OVER THE SEA AND FAR AWAY BEING A NARRATIVE OF WANDERINGS ROUND THE WORLD BY THOMAS WOODBINE HINCHLIFF, M.S., F.R.G.S. PRESIDENT OF THE ALPINE CLUB ... WITH FOURTEEN ILLUSTRATIONS ENGRAVED ON WOOD BY G. PEARSON FROM PHOTOGRAPHS AND SKETCHES. London: Longmans, Green, and Co., 1876. 22.5x15.5 cm, pp. [i-vii] viii-x [xi] xii-xiv [xv-xvi] [1] 2-416, 14 inserted plates with illustrations engraved on wood by George Pearson, original pictorial green cloth, front panel stamped in black and gold, spine panel stamped in gold, rear panel stamped in blind, gray coated endpapers, top edge untrimmed. First edition. Thomas Woodbine Hinchliff (1825-1882), British barrister, Lincoln's Inn, mountaineer, amateur botanist and world traveler, took part in the founding of the Alpine Club, 1857, and was its first secretary and, later, its seventh president, 1875-1877. A hand injury curtailed Hinchliff's climbing activity but he continued to travel widely. In 1873 Hinchliff and a friend, William Henry Rawson, set off to travel around the world. In two years they crossed nearly 36,000 miles of ocean, while spending about six months "in sojourns and expeditions" on land. In 1876 Hinchliff published OVER THE SEA AND FAR AWAY, his account of his journey around the world. Hinchliff and Rawson arrived in California by ship from South America in the spring of 1875 and stayed at the Grand Hotel in San Francisco, from which they made excursions to the mountains in Marin County and to White Sulphur Springs in St. Helena (California's oldest resort, founded in 1852, now largely destroyed by fire in 2020). Their two-day stay in Yosemite Valley in mid-April, reached by horseback from Mariposa over a rough new trail (then under construction) via Skelton's and Hite's Cove is found on pages 242-292. A separate trip to the Calaveras Grove of Big Trees (due to heavy snow in the Sierra between the valley and the grove) is found on pages 293-306. This is one of the more detailed accounts of a trip to and from Yosemite published in the early 1870s. Regarding California Hinchliff states: "I enjoyed our spring rambles in California even more that I could have expected. The wonders of the Yosemite Valley, the sublimity of the forests, the shining snows of the Sierra Nevada, the lovely hills of the Coast ranges, and the vast regions of park-like land clothed in sheets of innumerable flowers, all combine to form a picture of beauty and magnificence which can never fade from the memory of the fortunate beholder" (preface, page ix). The entire account of the California visit is worthy of reprinting. Rocq (1970) 15856. Not in Voth, et al. Previous owner's signature at the top fore-edge of the verso of the front free endpaper. Light wear to lower spine end, corner tips bumped, short tear in fore-edge margin of front free endpaper, inner hinges tender with several hairline cracks, a very good copy. (#167188).
No statement of printing.