La República Mexicana, Territorio de la Baja California: Reseña Geográfica y Estadística
Paris and Mexico: Librería de la Vda. de C. Bouret, 1912.
Softcover. Good. 10" x 13", [4], 40 pp., with colored folding map, 6 maps in text, and many illustrations from photographs. Wrappers have considerable chipping to the edges, first few pages show wear at fore edge, internals clean, with some general handling wear. A good copy of this detailed and well illustrated survey of the geography, climate, and natural resources of Baja California in the early twentieth century. Léon Diguet (1859-1926) was a French naturalist, ethnographer, explorer, and chemical engineer who first went to Mexico in 1889 in the employ of a French-owned copper mining company operating in Santa Rosalia, Baja California Sur. During three years in that position, he took the opprortunity to explore the peninsula's interior, collecting specimens for the National Museum of Natural History in Paris. Between 1893 and 1913, he made six more trips to Mexico--inckuding two to Baja California--for purposes of botanical, archaeological, and ethnographic exploration and study. This book is part of a series that included geographical and statistical information on several Mexican states, including Coahuila, Chihuahua, Sonora, Chiapas, and Veracruz. A contemporary review of four works from the series called them "a praiseworthy compilation of geographic interest" and reserved special praise for this volume: "The brochure on the peninsula of Lower California is the best of the four and is illustrated by photographs that quite surpass any ofther collection yet published on this region. They tell a story in themselves. The hachure sketches of Magdalena Bay and other natural harbors are among the best to be had" (Geographical Review,Vol. 6, 1918).
Item #22245
Price: $150.00