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Are you interested in this item? This item is up for auction at Catawiki. Please click on "respond to advert" (orange button) to get redirected to the Catawiki website. Catawiki’s goal is to make special objects universally available. Our weekly auctions feature thousands of unusual, rare, and exceptional objects you won’t find in just any store. I have here for sale a 3-volume set entitled JOURNAL OF AN EXPEDITION TO EXPLORE THE COURSE AND TERMINATION OF THE NIGER; with a Narrative of a Voyage down that River to its Termination by Richard and John Lander. It is a First Edition in fine binding, published by John Murray in 1832. Vol I has a frontispiece portrait of Richard Lander, a single page b/w map of the Quorra, Senegal, and Gambia Rivers, (the fold-out map of the Course of the Quorra, the Joliba or Niger of Park from the Journals of Messrs Richard and John Lander with their Route from Badagry to the Northward is missing), and 3 in-text b/w illustrations; Vol II has a frontispiece portrait of John Lander, 3 plates and 2 in-text illustrations; Vol III has a frontispiece plate and one other.
This adventure is one of the great African narratives completing the navigation of the River Niger. Richard Lander accompanied Hugh Clapperton as his manservant on his second expedition to explore the Niger in 1825. The expedition disembarked on the Nigerian coast determined to strike inland to Sokoto, then descend the Niger to the Atlantic. Most of the party died of malaria en route and it was only Clapperton and Lander who made it to Sokoto. The local ruler, Mohammed Bello, who had tried to trick Clapperton with a false map on his first expedition with Denham, agreed to allow them to return to the sea by way of the Niger. With success all but guaranteed, Clapperton fell victim to malaria and dysentery and Lander was left to make his way back alone through territory controlled by hostile tribes. Lander returned to Nigeria in 1830 on a government-backed expedition accompanied by his brother John and successfully descended the last section of the Niger from Bussa to the Atlantic.
Beautifully bound in half calf leather on orange and blue marbled hardboards, marbled matching endpapers and page-edges. Gilt bands and red leather title and author blocks with gilt lettering. Spine renewed, covers rubbed. Binding firm, with no loose or missing pages. Vol I - 272 pages, Vol II - 321 pages, Vol III - 354 pages. 15 x 10 cm.
67266765
