Travels into North America; Containing Its Natural History by KALM, Peter - 1772

1772. KALM, Peter. Travels into North America; Containing Its Natural History, and a Circumstantial Account of Its Plantations and Agriculture in General, with the Civil, Ecclesiastical and Commercial State of the Country, the Manners of the Inhabitants, and Several Curious and Important Remarks on Various Subjects. London: Printed for T. Lowndes, 1772. 2nd ed. in English. 2 Vols. xii,414; iv,423,[8]pp. Six engraved plates, folding map. Early 19th-century full polished calf, gilt-ruled, elaborately gilt-decorated spine with raised spine bands and red morocco spine labels. Occasional very faint scattered foxing, else near fine. HOWES K-5, "aa." Taxonomic Literature 3493. Reese, The Struggle for North America 80. Coates, The Plant Hunters, pp. 277-279. Sabin 36989. Translated by George Reinhold Forster, after the Swedish first edition of 1753-1761 and the rare first English edition published in Warrington in 1770-1771. "One of the most important and reliable eighteenth-century accounts of American natural history, social organization, and political situation. Kalm gives especially important accounts of the American Swedish settlements"--Streeter Sale, 823. Kalm was in America in 1748-1749 and made a notable trip into the back country of New York with the naturalist, John Bartram, as well as traveling in more settled regions. He was one of the most notable of early American naturalists, and made important contributions to the study of American botany. In his dedication, Forster writes the text will "display to the British nation, the circumstances of a country which is so happy as to be under its protection." While this statement might have expressed colonial sentiment during the years of the book's first production, by the time the Warrington edition was produced such affection for Great Britain had clearly subsided. A fundamental work of early American natural history.