First edition in a variant issue of a beautifully illustrated account of the circumnavigation of the l'Uranie under command of Captain Louis Freycinet in the years 1817-1820; one of the most important explorations of the Pacific. Written and illustrated by Jacques Etienne Victor Arago (1790-1855), the draughtsman of the expedition, the work focuses on the scenery, people, and natural history encountered during the voyage. The text, written as a series of letters to a friend, includes many insightful comments on the places visited, in particular on Western Australia and Hawaii. "These entertaining letters, written in a lively and witty literary style, provide vivid descriptions of the topography and the inhabitants of the Pacific Isles" (Hill).
In 1817, Captain Freycinet was given command of the l'Uranie for an expedition to the Pacific, with the goal to collect natural history specimen, and gather information in the fields of geography, ethnology, astronomy, terrestrial magnetism, and meteorology. Together with a group of scientists, he sailed from Toulon to Gibraltar, Tenerife, and Rio de Janeiro, continued by way of Cape of Good Hope to the Mascarene Islands, Western Australia, Timor, New Guinea, the Mariana islands, the Caroline islands, the Sandwich islands, New South Wales, New Zealand, Tierra del Fuego, and the Falklands, where the ship was wrecked. Fortunately, the natural history specimen were saved. Freycinet was able to buy the American ship Mercury, which he renamed La Physicienne, and sailed back to Le Havre via Rio de Janeiro with the many fine specimen, as well as voluminous notes and drawings of the countries visited. Freycinet published his own account of the expedition in 1824-1826 as Voyage autour du monde, which presented the scientific results of the voyage. Arago's account, however, published a few years earlier, became far more popular, as it was much lighter, leaving out the technical details of sailing and navigation typically included in travel accounts of the time.
The present work was also popular because of its beautiful lithographs, made after Arago's own drawings. They show Gibraltar, Tenerife, Rio de Janeiro, Hawaii, Maui, Oahu, the Mariana islands, Timor, New Guinea, Australia, New Zealand, Tierra del Fuego, the Falkland Islands, and the indigenous peoples encountered during the voyage. First published in 1822, the present set is a variant issue of the first edition, with undated cancel title pages for the two text volumes, and a shortened title. The atlas, however, seems to be identical to its most common version in the first edition.
The spines of the text volumes are rubbed, the foot of the spine of vol. 1 is damaged, the boards of the atlas volumes are somewhat frayed and soiled. The leaves of all volumes are foxed, the atlas volume is untrimmed. Otherwise in good condition. Borba de Moraes I, 44; Chadenat 6; Ferguson 850; Forbes 537-538; Hill 28; Sabin 1867.