Beschreibung:

BOUGAINVILLE, Louis Antoine, Comte de (1729-1811)]. Voyage autour du monde par la frégate du roi La Boudeuse et la flute L'Ètoile; en 1766, 1767, 1768 & 1769 . Paris: Saillant & Nyon 1771.
BOUGAINVILLE, Louis Antoine, Comte de (1729-1811)]. Voyage autour du monde par la frégate du roi La Boudeuse et la flute L'Ètoile; en 1766, 1767, 1768 & 1769 . Paris: Saillant & Nyon 1771. 4 o (248 x 192 mm). Woodcut Royal arms on title, 20 folding engraved maps and charts, 3 engraved plates, head- and tail-piece woodcut ornaments and initials, half-title. (A few very minor stains to margins.) Contemporary French "cat's paw" calf, covers with triple gilt fillet borders, gilt spine, edges marbled in blue (rebacked preserving original spine and gilt-lettered label). Provenance : Ham Court Library (armorial bookplate). FIRST EDITION. Bougainville, a highly regarded officer, served as aide to the Marquis de Montcalm in Canada and was a combatant at the fall of Quebec and later Montreal. He helped negotiate the Treaty of Paris--ceding most of France's North American colonies to the British--then attempted unsuccessfully to establish a French colony in the Falkland Islands. At the request of the King, he undertook the first French circumnavigation of the globe, departing Nantes in November 1766 and returning to St. Malo in March 1769 (a voyage also notable for carrying the first woman on a circumavigation: the mistress of the ship's botanist, disguised as his valet). The important engraved maps depict the route of the circumnavigation by the two vessels, the Straits of Magellan, Tierra del Fuego, Tahiti, the Solomon Islands, the Celebes, Java, and other Pacific regions. Hill 163; Sabin 6864.