[WILSON, William] - Lot 165

[WILSON, William] A Missionary Voyage to the Southern Pacific Ocean, performed in the Years 1796, 1797, 1798, in the Ship Duff. With a preliminary discourse on the geography and history of the South-Sea Islands and an appendix including details never before published, of the natural and civil state of Otaheite. London, printed by T. Gillet for T. Chapman, 1799. In-4 (263 x 208 mm) of 6 ff.n.ch., C, 395 pp. 4 ff.n.ch. list of subscribers, 7 folding maps and 6 engraved plates. Mottled calf, decorative gilt border, gilt centerpiece, smooth spine decorated, spotted edges (contemporary binding). Hill, 1895; Ferguson, 301; O'Reilly, 675. First edition of the official account of the first missionary trip to the Pacific. Copy of the regular paper edition with the list of subscribers in 7pp. This is the complete official account of the first missionary voyage to the South Pacific. Le Duff left for Tahiti in 1796, but visited many island groups, including Tonga and the Marquesas. A new group of islands, the "Duff Group", was discovered among the Santa Cruz Islands. The maps presented here include a large map of Fiji as well as maps of Tongataboo, the Gambier Islands, the Marquesas, Tahiti, and the Duff Group; the plates include an engraved view of Rio de Janeiro. Wilson is identified as the author of the main body of the work in the preface, which explains that he compiled it from the papers of the captain and his people, as well as from missionary reports. The Hill catalog notes that "the long 'preliminary discourse' was written anonymously by Samuel Greatheed, from the then unpublished account of James Morrison, one of the pardoned Bounty mutineers. Morrison's manuscript is also the source of the detailed appendix on Tahiti. In fact, William Wilson and James Morrison can be said to be co-authors of this book. According to map expert Dorothy F. Prescott, "Wilson's book contained a map that actually used the words 'Greater Australia' - taking Captain Cook's map of the southern and eastern coasts of Van Diemens Land. This map would have influenced Matthew Flinders. Flinders is traditionally said to have been the first to use the term "Australia" in the context of a voyage: Duff's account appeared about fifteen years earlier. There is much Australian interest in the account of the voyage, including a mention of the escaped convicts from Botany Bay, and the flight of several missionaries from Tonga, where three were killed, to Sydney. Some of these missionaries settled in Sydney and founded families that would later become important in Australian history. A complete copy of the 13 maps and plates required. Minor restorations to spine and corners. A very good and well preserved copy in its period binding which could be a publisher's binding. Provenance: unidentified bookplate with the monogram 'JP' - Clissold (label on the endpaper).