xii, 439 pp. 21.6x13.7 cm (8½x5½"), three-quarter blue calf over marbled boards. First Edition.
One of the earliest, rarest and most significant narratives of travel by an Englishman in the Mississippi and Ohio valleys, not published till nearly 60 years after the event. As a young man, Baily, who was to become President of the Royal Astronomical Society, traveled from Baltimore to Natchez by riverboat, and returned by land up the Natchez Trace.
The narrative is of great importance for its observations on topography, vegetation and the life of the river, including descriptions of all the places he visited, which included Baltimore, Philadelphia, New York, Washington D.C., Charleston, Pittsburgh, Wheeling, Limestone, Columbia, Cincinnati, Port William, Louisville, Fort Massac, Natchez, Baton Rouge, New Orleans, Nashville and Knoxville. On the way he met Daniel Boone and Zebulon Pike. Buck 52; Clark III, 74; Howes B40; Sabin 2770; Rader 230.