[Rarebooks] fa: Faux's MEMORABLE DAYS IN AMERICA 1823 (re. Morris Birkbeck & Illinois, etc.)

[Ardwight Chamberlain]

Listed now, auctions ending Sunday, March 1. More details and images can be found at the URL below or by searching under the seller name arch_in_la.

http://tinyurl.com/q2x237e

Thanks,
Ardwight Chamberlain
L.A.


William Faux: Memorable Days in America: Being a Journal  of a Tour to the United States, Principally Undertaken to Ascertain, by Positive Evidence, the Condition and Probable Prospects of British Emigrants; Including Accounts of Mr. Birkbeck's Settlement in the Illinois: and intended to show Men and Things as they are in America. By W. Faux, an English Farmer. London: Printed for W. Simkin and R. Marshall, 1823. FIRST EDITION. Later half calf binding by Morell, spine lettered and tooled in gilt; xvi + 488 pp.; with the half-title,  list of subscribers and engraved frontispiece. Sabin 23933; Howes F-60.

An important and, at the time, highly controversial account of an American tour made by an English farmer exploring the prospects for British emigrants in the New World. In his travels Faux visited Philadelphia, New York, Washington, Camden, Charleston, Kentucky, Indiana, etc., as well as the settlement established by Morris Birkbeck in Illinois, of which he gives a lengthy account. "Faux laps up stories that are unpleasant or frightening, [and] reports about bilious fever, ague, jaundice, and other diseases which might discourage emigration. Yet Memorable Days in America is not a one-sided account. It makes light of things British as well as American. On the whole it is as complimentary as it is critical. American dislike of the book was probably partially due to sensitiveness about any British criticism of American institutions in those postwar years" (Clark II 202). The frontispiece depicts "A Log Cabin drawn from Ingle's Refuge, State of Indiana."

Sunning and some scuffing to the spine, wear to the corners and edges; mild toning to the leafs with a very few occasional small spots, otherwise clean and sound, firmly bound.