Dalrymple Alexander Compiler (1 results)

8vo, pp. 16, 172, 33; bound in contemporary deerskin, once stained purple but now rather faded, the covers ruled in gilt with a circular medallion frame in the centre left uncoloured and containing the ink inscription 'To Lady Banks, A.D. 1796', spine gilt (a bit rubbed, but very sound). First edition: an extraordinary presentation copy from the compiler to Lady Banks, i.e. Dorothea, née Hugessen (1758-1828), wife of Sir Joseph Banks (1743-1820), president of the Royal Society, commissioner of the Board of Trade, president of the Royal Institution, botanist, and explorer, who accompanied Capt. James Cook on the Endeavour on his first voyage to the South Seas (1768-1771). The recipient has inscribed the title page with her name, 'D. Banks'. This miscellany was compiled by Alexander Dalrymple (1737-1808), the leading hydrographer of his generation, and a man of great dedication and prolific output who had long been passionately involved in the argument over the possible existence of a great southern continent, and had been much aggrieved, despite his nautical inexperience, not to have been awarded the command of the 1768 expedition which was assigned to James Cook. Dalrymple continued to direct his energies into hydrographical research, but this volume was the fruit of his leisure, as he explains in his preface: 'My Life has not been a Life of Idleness, but of Labour; although I have published almost as much as would load a Pack-horse, yet have I never been a Pack-horse-Drudge! I have indeed found in Poetry the best relief to the Mind, in Researches so fatiguing as the investigation of Hydrographical Truth, amidst the variety of discordant authorities, all of them claiming implicit confidence; and I am not ashamed to avow, that the idea of communicating pleasure to others, is very agreeable to me.' The songs in this volume are from a wide variety of sources, from Ben Jonson, Samuel Daniel, and George Wither, to Aphra Behn, John Gay, Samuel Johnson, Oliver Goldsmith, Christopher Smart, Ann Radcliffe, and Anna Laetitia Aikin. The 33-page appendix was a more personal affair: 'To the disconsolate widow of my lamented Brother Lt. Col. James Dalrymple, I am indebted for the MSS from whence the following were extracted: the Collection is in 3 vols. 4to, written in his own hand. Of their merit The Publick are to judge, and I will not let the partiality of a Brother anticipate that opinion, but I cannot let them go into the World without my acknowledgement to my Sister-in-Law, for the obligations I have received from her affection'. This rather idiosyncratic anthology is not uncommon, but the association here between Dalrymple and Lady Banks is quite remarkable, and the modest presentation binding, if now somewhat rubbed and faded, is itself very unusual.…