Crozet's Voyage to Tasmania, New Zealand, the Ladrone Islands, and the Philippines in the Years 1771-1772
London: Truslove & Shirley, 1891.
First Edition. Hardcover. Very good. Octavo, 148 pp, with eight photogravure plates, folding plan of outrigger canoe, folding chart, and other illustrations. Number 291 of 500 copies issued. Spine lean, rubbed and bumped corners, old tape repair to verso of chart, otherwise clean and sound. First English translation of Crozet's account of the South Pacific voyage of Marion du Fresne (with Crozet as second captain), which had two objectives: to return a Tahitian native who had been taken to France by Bougainville in 1769, and to seek the great southern continent," Terra Australis," which the French hoped to use as a base on the route to India and a strategic position to cut off British shipping lanes in wartime. The expedition discovered the Crozet islands (in the southern Indian Ocean) and visited Tasmania. Hill (401, 402): "Reaching New Zealand, a party put ashore in the Bay of Natives, where Marion du Fresne and twenty-one of his men were massacred [by the Maori]. Crozet became captain and they sailed homeward via Guam, the Philippines, and Mauritius. An excellent description of New Zealand, its products, its natives, and their customs is given. An extract from Jean de Surville's earlier voyage to New Zealand is added to this account."
Item #19168
Price: $300.00