Flora Americae Septentrionalis; or, A Systematic Arrangement and Description of the Plants of North America. Containing, besides what have been described by preceding authors, many new and rare species, collected during twelve years travels and residence. by Pursh, Frederick - 1814

Fleet Street, London: White, Cochrane & co., 1814. Two volumes, 1814 [1813]. Octavo, illustrated with 24 plain stipple-engraved plates, pp xxxvi, 751, (i),(vi), untrimmed, age-toned and with foxing heavy on some pages and plates but almost , or entirely, lacking on the larger parts of the volumes, one page more heavily browned from the insertion of a paper at some point, with the blindstamp of the Carnegie Institution on the title pages and also the tiny stamp of the Haverford College Library; the 'sold' label of Haverford is loosely inserted. Recently bound in grey boards, new endpapers, the paper spine labels reading "The Plants of North America". SCARCE. ["The first publication on plants from all of North America above Mexico and the first to publish plants from the Pacific Coast, Pursh's Flora includes more than 3,000 species and 470 genera, including the first descriptions of more than 100 species collected by the Lewis and Clark expedition" (ANB). Sabin 66728. Pursh, a German botanist, came to America in 1799 as a traveler, collector, gardener, and landscape artist. From 1803 until about 1805, he was in charge of William Hamilton's estate near Philadelphia before becoming employed in the botanizing expeditions of Benjamin Smith Barton. From 1809 to 1810 he headed Hosack's Elgin Botanic Garden in New York. In 1811 Pursh traveled to England where he produced his Flora under the patronage of A. B. Lambert, to whom the work is dedicated. Pursh relied upon the Lewis and Clark specimens entrusted to M'Mahon for many of his descriptions of the Pacific coast plants; he also consulted some forty-one other botanical collections for his research. Apperently William Hooker, the artist of Salisbury's Paradisus Londinensis, was responsible for a good portion of both the drawings and engravings. Printing of the Flora Americae Septentrionalis was completed in late 1813, as the Linnaean Society possesses a presentation copy dated 21 December 1813. ]. Nissen BBI 1570; Pritzel 7370; Stafleu & Cowan TL2 8404. . First Edition. Boards. Good.