PERON, François & FREYCINET, Louis de

Voyages et découvertes aux terres australes, fait par ordre du gouvernement, sur les corvettes Le Géographe, Le Naturaliste et la schélette Le Casuarina, pendant les années 1800, 1801, 1802, 1803 et 1804. Written by Péron. Second edition, revised, corrected and increased by M. Louis de Freycinet. Paris, Arthus Bertrand, 1824. 4 volumes of text in-8 (207 x 128 mm), and one volume of atlas in-folio 337 x 250 mm). Text: lithographed portrait of François Péron in frontispiece, XXIV, 400 pp. for volume I; 2 ff.n.ch., 532 pp. for volume II; 2 ff.n.ch., 432 pp. for volume III; 2 ff.n.ch., 355 (misquoted 356), 1 f.n.ch. of errata for volume IV. Atlas: engraved title, 5 ff.n.ch. of table of plates, 68 engraved plates (27 in color). Uniformly bound in black half-chagrin, smooth spine, caissons decorated in cold, gilt title (period binding). Chadenat, 4378; Ferguson, 978. See Hill 1329 (for the 1807-1816 edition). Definitive edition of the famous voyage. It contains, among other things, a larger atlas than the first edition, which had only 54 plates. The second edition contains important changes, especially to the geographical places whose names, first given in French in the first edition, were changed into English names. Here the atlas contains 68 plates including a double page map, 8 simple maps, two plates of notated music, and 27 portraits of natives or animals in color. This is a capital work for the discovery of Australia, especially of its southern coast, and it appears as an important step for the knowledge of the local fauna and flora: during the voyage, a collection of more than 2500 new species came to enrich the collections of the Museum of Natural History. Many of the plates in the atlas represent the most extraordinary species that Europeans saw for the first time (wombats, cassowaries, kangaroos, etc.). Scattered foxing, otherwise a very nice copy, complete with the portrait in the first volume of text and all the plates required for the atlas. The rare errata leaf is also present. Provenance: Buisnes library (wet stamp) - General R. Vaudable (bookplate) - Ginette and Marcel Lavergne (bookplate).