Description
Folio, [4pp], ivii, [1pp blank] 244pp. Supplement: [8pp], 72pp. Full leather, gilt title over red morocco on spine, gilt bands. Marbled endpapers. Supplement by John Pearce Hockin, first edition publication. Includes 21 plates, frontispiece portrait of Captain Wilson, foldout map of Palau Islands and 2 illustrated plates in supplement. Light wear to leather, shelf wear to edges, toning to pages as expected.
Comments: Captain Henry Wilson was an English navy captain, employed by the East Indian Company. He was shipwrecked in the Palau Islands in 1783, making the first sustained contact between western Europeans and the native inhabitants of the islands. His ship was rehabilitated with the help of the native population, then returning to England. Many of the objects he collected during his time at Palau are housed in the British Museum.