Journal Historique du Dernier Voyage que feu M. de la Sale fit dans le Golfe de Mexique, pour Trouver l'Embouchure & le Cours de la Riviere de Missicipi, Nommee a Present la Riviere de Saint Louis, qu

$3,500 · Offered by Book Collector Inc

Author: Henri Joutel (c1643-1725) Year: 1713 Publisher: Chez Estienne Robinot Place: Paris Description: xxxiv+386 pages, lacking the prescribed folding map but anomalously bound with "Carte de la Louisiane" from Antoine Le Page du Pratz Histoire, 1758, bound in at page 138. Duodecimo (6 1/2 " x 4") bound in original publisher's full contemporary speckled calf with five raised spine bands and red label in gilt lettering and decorative inserts. ( Church 855. Graff 2251. Harrisse 750. Howes J266. Phillips, Maps of America, p. 367. Wagner, Spanish Southwest, 79) First edition. Henri Joutel the preeminent eyewitness historian of the La Salle expedition. Henri Joutel was a native of Rouen, France, which also was the hometown of René Robert Cavelier, Sieur de La Salle. At the time the expedition was being organized, his amanuensis tells us, Joutel had just returned from "sixteen or seventeen years" in the army. Influenced by La Salle's reputation as an explorer and his own acquaintance with other members of the expedition, he decided to join. The last phase of La Salle’s extraordinary career centered on his proposal to fortify the mouth of the Mississippi and to invade and conquer part of the Spanish province of Mexico. He planned to accomplish all this with some 200 Frenchmen, aided by buccaneers and an army of 15,000 Indians—a venture that caused his detractors to question his sanity. But the king saw a chance to harass the Spaniards, with whom he was at war, and approved the proj

• Binding: Hardcover

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