Richard Hakluyt's remarkable compilation of the voyages and explorations of the English nation, from the time of King Arthur through the 16th century, concentrating on the age of Queen Elizabeth. This three-volume second edition is much expanded from the 1589 first edition in one volume. As Hill states, describing this edition, "This enormous work - it contains one million and seven hundred thousand words - is the most complete collection of voyages and discoveries (by land as well as by sea) and of the nautical achievements of the Elizabethans.... After studying at Christ Church, Oxford, where among much else he learned four languages, Hakluyt became the first lecturer on modern geography. He was later appointed chaplain to the Paris embassy, and, after publication of this book, chaplain of the Savoy and canon of Westminster Abbey. Although Hakluyt himself never traveled farther than France, he inspired some of the great overseas explorations of his time and was one of the leading spirits in the Elizabethan maritime expansion. He met many of the great navigators: Drake, Raleigh, Gilbert, Frobisher, and others; corresponded with Ortelius and Mercator; and collected all the material on voyages he could find... Hakluyt was a vigorous propagandist and empire-builder; his purpose was to further English expansion overseas. He saw England's greatest opportunity in the colonization of America... He pleaded for a voyage to find the Northwest Passage, which he firmly believed to exist, and for the expansion for English interests in Asia..."

The section on the conquest of Cadiz by Essex at the end of Vol. I (pp. 607-[620] in the original issue) was ordered suppressed by Queen Elizabeth in 1599. Subsequently, there were reprints of it which are often placed into copies of the second edition. The present copy has the reprint of c.1795 in place of the original, comprising pp. 607-617 (misnumbered 417), with the verso of the last page blank. The very scarce original map is not present in this copy (neither was it in the Hill copy, with the notation "lacking as usual"); in its stead is substituted a double-hemisphere map of the world by Nicolas Sanson, c.1650 - it is trimmed, backed with paper, and placed at the end of Vol. III. With the bookplate of Sidney Herbert Williams in each volume; rubberstamps of the Pony Express Museum to endpapers, back of the map, and a few other places. Hill 743; Printing & the Mind of Man 105; Sabin 29595, 29597 & 29598.