xxii, [blank leaf], 268 pp. With 2 folding engraved maps loose in rear endpaper pocket. (4to) 24.3x19 cm (9½x7½"), modern calf, raised spine bands, morocco lettering piece. First Edition.

Important geography of the arctic regions with two excellent maps. Lada-Mocarski notes that  Engel "examined diligently the maps and writings of Kirilov (the compiler of the first Russian atlas), Buache, Delisle, Muller, Gmelin, and others--and invariably, with some justification, found something wrong with each of them. He examined these works with regard to the northern parts of both Asia and America. Most of the questions he raised were valid and the present-day student of these regions would profit by reading his work with a modern maps before him, to see who was right or wrong--and when wrong, how wrong. A valuable part of Engel's present work is his rejection of the persistent belief held by many of his contemporary geographers and cartographers that California was an island. He unequivocally asserted... that (in translation), 'California is not an island but a peninsula'". The two maps, engraved by I.A. Chovin, are "Carte de la partie Septentrionale et Occidentale de l'Amerique " and "Carte de la partie Septentrionale et Orientale de l'Asie " with four insets of North American regions. According to Wagner, the first map is "chiefly interesting for the remarkable imagination displayed by the maker about the rivers entering the northwest coast... Lahotan's geography is followed, but the famous Lake Tahuglauk is almost thirty degrees of longitude removed from the coast."  The two maps are trimmed to the neat lines.

Provenance: Alta California Books, 12/69

References: Howes E-149; Lada-Mocarski 18; Sabin 22571; Streeter sale 3460; Wagner Northwest Coast 603 & 604; Wickersham 3542.