Two parts in one. [22], 299, [1]; [32], 178, [2], 303-355 pp. With copper-engraved frontipiece; one (of two) folding copper-engraved map; 6 folding copper-engraved plates. (8vo) 7¼x4¼, period calf, spine tooled in gilt, raised bands, morocco lettering piece. First Edition in English, "Bon" issue.
First English edition of Hennepin's Nouvelle découverte d'un très grand pays...dans l'Amérique... (Utrecht, 1697), the second work of the somewhat tarnished Franciscan priest. Howes notes that "in this second book Hennepin adds, to his actual voyage up the Mississippi, a pretended one down that stream prior to La Salle, an imposture which has consigned him to eternal obloquy." Nonetheless, a rare and significant work, with marvelous plates showing Niagara Falls, a buffalo, the assassination of La Salle, the cruelties of the Iroquois, etc. The map shows the eastern have of present U.S. and Canada. This the first issue, or "Bon" issue, so-called because line one of the printer imprint ends with "Bon," the first three letters of Bonwick. The second part of the book is titled "A Continuation of the New Discovery of a Vast Country in America..." Field 685; Graff 1862; Howes H416; Sabin 31371. Bookplate of Sir Alexander Don.
Condition:
Some rubbing and wear to covers, joints cracked; old ink drawing of a man in a turban on the back of the frontspiece which has bled through, smaller crude sketch in margin of frontis, several ownership signatures to title-page, old shelf marks on front pastedown with remains of earlier bookplate; some soiling, aging and darkening to the contents, a number of plates with short mostly marginal tears, map soiled with darkening, several repaired tears; lacking the map that should be in the second part; good to very good.