Travels into North America, containing It's Natural History

1770. KALM, Peter. Travels into North America, containing It's Natural History, and A Circumstantial Account of Its Plantations and Agriculture in General...The Civil, Ecclesiastical and Commercial State of the Country. Warrington. 1770-71. Three volumes. xvi,[8],400; 352; viii,310,[14]pp. plus folding map and six plates. A very handsome set bound in later full paneled and blind calf, with raised bands and red spine labels. HOWES K5, "b." STREETER SALE 823. SABIN 36989. Coats, THE PLANT HUNTERS, pp.277-79. LARSON 329. LANDE 482. TPL 214. MEISEL III, p.346. TAXONOMIC LITERATURE 3493. The first English edition, translated by John Reinhold Forster, after the original Swedish edition published in Stockholm in 1753-61. Kalm was in America in 1748-49, using Philadelphia as his base of operations. Much of the first volume is devoted to his observations on the country around that city; much of the second volume relates to his sojourn in the Swedish settlements in southern New Jersey; and the remaining volume concerns his journey north through New York to Montreal and Quebec, and his experiences there in 1749. "One of the most reliable eighteenth-century accounts of American natural history, social organization, and political situation. Kalm gives an especially important account of the American Swedish settlements" -Streeter. This is also an important work of natural history and botany. Kalm was a student of Linnaeus, and he gathered impressive collections during his American travels. He was also a close friend of the American naturalist, John Bartram, and travelled with him into New York State. The text is accompanied by an excellent and large map, "A New and Accurate Map of Part of North America...," which shows the northeastern section of North America from Virginia north and west to Ohio.