The Early Days Of California, Embracing What I Saw And Heard There With Scenes In The Pacific

Philadelphia: John E. Potter. Good+. 1860. Hardcover. Farnham describes his travels and adventures in California in 1840. He left Oregon by sailing ship for California (by way of Hawaii) and his narrative is filled with local color. The book is illustrated with 20 plates and a frontis illustration. This is a later printing of the original 1844 edition which was titled "Travels in the Californias." The book was republished in 1859 with a new title, "The Early Days of California." The author says that this book is a sequel to his previous book, "Travels in the Great Western Prairies" which was published in 1843. The covers are the original publishe's dark green cloth binding; the gilt spine lettering is dull, but still legible. There is foxing to the frontis illustration and its tissue guard, and some light tanning to the title page opposite the tissue guard. There is an occasional bit of scattered foxing, but most pages are clean and bright as are the plates. There is a bit of extremity wear to the tips and the top and bottom of the spine and the spine is leaning slightly. There is an old owner name in an old hand on the front end paper. He covers Indians, missions, Mexican War, gold, sea voyage, villages, traders, trappers, Hawaii, etc. Ref: Howes F49, Cowan p. 203, Graff 1294, Smith 2999, Wagner Camp 107: 13; B&W Illustrations; 12mo 7" - 7½" tall; 314 pages .