Journals of Australian Explorations
Brisbane, James C. Beal, Government Printer, 1884 (presentation issue).
Octavo, [iv], 210 pages plus 6 albumen silver photographs mounted on additional leaves.
Original half roan and marbled papered boards, spine with black morocco title-label lettered and tooled in gilt; covers sunned about the spine and a little worn; front joint cracking (but firm); mounts for the photographs a little cockled (as usual); outer leaves slightly tanned at the edges (from the turn-ins); a few other minor signs of age and handling; a very good copy, internally near-fine.
The superior presentation issue, inscribed to 'W.B.T. Andrews Esq. | From the Authors' and illustrated with six photographs, the first signed by A.C. Gregory. The presentation issue, bound by the Queensland Government Printer's bindery, can be found in several variants with more or fewer photographs. This example contains the full complement of six albumen prints, and collates identically to Wantrup's 'Copy A', signed by Gregory on the frontispiece, and with the other photographs comprising portraits (titled in another hand) of Francis Thomas Gregory, H.C. Gregory, C.F. Gregory, and Thomas Baines (the expedition's artist), and 'The gouty-stem tree, near the "dome" on the River Victoria, N.W. Australia' (reproducing an engraving after one of Baines' sketches). The copy described thus by Wantrup was sold by Sotheby's Australia in Melbourne in August 1989; in the 2023 revised edition of his 'Australian Rare Books' he states that the 'Sotheby's copy so far appears to be unique'. The first complete account of the important expeditions undertaken by the Gregory brothers across Western, Northern, and Central Australia, including the search for Ludwig Leichhardt. The recipient of this copy was Walter Boyd Tate Andrews (1823-1899), sometime Registrar General of South Australia. Wantrup 190b (for the presentation issue); Holden 46.
Item #144648
Sold