[Color Plate] Tour of The Grand Junction, illustrated in a series of engravings; with an Historical and Topographical Description of those parts of the counties of Middlesex, Hertfordshire, Buckinghamshire, Bedfordshire and Northhamptonshire, through which the canal passes

London: Printed for J Hassell, 27, Richard Street, Islington; and sold by all book sellers, 1819. Full Leather. Very Good +. First Edition of this work issued as a celebration of the newly completed Grand Union Canal. 8vo: viii,147,[5] pp, with hand-colored frontispiece and 23 full-page hand-colored plates "of great topographical interest" (Hardie; according to Abbey, some copies were issued uncolored). Full period black straight-grain morocco, spine elaborately tooled gilt in six compartments, boards tooled in blind and gilt, turn-ins gilt, all edges gilt. A Very Good or better copy, the plates clean and bright, with sporadic, mostly marginal (occasionally heavy) foxing to text. Provenance: book plate to front paste-down of Howard Calhoun Davidson (1890-1984), U. S. Air Force Major General and veteran of both World Wars. Abbey (Scenery) 30. Tooley 252. Martin Hardie, pp. 140-141. Prideaux, p. 272. The Grand Junction Canal's 93 miles of waterway, from Braunston in Northhamptonshire to the River Thames at Brentford, was designed to facilitate water transport to London as an alternative to the uncertain Thames. By 1790, an extensive network of canals was in place in the Midlands, but the only route to London was via the Oxford Canal to the Thames, then down the river to the capital. The River Thames, particularly its upper reaches, suffered from shallow sections and shortages of water leading to delays at locks. The mainline (there were numerous branches) of the Grand Junction Canal, built between 1793 and 1805, by-passed the upper Thames and shortened the journey to London. Hassell, a watercolorist and engraver, first appeared as an exhibitor at the Royal Academy in 1789, with a "View of Stonehenge on Salisbury Plain." Note: With few exceptions (always identified), we only stock books in exceptional condition. All orders are packaged with care and posted promptly. Satisfaction guaranteed.