Au Texas [with] Au Texas Quatrième Partie Complément

Paris: La Librairie Phalanstérienne, 1854. First edition. 8vo, 22x14cm. Au Texas: [4], 190, [2], [191]-194, [1]-4pp. plus two folding, lithographed maps with outline color: Étas-Unis. Avril. (7" x 12"), Gravé par les Sres, Imp. Lemercier, Paris; [and:] Texas d'aprés la Carte Publiée par J. H. Colton.... (11" x 13.5"), Gravé chez Delamare rue St. André-des-Arcs, 45; Paris Imp. Lemercier Rue de Seine St. G. in 57. Au Texas Quatrième Partie Complément: 113pp. plus [1] currency conversion table. Contemporary quarter red morocco with raised bands and stamped in gilt. Marbled paper boards and marbled endpapers. First few leaves professionally touched up at upper margin else clean internally. Spine slightly cocked, small split to upper joint at head of spine, boards worn at corners. From the B.A. McKinney (Dallas) collection, with stamp to bottom of text block. French socialist philosopher, Victor Prosper Considerant (1808-1893) journeyed on horseback through the Texas countryside in 1853 beside his fellow Charles Fourier disciple and founder of several American utopian communities, Albert Brisbane. Considerant's Au Texas is an account of that sojourn, a detailed and full description of the state written with glowing optimism. The book was published and distributed as a recruiting tool for emigration to his utopian community near Dallas, La Reunion, which is also planned out in detail in the work. The settlement was established the next year with close to 500 colonists relocating to the 47,000 acres Considerant had purchased. Jenkins, in his Basic Texas Books, elaborates on the community's meteoric downfall: "These [colonists] included writers, musicians, artists, artisans, and free spirits, but only two farmers. As might be expected, a couple of years of utopian bickering and successive Texas droughts brought the experiment to a speedy collapse. The colony was abandoned, and Considerant moved to San Antonio, where he lived until 1869, when he returned to France." The maps in this work are of interest and beauty, the book often being found with them removed. The full map of Texas shows cities, townships, and communities such as Dallas which was incorporated two years later. Au Texas is scarce and the supplement more so. This is a superior example of Considerant's important volume on European colonization in Texas. Basic Texas Books 33. Howes C697. Sabin 15925.