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xv, [1], [17]-492 pp. Illustrated with duotone lithograph frontispiece, additional title, and with a folding map. 7½x4¾, original cloth gilt-lettered. First American Edition.

First American edition of Burton's most famous, and most important, work, being an account of his surreptitious entry into the holy sites of Islam. According to Penzer, and to countless readers since, this is "one of the greatest works of travel ever published." Burton was one of the first westerners to enter the Arab holy cities and to accomplish this he had to assume the character and costume of a Persian Mirza, a wandering Dervish, and a "Pathan" born of Afghan parents.