FRANCOIS LE VAILLANT - FIRST EDITION 1790 OF HIS FIRST IN SOUTH AFRICA

 "Voyage de Mr. Le Vaillant dans l'Interieur de l'Afrique par Le Cap De Bonne-Esperance, dans les Annees 1780, 81, 82, 83, 84, & 85."  Mr. Le Vaillant's Travels to the interior of South Africa from the Cape of Good Hope, in the years 1780 - 85. First edition of Le Vaillant's famous work, published at Liege in 1790 by the printers of Le Journal General de L'Europe. The two volumes are complete with all twelve plates and fold-out plates present. Volume I, 341pp. Volume II 359pp. The two books are in excellent condition with clean, fresh pages, no inscriptions and no tears. The text is clean and the text block is square. There are only two defects on these two copies: a). the missing leather backstrips on the spine which can easily and esthetically be replaced by a skilled bookbinder, and b). a former owner's bookplates have been removed, but this can be replaced with a new bookplate. This copy contains what is known amongst collectors as the "suppressed plate". Mendelssohn describes it as follows: 'Among the plates in these volumes is that of "A Hottentot Woman," showing the peculiar conformation sometimes found in females of this race. This plate was afterwards suppressed, and in other editions it has been replaced by an illustration entitled "A dangerous attack of a Tiger." Another source states that this plate is "sometimes found painted over or with an apron of fur and beads added," the plate in this copy, however, has escaped 18th century censure (see below). During a visit to one of the isolated Hottentot tribes in the far interior of the country Le Vaillant's keen ornithologist's eye noticed a young Gonaqua girl and he spends a considerable part of the second volume rhapsodizing about her elegance and beauty. He describes in detail their fascination - infatuation, even - with each other, yet frequently feels compelled to mention to his european readers that their flirtations were "entirely innocent". On one occasion he asked her what her name was and upon hearing it decided that it was decidedly unpronounceable. Consequently he renamed her "Narina", which was the Hottentot word for flower. Although the 18th century copperplate engraving of Narina is rather crudely executed, her elegance and beauty is still quite apparent (see below). An interesting hunt of the now extinct Cape Blue Buck is described in the early part of the first volume. This happened just past the Botrivier (Hermanus district) and Le Vaillant made a sketch of the beast on the spot, noting that it is the most beautiful antelope species he had ever seen. His sketch of the animal is one of the few examples drawn from life that have remained. He would of course not have known what the ultimate fate of this antelope species would be, and the modern reader can find it a bit frustrating how he describes in detail the habits of animals that are still common today - his preoccupation with Giraffes being but one example - but only gives a cursory comment about animals that have long since disappeared, like the Quagga, the Cape Lion and the Blue Buck. levaillant