Beschreibung:

Title: Voyage of Discovery in the South Sea, and to Behring's Straits, in search of a North-east Passage; Undertaken in the Years 1815, 16, 17, and 18, in the Ship Rurick Author: Kotzebue, Otto von Place: London Publisher: Richard Phillips Date: 1821 Description: 2 parts in 1. [2], 110, [2], [111]-220 pp. With 19 plates, including 5 folding copper-engraved charts & 15 engraved or aquatint views, 4 of them folding and 4 hand-colored. (8vo) 8½x5, modern half calf & marbled boards, spine ruled & lettered in gilt. Abridged version of the English edition of Kotzebue's Voyage, published the same year, and notable for containing additional plates. This was the second Russian expedition into the Pacific for scientific exploration, sponsored by Count Romanzof, commanded by Kotzebue (who had sailed with Kruzenshtern in 1803-6), and including the famous artist Ludwig Choris. After rounding Cape Horn and visiting Chile, Easter Island and the Marshall Islands, Kotzebue explored the North American coast and Hawaii and searched unsuccessfully for a passage to the Arctic Ocean. Hill remarks that "the description of the northwest coast of America is a most important contribution. Graff calls the expedition "one of the great early nineteenth-century voyages of discovery." The Zamorano Eighty notes that "Kotzebue was in San Francisco about the month of October, 1816. He, like La Pérouse, was critical of the condition of the mission Indian. He mentioned the Russian sailors who were taken prisoners for landing on the coast without permission." The first English edition contained 16 maps and plates, and the first issue of the present edition 12. As Forbes notes, "The second state or issue has an increased number of plates..., and those relating to Hawaii are six in number. This later issue is preferrable as it contains plates adapted from those in Choris, Voyage Pittoresque (Paris, 1822), then in the process of publication, that do not appear in any other edition of the Kotzebue narrative..." Forbes 529; Hill 945; Howes K258; Sabin 38292. Lot Amendments Condition: Charts with a bit of foxing, some offset from them and from the plates to the text; near fine. Item number: 192276