Clearwater Books

P.S.ALLFREE. Hawks of the Hadhramaut. Robert Hale, London, 1967. First edition. 8vo. 192pp. Illustrated with twenty photographs and a map. A lovely crisp copy in very lightly chafed, stained and edge worn dust wrapper, just a little spotted at rear panel and internally. The author's second book, an account of the year and a half he spent as political officer amongst the Bedouin in Arabia's 'Empty Quarter'. £35

HILAIRE BELLOC. The Cruise of The “Nona”. Constable & Company Ltd., London 1925. First edition. 8vo. xiv, 347pp. Top edge gilt, others untrimmed. A touch of bruising to the backstrip ends, and just a trace of wear to the tips of several corners. Free endpapers very slightly toned and spotted. A very good copy in the uncommon dust wrapper, toned at the spine panel, with some considerable spotting, several internally repaired tears, and a single fraction of enclosed loss. The author’s celebrated account of his early 1920 sailing voyages around the coast of Britain, with a lengthy printed dedication to Maruice Baring. Cahill 86. £125

CHRIS BONINGTON. Everest. The Hard Way. Hodder & Stoughton, London 1976. First edition. This copy signed by the author on the title page. 4to. 239pp. With photographic endpapers, a colour frontispiece, and scores of colour and black and white photographs throughout including full-page and double-spread presentations, plus various maps in the text. Trace of partially erased former owner pencilled details to the tip of the front free endpaper. A virtually fine copy in virtually fine dust wrapper. An account of the 1975 British Mount Everest Southwest Face expedition (the first successful effort to climb Everest by ascending one of its faces. Bonington led the party and four men reached the summit, but BBC cameraman Mick Burke died in the attempt). £100

NORAH BURKE. Eleven Leopards. A Journey Through the Jungles of Ceylon. Jarrolds Publishers (London) Ltd., London 1965. First edition. This copy inscribed by the author on the front free endpaper, and dated the year of publication. 8vo. 200pp. With a colour frontispiece and twenty-one captioned black and white photographs. Edges lightly spotted, and with a strip of light partial toning to the free endpapers. A very good copy in lightly chafed, dust soiled, creased, and nicked dust wrapper, with several tiny fractions of edge-loss. £25

ROBERT BYRON. Europe in the Looking-Glass. Reflections of a Motor Drive from Grimsby to Athens. George Routledge & Sons Ltd., London 1926. First edition. 8vo. 229pp. The backstrip faded and with a touch of much lighter uneven fading to the margins of the rear board and a small area of light soiling to the base of the upper board. Top edge dust soiled and with a touch of spotting, also to the fore edge and, very lightly, to half a dozen preliminary leaves. A very good copy. No dust wrapper. The author’s first book, a splendid travelogue with the increasingly relevant closing lines: “The world seemed larger now than it had done in 1909. Private school, public school, university; intermittent trips abroad, intermittent Wiltshire; and last of all this tour, had all intervened. Leaning forward to warm my hands over the logs, I experienced a new price of race: the pride of being, as well as English, European”. £325

ROBERT BYRON. The Road to Oxiana. Macmillan, London 1937. First edition in the first state binding of dark blue smooth-weave cloth, lettered in gold at the spine and with the publisher’s blue top edge stain, which is a little faded. 8vo. ix, 341pp + [ii] publisher’s advertisements. With a photographic frontispiece, fifteen photographic plates and five maps. The cloth at the backstrip a little darkened, and with a touch of bruising to the backstrip ends and to several corner tips. The plate margins lightly toned and soiled. A very good copy of the author’s most celebrated book and one of the all-time great travelogues: an account of Byron’s travels in Persia and Afghanistan. Lacking the most fugitive dust wrapper. £375

DONALD CAMERON. Sons of El Dorado. Venezuelan Adventure. With drawings by Peter Edwards. Longmans, London 1968. First edition. 8vo. 215pp. A little light spotting to top edge and just a hint of light partial browning to endpapers. A very good copy in fine pictorial dust wrapper. The author’s second book, an account of several month period he spent teaching English in Caracas, followed by just under a year of diamond prospecting in the steaming forests of the Interior. £15

BRUCE CHATWIN. In Patagonia. Jonathan Cape, London 1977. First edition of Chatwin's desirable first book. 8vo. 204pp. Map-illustrated endpapers with a frontispiece map and fourteen captioned photographs by the author. Contemporary former owner gift inscription inked to the head of the half-title. Very good indeed, but lacking the dust wrapper. The author's first book – an account of his six-month travels in Patagonia beginning in December 1974. Winner of the Hawthornden Prize and the E.M.Forster Award. £50

THOMAS COOK. The Traveller’s Handbook for Norway, Sweden and Denmark, including Spitsbergen, Iceland, and Other Arctic Islands. With maps, plans and vocabulary. Thos. Cook & Son, London 1923. Reprint. 8vo. xi, 564pp (inc. xxxii pages of advertisements at the rear). Limp maroon cloth wrappers. With a multi-panel folding frontispiece map, and two further multi-panel folding colour maps. Ribbon place marker. A minor slant to the binding, and with the signature and date of Deluis scholar Lionel Carley neatly pencilled to the front free endpaper. A very good copy in slightly rubbed and chipped dust wrapper. A splendidly preserved example - and really quite desirable in the dust wrapper (a one-hundred year old travel guide in a wrapper in anything like this condition is a rare find). £95

CHARLES M.DOUGHTY. Wanderings in Arabia. Being an Abridgement of Travels in Arabia Deserta. Arranged and introduced by Edward Garnett. Duckworth & Co., London 1908. First edition, complete in two volumes. 8vo. xx, 309 and x, 297pp. Top edges gilt. With a tissue-protected portrait frontispiece to the first volume, and a frontispiece drawing to the second. Backstrip ends gently bruised, and with a little toning to the free endpapers and spotting to several preliminary leaves. The binding a fraction tender at the first text leaf of volume one. Tiny dealer plates to the base of the front pastedowns. A very good set of this abridgement of Doughty’s important 1888 travelogue, which recounts just under two years spent exploring Western and Central Arabia. Travels in Arabia Deserta was rejected by four publishing houses and went largely unnoticed until the full text was reissued in 1921 accompanied by a glowing T.E.Lawrence introduction. £350

PETER FLEMING. One's Company. A Journey to China. Jonathan Cape, London 1934. First edition. 8vo. 319pp. With a photographic frontispiece, twenty-four photographs taken by the author and presented over fifteen plates, and one multi-panel folding two-colour map. Top edge very lightly spotted. A small area of blemishing to the half-title where perhaps a former owner name was erased. Former owner name and date (1953) neatly inked to the head of the front free endpapers. A very good copy, with no trace of the customary flecking to the orange lettering or decoration, in dust wrapper, toned at the spine panel, lightly dust soiled, and with two small areas of internal repair. An area of surface abrasion to the back of the wrapper flaps, form where the wraparound band was once secured (and band itself is now absent). The author's second travel book, detailing a journey from Moscow to Peking as a special correspondent of The Times. £225

GRAHAM GREENE. Barbara Greene. Too Late to Turn Back. Barbara and Graham Greene in Liberia. With an introduction by Paul Theroux, and a new foreword by the author. Settle & Bendall, London 1981. First edition thus. 8vo. xxxv, 205pp. Illustrated with one map and eight black and white photographs. A light scattering of spotting to the top edge, else a fine copy in very good dust wrapper, with a tiny area of tape reinforcement to the base of the spine panel. A companion piece to Greene’s Journey Without Maps, detailing the same 1935 journey through the jungles of Liberia but this time from the point of view of his cousin, Barbara Greene (to whom Greene’s work was dedicated). This account was first published in 1938 as Land Benighted, and is here accompanied by a new eleven-page foreword by the author, and Theroux’s new thirteen-page introduction. £20

HEINRICH HARRER. Seven Years in Tibet. Translated from the German by Richard Graves and with an introduction by Peter Fleming. Rupert Hart-Davis, London 1953. The First English edition. 8vo. xiii, 288pp. With a colour frontispiece, one double-spread map and twenty-fine black and white photographs, mostly full-page or double-spread. A little fading to the publisher’s top edge stain, and a little spotting to the edges and endpapers. A very good copy in dust wrapper, a little spotted and chafed at the natural folds, and with some nicks, creasing and several tiny fractions of loss from the upper edge. £100

THOR HEYERDAHL. The Tigris Expedition. In Search for Our Beginnings. George Allen & Unwin Ltd.,  London 1980. First edition. This copy signed by the author on the half-title and dated the year of publication. 8vo. 333pp. With colour map-illustrated endpapers and scores of colour photographs. A fine copy in fine dust wrapper. An account of the author’s five-month Red Sea voyage in a reed boat, initiated to demonstrate that trade and migration could have linked Mesopotamia with the Indus Valley Civilization. Uncommon with the author’s signature. £95

NICHOLAS JUBBER. Epic Continent. Adventures in the Great Stories of Europe. John Murray, London 2019. First UK edition. This copy signed by the author on the title page, with his signature incorporating an indeterminate sketch (a cyclops, maybe?). 8vo. xi, 322pp. With one double-spread map. A fine copy in virtually fine dust wrapper. An account of the author’s journey across Europe, from Turkey to Iceland, tracing the routes described in the continent’s epic poems, specifically The Odyssey, The Kosovo Cycle, The Song of Roland, The Nibelungenleid, Beowulf, and Njal’s Saga. £35

PATRICK LEIGH FERMOR. The Traveller's Tree. A Journey through the Caribbean Islands. John Murray, London 1950. First edition. Large 8vo. 403pp + 50 pages of unpaginated photographic plates. With an illustrated frontispiece and sixty-one photographs by A.Costa [i.e. Costa Achillopoulos], plus a double-spread sketch-map by H.W.Hawes. Edges lightly spotted. A very good copy in price-clipped dust wrapper, chafed with a little loss to spine ends and corner tips and with two short tears and several light accompanying creases. Former owner bookplate and accompanying inked inscription to the front free endpaper. £350

PATRICK LEIGH FERMOR. The Traveller's Tree. A Journey through the Caribbean Islands. John Murray, London 1950. First edition. Large 8vo. 403pp + 50 pages of unpaginated photographic plates. With an illustrated frontispiece and sixty-one photographs by A.Costa [i.e. Costa Achillopoulos], plus a double-spread sketch-map by H.W.Hawes. Cloth lightly marked in one or two places and with just a touch of spotting to several preliminary leaves. A very good copy of Fermor's celebrated debut, housed in a price-clipped dust wrapper with several short jagged tears and a little accompanying creasing, and several small portions of loss from the head of the spine panel, and a larger area of loss from the base. £250

PATRICK LEIGH FERMOR. Three Letters from the Andes. With illustrations and a dust wrapper design by John Craxton. John Murray, London 1991. First edition. 8vo. 118pp. With a map, several illustrations and a small title-page design by John Craxton who also contributes a splendid dust wrapper illustration. A fine copy with very good pictorial dust wrapper, with some fading to the publisher’s red spine panel lettering. £15

"This was a private account of an Andean journey organised and led by Robin Fedden in 1971. As I had no particular task during the journey, except looking after the Primus stove, I wrote down a rough and ready description of our doings in the form of three long letters to my wife" - Leigh Fermor.

NORMAN LEWIS. To Run Across the Sea. Jonathan Cape, London 1989. First edition. 8vo. ix, 230pp. A slight ridge to the backstrip, else a fine copy in very good dust wrapper, lightly creased at the head of the spine panel. A selection of twenty-one original travel pieces, the destinations including Spain, Khartoum, Thailand, Haiti, Bolivia, Siam, Tahiti – and Essex. £10

ROBIN MAUGHAM. Nomad. Chapman & Hall, London 1947. First edition. This copy humorously inscribed by the author on the half-title: “For Andy, once again to get his - - sideburns CUT. With love from Robin 23 Nov 1957”. 8vo. 243pp. Map-illustrated endpapers. Printed on lesser quality economy wartime paperstock, yet still a very crisp copy in toned, rubbed and lightly spotted dust wrapper, with a short internally repaired snag to the rear panel.  The author’s second book, an account of his travels in the Levant, and including encounters with Glubb Pasha and Ernest Altounyan (the basis for the “Swallow’s” father in Ransome’s Swallows and Amazons, and a close friend of T.E.Lawrence). £50

PAUL MORAND. Hester Sainsbury. Earth Girdled. Translated from the French of Rien que la Terre by Charles-Emile Roche and with woodcuts by Hester Sainsbury. Alfred A.Knopf, London 1928.  First English edition. 8vo. 175pp. Quarter cloth with marbled paper sides. With a small title page decoration in red, six full-page woodcuts and one chapter header decoration, all by Hester Sainsbury. Several text leaves uncut. Free endpapers lightly and partially browned and with just a hint of wear to the corner tips. Former owner name neatly inked to the head of the front free endpaper. With ten instances of light pencilled marginalia, and two more in ink. A very good copy in dust wrapper, nicked at the upper edge with several tiny fractions of loss and with some careful internal repair. Both wrapper flaps have been neatly severed from the main body of the wrapper, and each reattached with a single tiny piece of tape. A series of travel essays from the noted Modernist and Imagist (and later Nazi collaborator), original published in France in 1926.  £50

JAMES MORRIS. Cities. Faber, London 1963. First edition. 8vo. 375pp. With a frontispiece and twenty-eight full-page or double-spread black and white photographs. A tiny trace of bruising to the backstrip ends, else a fine copy in lightly chafed and edge-creased price-clipped dust wrapper. £35

JAN MORRIS. Hong Kong: Xianggang. Viking, London 1988. First edition. 8vo. 320pp. Illustrated with maps and photographs. Some quite light toning to the leaf margins, and a contemporary former owner gift inscription inked to the tip of the front free endpaper. A very good copy in dust wrapper, lightly rubbed at the spine ends and corner tips. A portrait of the British Crown Colony of Hong Kong, penned just over a decade before the territory was returned to China. £20

JAN MORRIS. Trieste and the Meaning of Nowhere. Simon & Schuster, New York 2001. First American edition, issued the same year as the UK edition. 8vo. 203pp. Quarter cloth with marbled paper-covered sides. Map-illustrated endpapers. The edges very lightly spotted, else a fine copy in fractionally dust soiled dust wrapper. A love letter to “the first city [Morris] knew as an adult” – blurb. £55

ERIC NEWBY. The Last Grain Race. Secker & Warburg, London 1956. First edition. 8vo. 243pp. With map-illustrated endpapers, a photographic frontispiece, and dozens of captioned photographs taken by the author, all hitherto unpublished, plus a multi-panel fold-out plan of the ship tipped to a blank endpaper. Contemporary former owner name and date inked to the front free endpaper, and a tiny dealer plate to the base of the adjacent pastedown. The title page lightly toned. A very good copy in the handsome pictorial dust wrapper with a touch of wear and several tiny fractions of loss to the spine panel ends, one short edge-tear and another miniscule nick, and some light dust soiling and a small area of indeterminate staining to the base of the rear panel. The author’s first book, an account of his 1938 trip aboard the four-masted steel barque Moshulu during the vessel's last voyage in the Australian grain trade. £75

REDMOND O’HANLON. Congo Journey. Hamish Hamilton, London 1996. First edition of the author’s third travelogue; an account of his trip across Congo-Brazzaville in search of a legendary Congo dinosaur. A presentation copy, inscribed by the author: “To David Stewart, a real traveller and scholar and bibliophile, with a big thank you. From Redmond, July 1997”. 8vo. 472pp. Illustrated with twenty-eight monochrome photographs and three maps. Boards very lightly marked and with a minor slant to the binding. A very good copy in fine dust wrapper. £35

F.D.OMMANNEY. South Latitude. Longmans Green, London 1938. First edition - this copy signed by the author. 8vo. 308pp. Map-illustrated endpapers. With a frontispiece and fifteen photographic plates. Binding cocked. Covers slightly grubby and bumped at one corner. Former owner bookplate to half-title. No jacket. £30

RICHARD A.VAN ORMAN. The Explorers. Nineteenth Century Expeditions in Africa and the American West. University of New Mexico Press, Albuquerque 1984. First edition. 8vo. 243pp. A tiny strip of narrow browning to endpapers, else a fine copy in fine dust wrapper. An authoritative account of the travels of numerous celebrated nineteenth century explorers, with chapters devoted to David Livingstone, Richard Burton, Lewis and Clark, Mungo Park, Jedediah Smith, John Charles Frémont and others, drawn primarily from contemporary sources. £15

STEWART PEROWNE. The One Remains. [A Report from Jerusalem]. Hodder & Stoughton,  London 1954. First edition. 8vo. 192pp. With map-illustrated endpapers, one map and thirty-five captioned black and white photographs and reproductions. Some spotting to the edges, preliminary leaves and to some text leaf margins (mostly) throughout. A good sound copy in dust wrapper, a little rubbed, chafed and dust soiled with some internal taped repair.  A personal reflection on the “Eternal City”. £10

POLAR EXPLORATION. William Barr. Searching for Franklin: The Land Arctic Searching Expedition. James Anderson’s and James Stewart’s Expedition via the Black River 1855. Edited by William Barr. The Hakluyt Society, London 1999. First edition. Tall 8vo. xv, 292pp. Illustrated with maps and several black and white photographs. The tiniest hint of spotting to the top edge, and a contemporary former owner acquisition date stamp to the front free endpaper. A virtually fine copy in virtually fine dust wrapper, just fractionally toned at the spine panel. £15

POLAR EXPLORATION. Robert Randolph Carter. Searching for the Franklin Expedition. The Arctic Journal of Robert Randolph Carter. Edited by Harold B.Gill Jr. and Joanne Young. Naval Institute Press, Annapolis, Maryland 1998. First edition (“first printing” stated, but with a number line starting in ‘2’). 8vo. 201pp. With a frontispiece reproducing the title page of Carter’s original journal, and a number of maps, photographs and reproductions. A virtually fine copy. No dust wrapper called for, but with probably the original unprinted acetate protector, lightly dust soiled. £20

POLAR EXPLORATION. Walter E.Gilbert. Arctic Pilot. Life and Work on North Canadian Air Routes. The Experiences of Walter E.Gilbert as told to Kathleen Shackleton. Thomas Nelson & Sons Ltd., London 1940. First edition. 8vo. xiv, 256pp. With map-illustrated endpapers, a photographic frontispiece, twenty-three photographs and reproductions, and one map. Top- and fore edge very lightly spotted, and with a little wear to the cloth at several extremities, and a small area of wear to the upper gutter. A nice crisp copy. No dust wrapper. £15

POLAR EXPLORATION. Edward Wilson. Diary of the ‘Discovery Expedition’ to the Antarctic 1901-1904. Edited from the original manuscript by Ann Savours. Blandford Press Ltd., London 1966. First edition. Small 4to. 416pp. Illustrated with forty-seven of his watercolours, and with a selection of his pencil drawings in the text and a multi-panel fold-out map at the rear. A short crease to the tip of the front free endpaper, and just a touch of spotting to the fore edge.  Very good indeed in virtually fine dust wrapper. The first appearance in print of Wilson’s Discovery expedition diary. £50

POLAR EXPLORATION. Edward Wilson. Birds of the Antarctic. Edited by Brian Roberts. Blandford Press Ltd., London 1967. First edition. 4to. 191pp. With over three hundred predominantly colour illustrations from the collection of the Scott Polar Research Institute, accompanied by extracts from Wilson’s diaries. Top- and fore edge quite lightly spotted, with some further spotting to the free endpapers. A very good copy in very good dust wrapper, with several small areas of light spotting, and the publisher’s laminate lifting a fraction in two small areas. £20

POLAR EXPLORATION. Edward Wilson. Diary of the ‘Terra Nova Expedition’ to the Antarctic 1910-1912. Edited from the original manuscript by H.G.R.King, and with a foreword by Sir Charles Knight. Blandford Press Ltd., London 1972. First edition. This copy signed by the editor on the title page. Small 4to. xxiii, 279pp.  Illustrated with twenty-seven of his watercolours, and with various photographs, maps, sketches, and pencil drawings. A fine copy in virtually fine dust wrapper, marred only by a touch of internal spotting. The first appearance in print of Wilson’s Terra Nova expedition diary. £75

V.S.PRITCHETT. Marching Spain. Ernest Benn, London 1928. First edition, in apparently a later state binding with the spine lettering in gilt not black. 8vo. xiii, 224pp. With eight black and white photographs and one map in the text. Fore edge untrimmed. A strip of partial toning to one blank preliminary leaf, and also to the final text leaf. Very good indeed in the uncommon dust wrapper, with some toning, a little wear to the upper edge, a small splash of staining, and two inches of loss from the base of the spine panel. The author’s first book, recounting his three-hundred mile tramp through Spain. £150

E.I.ROBSON. A Wayfarer in French Vineyards. With illustrations by J.R.E.Howard. Methuen & Co. Ltd, ‘The Wayfarer Series of Books of Travellers’, London 1928. First edition. Crown 8vo. xii, 212pp + viii publisher’s catalogue. With map-illustrated front endpapers, a frontispiece drawing and eleven full-page plates of drawings. Edges fractionally spotted and dust soiled. A virtually fine copy in very good dust wrapper, very slightly toned, dust soiled and edge-worn. The fourth of Edgar Iliff Robson’s seven contributions of the Wayfarer series, quite uncommon in the dust wrapper, this being a particularly well preserved example. £20

Methuen’s ‘Wayfarer Series of Books for Travellers’ was a popular collection of mid-1920s to 1930s travel memoirs and descriptive guides, covering regions and countries in Europe, the Americas and the Far East, and designed to capitalise on the new wave of enthusiasm for armchair travel.

E.I.ROBSON. A Wayfarer in the Pyrenees. With illustrations by J.R.E.Howard. Methuen & Co. Ltd, ‘The Wayfarer Series of Books for Travellers’, London 1929. First edition. Crown 8vo. xii, 216pp. With map-illustrated front endpapers, a frontispiece drawing and eleven full-page plates of drawings. Edges fractionally spotted and dust soiled, and a miniscule bump to the tip of one corner. A virtually fine copy in very good dust wrapper, very slightly toned, dust soiled and edge-worn, with a tiny splash of staining to the head of the front panel. The sixth of Edgar Iliff Robson’s seven contributions of the Wayfarer series, quite uncommon in the dust wrapper, this being a particularly well preserved example. £20

V.SACKVILLE-WEST. Passenger to Teheran. The Hogarth Press, London 1926. First edition. Tall 8vo. viii, 181pp. Two-tone patterned cloth. Illustrated with thirty-two photographic plates, most of which were taken by the author. A trace of bruising to the backstrip ends, and some spotting to the edges and throughout. The free endpapers browned and the binding cracked and a little tender at the half-title. Neat former owner bookplate to the front pastedown. Quite a good copy, lacking the fugitive dust wrapper. The author’s first travelogue, detailing explorations in Egypt, India, Iraq and Persia. Now really quite uncommon. Woolmer 107 / Cross & Ravenscroft-Hulme A14. £300

TIM SEVERIN. In Search of Genghis Khan. With photographs by Paul Harris. Hutchinson, London 1993. Reprint, issued in the same year as the first edition. This copy signed by the author on the title page. 8vo. 276pp. With map-illustrated endpapers, two double-spread maps and fifty-two captioned colour photographs. A fine copy in virtually fine dust wrapper, with just a touch of rubbing to the spine panel ends. An account of the author’s autumn 1989 exploits riding across Mongolia in the company of a band of Mongolia horsemen, re-enacting the feat of Genghis Khan’s courier riders. £20

ANTHONY SMITH. A Persian Quarter Century. Hodder & Stoughton, London 1979. First edition. 8vo. 192pp. Map-illustrated endpapers. With thirty-seven photographs. Minor scuff to front board, else a virtually fine copy in very good dust wrapper with a single tiny tear to upper rear panel. Neat inked name of former owner to front endpaper. £5

HENRY M.STANLEY. Through the Dark Continent; or The Sources of the Nile Around the Great Lakes of Equatorial Africa and Down the Livingstone River to the Atlantic Ocean. Sampson Low, Marston, Searle & Rivington, London 1878. First edition, complete in two volumes. 8vo. xv, 522pp and ix, 566pp + xxxii publisher’s advertisements (dated April 1878). Original publisher’s brown cloth, gilt- and black lettered at the spine and upper boards with a double rule and brown and gilt stamped topographical design. With a different portrait frontispiece to each volume, 34 plates, 115 illustrations, and 10 maps including two large folding examples in pockets to the rear boards (one of which is a facsimile, and the other exhibiting some careful taped repair to some of the natural folds). Some bruising to the backstrip ends. Edges spotted and with a little discolouration to the rear board of the first volume. The protective frontispiece tissue absent from both volumes, resulting in some off-set browning from the plates to the adjacent title pages, and some spotting to the preliminary leaves and to very occasional leaves throughout. The outer rear hinge of the second volume slightly split (a result of the facsimile map being on slightly thicker paperstock). Some unsightly creasing to the final page of the publisher’s catalogue. A nice sound set of Stanley's account of his 1874-77 Central African expedition: a 7,000 mile trek exploring Lake Victoria, Lake Tanganyika, and the Lualaba and Congo rivers, and ultimately determining the source of the Nile. £500

LAURENCE STERNE. A Sentimental Journey – Through France and Italy. Designed by Eric Gill (and printed in a type he composed specially for this book) with etchings by Denis Tegetmeier. The Limited Editions Club, High Wycombe 1936. The first edition with these illustrations, limited to 1,500 numbered copies, signed by Gill and Tegetmeier (this being #605). 4to. 136pp. Original publisher's decorated cloth with bevelled edges. Backstrip darkened, and with a touch of occasional marking to the boards. A little light browning to the endpapers. Neat former owner bookplate to the front pastedown. A very good copy in the original cloth-covered slipcase, chafed and a little marked in places and with a tanned, faded and slightly chipped paper spine label. No dust wrapper called for. £200

PAUL THEROUX. Fresh-Air Fiend. Travel Writings 1985-2000. Hamish Hamilton, London 2000. First edition. 8vo. 453pp. Leaf margins lightly tanned. A very good copy in very good dust wrapper, with several tiny closed tears to the head of the spine panel. Over fifty of the author’s shorter travel pieces, the majority of which were hitherto unpublished in the UK. £15

WILFRED THESIGER. The Marsh Arabs. HarperCollins, London 2000. Reprint – this copy inscribed by the author on the half-title in a rather shaky hand and dated the year of publication. 8vo. Illustrated with three maps and fifty-four photographs by the author. Paperstock a little tanned, else a fine copy in lightly rubbed and fractionally dust marked dust wrapper. A scarce inscribed re-issue of Thesiger’s second book, an account of the eight years the author spent living with the indigenous people of the marshlands of southern Iraq. Sadly, this re-issue omits about half of Thesiger’s superb photographs which appeared in the original 1964 edition. £150

WILFRED THESIGER. Visions of a Nomad. Collins, London 1987. First edition. 4to. 224pp. A little uneven offset browning to the front free endpaper where a newspaper clipping was once stored, and a trace of very light spotting to the top edge. A very good copy in fractionally rubbed price-clipped dust wrapper. Over one hundred and sixty of Thesiger’s superb photographs, predominantly full-page or double-spread and with many hitherto unpublished; plus a series of short introductory essays by the author. £35

WILFRED THESIGER. My Kenya Days. HarperCollins, London 1994. First edition. This copy signed by the author on the title page. Small 4to. xiv + 224pp. Illustrated with nearly 150 of the author’s monochrome photographs, plus one full-page map. In fine state with very good dust wrapper, lightly faded at the spine panel and with a touch of further uneven fading to the upper margin of the rear panel. A record of Thesiger’s thirty years living and travelling in Kenya. £125

WILFRED THESIGER. The Danakil Diary. Journeys Through Abyssinia 1930-1934. HarperCollins, London 1996. First edition. This copy signed by the author on the title page. 8vo. xvii, 214pp. 8vo. Illustrated with two colour maps, forty-six photographs by the author, many hitherto unpublished, and with several of the author's sketch maps in the text. Some toning to the paperstock, as is invariably the case, but thereafter a fine copy in virtually fine price-clipped dust wrapper. £125

WILFRED THESIGER. The Danakil Diary. Journeys Through Abyssinia 1930-1934. HarperCollins, London 1996. First edition. 8vo. xvii, 214pp. 8vo. Illustrated with two colour maps, forty-six photographs by the author, many hitherto unpublished, and with several of the author’s sketch maps in the text. A touch of tanning to paperstock and a tiny hint of spotting to the top edge. A virtually fine copy in virtually fine dust wrapper, lightly toned at the spine panel. £35

WILFRED THESIGER. Wilfred Thesiger in Africa. Edited by Christopher Morton and Philip N.Grover. HarperPress, London 2010. First edition, published to accompany a centenary exhibition at the Pitt Rivers Museum. 4to. 280pp. Illustrated with nearly two hundred photographs from Thesiger’s personal collection, many hitherto unpublished, and with essays by Alexander Maitland, Sir David Attenborough, Benedict Allen, Jeremy Coote, Elizabeth Edwards and Schuyler Jones. Two tiny indentations to the upper board else a fine copy in fine dust wrapper. £20

H.W.TILMAN. The Eight Sailing / Mountain-Exploration Books. Diadem Books Ltd., London 1987. First edition thus. 8vo. 956pp. Illustrated with maps and photographs, including some in colour. A virtually fine copy in dust wrapper, just fractionally rubbed at the upper edge. A nine-page introduction by Colin Putt precedes this omnibus edition of Tilman’s six Mischief books (Mischief in Patagonia, Mischief among the Penguins, Mischief in Greenland, Mostly Mischief, Mischief Goes South, and In Mischief's Wake) plus Ice With Everything and Triumph and Tribulation which recount subsequent seafaring adventures in Sea Breeze and Baroque following the loss of Mischief of the east Greenland coast. £30

MARK TWAIN. Life on the Mississippi. Chatto & Windus, London 1883. First edition in the correct first state binding, this UK issue preceding the American edition by a matter of days. 8vo. xxv, 561pp + xxxii publisher’s (first state) catalogue dated March 1883. Pictorial red cloth, gilt lettered at the spine and upper board. Patterned endpapers. With a tissue-protected frontispiece, and title page decoration and over three hundred illustrations as plates and in the text. The backstrip cloth very slightly faded. Some wear to the spine ends and just a touch more to the corner tips, and a strip of discolouration to the fore edge of the upper board. Fore edge lightly spotted, and with some spotting to several preliminary and concluding leaves. A good copy, really very crisp internally.  The author’s memoirs of his life as a steamboat pilot on the Mississippi River before the American Civil War, plus an account of his post-war river trip from New Orleans and Saint Paul. £225

EVELYN WAUGH. Labels. A Mediterranean Journal. Duckworth, London 1930. First edition of the author’s fourth book. 8vo. 206pp. With a frontispiece (drawn by the author), three pages of plates, a double-spread map and another map in the text. Cloth a little faded at the backstrip and at the margins of the rear board, and with a little marking and chafing to the upper board. Edges spotted and the endpapers browned, with a little more quite light spotting to preliminary and concluding leaves. Quite a crisp and bright copy in the uncommon dust wrapper, somewhat tanned, worn, chafed and nicked with some loss to the spine ends and the upper edge. Book Society Recommendation label affixed to the front panel, fitting in quite splendidly with the wrapper design. £300

EVELYN WAUGH. Remote People. Duckworth, London 1931. First edition. 8vo. 240pp. With a frontispiece, six plates and two folding maps. A near-invisible sliver of fading to the cloth at the head of the upper board. Free endpapers lightly toned, and with some creasing to the edge of one of the folding maps, a result of the book being carelessly closed. Handsome former owner armorial bookplate to the front pastedown. A very good copy, lacking the most uncommon dust wrapper. The author’s fifth book, and his second collection of travel writing, recounting reportage in Ethiopia and throughout the British Empire. £75

RICHARD WRIGHT. Pagan Spain. The Bodley Head, London 1960. First UK edition. 8vo. 191pp. Just a hint of soiling to the top edge. Very good indeed in very lightly rubbed and dust soiled dust wrapper.  An account of the author’s two visits to Spain, recording encounters with aristocrats, intellectuals, priests, flamenco dancers, clerks, bull-fighters, pimps and prostitutes. £35

GAVIN YOUNG. From Sea to Shining Sea. A Present-Day Journey into America's Past. With illustrations by Jack McCarthy. Hutchinson, London 1995. First edition. 8vo. 297pp. Map-illustrated endpapers. A virtually fine copy in dust wrapper. Former owner book plate to front pastedown. £10