Voyages from Montreal, on the River St. Laurence, through the Continent of North America.

MACKENZIE, Alexander.

Voyages from Montreal, on the River St. Laurence, through the Continent of North America.

London: T. Cadell Jun. and W. Davies, 1801.

$35,000.00

In Stock Item Number: RRB-152697

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First Edition, Exceptionally Rare Presentation Copy of Alexander Mackenzie's Voyages from Montreal; Inscribed by Alexander Mackenzie

First edition of one of the great narratives of North American exploration, a presentation copy inscribed by the author. Quarto, contemporary streaked calf with elaborate gilt tooling to the spine, morocco spine label lettered in gilt, gilt scrolling to the front and rear panels, gilt turn-ins and inner dentelles marbled edges, engraved frontispiece portrait of Mackenzie and three engraved folding maps, one hand-colored in outline. Presentation copy, inscribed by the author on the title page, “From the author to W. Finnie, London, January 1810.” A superb association, the record of the first crossing of the North American continent north of Mexico, inscribed by the explorer who achieved it. Retaining the errata leaf at the end. In very good condition, offsetting from the frontispiece portrait, wear to the boards and spine worn, lacking half-title. Howes M-133; Sabin 43415. Rare and desirable signed and inscribed.

Voyages from Montreal, published in 1801, is the classic account of Alexander Mackenzie’s two great journeys of exploration across the North American continent. In 1789 he descended the vast river that now bears his name from Great Slave Lake to the Arctic Ocean, and in 1793 he crossed the Rocky Mountains and reached the Pacific coast, becoming the first European to traverse North America north of Mexico, more than a decade before Lewis and Clark. Sir Alexander Mackenzie (1764-1820), a Scottish-born partner in the North West Company, was knighted the year after the book appeared, and his narrative, with its detailed maps of a largely unknown continent, became one of the most influential travel books of its age. President Thomas Jefferson read it closely, and it is said to have helped inspire the Lewis and Clark expedition, a copy of Mackenzie’s book reportedly accompanying the explorers on their own crossing to the Pacific.