[Rarebooks] fa: 1751 Gentleman's Magazine: NIAGARA FALLS + INCAS OF PERU + BLACKLEAD MINES, &c.

[ArCh]

Auction ending Sunday, October 2. Images and more details can be found at the URL below or by searching for the seller name arch_in_la. 

https://tinyurl.com/yjrjkb96

Many thanks,
Ardwight Chamberlain
Ann Arbor, MI, USA


The Gentleman's Magazine, and Historical Chronicle. Volume XXI [21]. For the Year MDCCLI [1751]. London: Printed for Edw. Cave, at St. John's Gate, [1751]. Twelve monthly issues (Jan.-Dec.), plus the supplement, volume title, indices and preface. Thick 8vo (21.5 cm) in early/period calf-backed marbled boards with gilt-lettered spine label; [4] + 612 + [18] pp; with numerous in-text charts and tables, woodcut diagrams and illustrations, plus 29 copper-engraved plates, nine of which are folding (complete).

Contains the first account of NIAGARA FALLS written by a scientifically trained observer, "A Letter from Mr. Kalm, a Gentleman of Sweden, now on his Travels in America, to his Friend in Philadelphia, containing a particular Account of the Grat[sic] Fall of Niagara." Pehr, or Peter, Kalm was a Swedish botanist and naturalist who, in 1747, was commissioned by Linnaeus and the Royal Swedish Academy of Sciences to explore North America for plants and seeds that might prove useful in agriculture or industry. The account printed here of Kalm's travels to the "vast and terrifying Fall of Water" predates the appearance of his full work, En Resa til Norra America, first published in Stockholm 1753-1761, and is accompanied by an engraved "View of the Fall of Niagara," one of the earliest pictorial depictions of the falls ever published. Also of American interest in this volume are woodcuts and descriptions of Rice Birds of Carolina and the great black Wasp of Pennsylvania.

Other features of note include:
	- Portraits of the FIRST FIVE INCAS OF PERU.
	- A large folding Bird's-eye View of GOSPORT HOSPITAL.
	- A handsome folding view of the Interior of the PANTHEON IN ROME (with a closed tear to the left edge).
	- A folding map of the BLACKLEAD OR WAD MINES in Cumberland.
	- 18TH-CENTURY TECHNOLOGY. Plates and woodcuts (with accompanying text) of: a Machine to make a Watch serve as an Alarum; an Instrument for examining Timekeepers; a Botanic Thermometer; a Wheel used in Persia for drawing Water; a Self-moving Engine; a Weaving Engine; Filtering Machines; a Self-moving Wheel (tear to lower left corner); etc.
	- Folding views of St, Mary le Bow Steeple, St. Bride's Church and Steeple, the west end of Westminster Abbey (one with browning and wear to the fore-edge).
	- HENRY FIELDING: an extract from his Enquiry into the Cause of the late Increase of Robbers, &c.
	- Eight plates of the ARMS OF BARONETS created by Charles I and Charles II.
	- Woodcut portraits and accompanying accounts of Edmund Bright, of Malden, notable for his bulk, and Mr Manpferdt, the surprising Centaur, the greatest Wonder produced by Nature these 3000 Years, lately proposed to be exhibited to public View.
	- Additional PLATES depicting: Six Views of Bridges; the Aqueduct at Aleantra in Portugal; the plant Anhtelmia or Worm Grass of Jamaica, and the Cockroach or Blatta Americana; Roman Lamps (two plates); Frederick Prince of Wales and his consort. WOODCUTS of: a double-headed Snake; the Madagascar Bat; the Maucauco of Madagascar; etc.
	- Plus monthly Prices of Stocks and Goods, Accounts of Theatrical Performances, Register of Books published, Bills of Mortality, Obituaries, lists of Bankrupts and Promotions; and much more.

Binding with rubbing and wear, hinges cracked but secure; contents with intermittent browning and spotting, some offsetting to and from the plates; else quite clean and sound, firmly bound. Front paste-down with the early ownership signature of Christopher Hatton of Ampthill, Bedfordshire, and the engraved (by Johannes Britze) twentieth-century bookplate of Marius Nielsen.