WILLIAM ELLIS: THREE VISITS TO MADAGASCAR, DURING THE YEARS IN SOUTH AFRICA

About the product First American edition: The British first edition was published by John Murray in the preceding year. 8vo; original brown pebbled cloth, ornately blocked in blind to boards, and lettered in gilt on spine; pp. 426 + publisher's catalogue; folding frontis.; folding map; numerous plates and illustrations in text. Cover very worn and bumped; binding shaken; bottom fore-corner torn from front free endpaper; moderate foxing throughout; trace of damp-stain to gutters, becoming more extensive in the rear endpaper, appendix and final leaves. (Tenri Africana 2045; Mendelssohn I, p. 518) Pioneering account of all aspects of life in Madagascar at the time, detailing particularly the efforts of Ellis to establish a mission on behalf of the London Missionary Society. The ethnographical and natural history plates are a special feature, and the author's love of gardening is evident in the attention paid to the island's botany. William Ellis: Three Visits to Madagascar, during the Years 1853-1854-1856. Including A Journey to the Capital; with Notices of the Natural History of the Country and of the Present Civilization of the People