The Oregon Trail : Sketches of Prairie and Rocky Mountain Life [Review Copy] by PARKMAN, Francis (1823-1893) - 1872

Boston: Little, Brown [from 1849], 1872. Early Printing. Pictorial Cloth. Fine. Fourth Edition, Revised, of Parkman's classic account of a summer tour, in 1846, of Nebraska, Wyoming, Colorado, and Kansas, "with a view of studying the manners and character of Indians in their primitive state." 8vo (208 x 132mm): xii,381 Original green cloth, spine lettered in gilt, upper cover with gilt vignette of Sioux warrior, brown coated end papers. Blind stamp "With the Publishers Compliments" on title page. Pages marginally toned, else a superlative copy, square and tight with bright gilt. Grolier (American) 100, 58 ("one of the exuberant masterpieces of American literature" and the "classic account of the emigrant journey to the Rockies"). PMM 327. Howes P 97. Sabin 58801. Wagner-Camp 170. BAL 15461. Streeter III, 1814-16 (for first editions). Field 1177 ("It is not too high praise of his work to say, that his pictures of savage life are not excelled by the narratives which had their birth in the personal experiences of Washington Irving, or the imagination of Fenimore Cooper."). Holliday 853. Larned 2062 ("one of the classics of western narratives. . . . No other book on the West has enjoyed equal popularity."). Hubach, p. 100 ("No other book contains a more graphic presentation of the panorama of Western migration during this period"). Originally serialized in twenty-one installments in Knickerbocker's Magazine (1847-49), Parkman's account is "one part history and two parts travel narrative and adventure story. . . . There are many and better accounts of life among the settlers of the West; but Parkman has given us a unique picture of life in a Sioux village before it was changed and eventually destroyed by contact with the white man. . . . By what Parkman called 'a sly trick' the publisher of the first book edition changed the title to The California and Oregon Trail, Being Sketches of Prairie and Rocky Mountain Life, hoping to capitalize on public interest in the California Gold Rush. . . . Eventually [when Little, Brown, in this edition] decided to reissue the work in 1872 with a new preface by the author, Parkman insisted on a return to the original title, The Oregon Trail." (PMM) N. B. With few exceptions (always identified), we only stock books in exceptional condition, carefully preserved in archival, removable mylar sleeves. All orders are packaged with care and posted promptly. Satisfaction guaranteed. (Fine Editions Ltd is a member of the Independent Online Booksellers Association, and we subscribe to its codes of ethics.).