PBA Galleries

2 volumes. [2], xxii, 506 + [6] ad; [2], xvii, [1], 624 pp. Illustrated with 16 lithographed plates after Bartlett including folding frontispieces, with tissue guards; numerous wood engravings; large folding map in Vol. I. 9¼x5½, period ¾ gilt-ruled morocco & marbled boards, spines elaborately tooled in gilt, raised bands, marbled endpapers, top edges gilt. First Edition.

Important first-hand account of the survey which laid down the southwestern border between the United States and Mexico following the conclusion of hostilities. "John Russell Bartlett was a talented artist, observer, and reporter, who contributed greatly to the knowledge of the geography and topography of the Southwest in his Personal Narrative. During three years with the Mexican Boundary Commission, he traveled widely from central Texas to the Pacific Ocean, and from Mazatlan to San Francisco. A contentious man, and lacking perhaps in certain administrative skills, Bartlett succeeded in antagonizing most of his fellow officials on the Commission" - Wagner-Camp. Jenkins calls this work "the most scholarly and scientific description of southwest Texas of its era," although Graff points out that "a number of incidents described by Bartlett have been differently interpreted by his associates." As delineated by Howes, "only one geyser pl, not two as listed, is found in v.2, that deficiency being made up by an unlisted view of Tucson," although he also says that the frontispiece "belonging to v.2 was placed in v.1," which is not exactly the case, the frontispiece for the first volume is listed in the second, but correctly placed in Vol. I. Cowan p.36; Graff 198; Howes B201; Jenkins 12; Rader 287; Sabin 3746; Wagner-Camp 234:1; Wheat Transmississippi 798.