First Editions. Bates travelled with Alfred Russell Wallace in Amazonia for two years 1848–9, and remained behind when Wallace returned to England. He stayed there for eleven years, supporting his own entomological collecting interests by sending back specimens for public and private collections, “In total he dispatched some 14,700 species back to England, 8000 of them new to science” (ODNB). His application supported by Darwin, a personal friend, Bates became Assistant-Secretary to the Royal Geographical Society, his “twenty-seven-year tenure at the Royal Geographical Society coincided with a crucial period in the development of geography in Britain, a transition from its essentially explorer tradition to its establishment as an academic discipline in schools and universities... It was said of Bates that he knew all of the great and most of the lesser travellers of this heyday of Victorian exploration. Besides practical advice to such travellers, he was a skilled editor of their tales...” Attractive and well-illustrated compilation, contributions from Whymper, Vambery, Freshfield, and Michell, illustrators include Doré.
6 volumes bound in 3, 4to (320 × 240 mm). Contemporary bottle green half calf on green grained cloth boards, tan morocco labels, marbled edges. Profusely illustrated with steel engravings, many full-page. Occasional foxing and browning, spines sunned and a little mottled, else very good.
