as to remove the 'list of plates' in order that the blemish may remain undetected. With such defects, books of travel are generally of little worth.
Some of the byways included in these headings of Travel and Foreign Countries are of considerable interest for the bibliographer no less than for the traveller. Who has confined his attentions to the early Saracenic literature of North Africa? There is a number of works dealing with it, chiefly sixteenth-century Spanish books, and all are of considerable value. Luis del Marmol's 'Descripcion general del Affrica' is in three folio volumes, of which the first two were printed at Granada in 1573, the third volume being dated at Malaga, 1599. But though Marmol affixed his own name to it, the work is little more than a translation of the 'Description of Africa,' by Leo Africanus, a fellow-countryman of Marmol, who composed his work in Arabic. Marmol was certainly well qualified for his task, for he was taken prisoner by the Moors in 1546, and was eight years in captivity in Africa. Curio's 'Sarracenicae Historiae' was first published in folio at Basel in 1567; but it was English'd by T. Newton in 1575, quarto, black letter, London—if you are so lucky as to come across it. It is called 'A Notable Historie of the Saracens.' Dan's 'Histoire de la Barbarie,' folio, Paris, 1649, appears in the sale-room from time to time.
Americana.
3. Americana—what a vast subject in itself! Its very definition signifies the inclusion of everything upon any subject whatsoever that has ever been written upon the Americas! But in the bibliographer's reading this term is generally taken to imply those early works relating to the discovery and settlement of the United States and Canada, though not necessarily in the English language. For the purposes of our list, however, we will confine its meaning solely to the United States; classifying books upon Canada, Alaska, and Mexico under the heading Travels and Exploration. Under the latter heading also, of course, will come the various countries of Central and South America.
Many have been the collections upon the early history of New England, and you will do well to obtain the catalogues of the Huth, Church, Auchinleck, Winsor, Livingston, Grenville, and Hoe collections. The famous collection of Americana from the library at Britwell Court was to have been sold by auction at Sotheby's in August 1916; but it was purchased en bloc to go to New York, where it was dispersed by public auction the following January. The sale catalogue (Sotheby's) is an extremely good one, and contains a large number of works previously undescribed. The well-known library of Americana amassed by Dr. White Kennet, bishop of Peterborough during the latter part of the seventeenth century, and entrusted by him in 1712 to the keeping of the Society for the Propagation of the Gospel 'for their perpetual use,' was sold by order of that Society at Sotheby's in August 1917 and realised very high prices, though most of the items were in poor condition. The gem of the collection, 'New England Canaan,' 1632, and most of the other important volumes (seventy-nine in all) had been presented previously by the Society to the British Museum. The highest price realised was £650, which was paid for 'A True Relation of the late Battell fought in New England between the English and the Salvages,' 1637, a small quarto of sixteen leaves, said to be by the Rev. Philip Vincent.[77]
