Written in response to the ongoing controversy between Canada and the U.S. over the Alaska boundary, and originally intended for private use, the publishers felt that it was "of such inestimable worth as an historical and geographical treatise on that subject, that we have concluded to publish it...." Howes notes that it was produced in a "small ed." With complimentary slip from the publisher laid in. Howes D88; Wickersham 1941.