A Narrative of Voyages and Travels, in the Northern and Southern Hemisphere, comprising three voyages

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Author: Amsa Delano (1763-1817) Year: 1817 Publisher: E G House for the author Place: Boston Description: 599 pages with frontispice, plate and map. Octavo (8 3/4" x 5 1/4") Bound in leather, respined with gilt. ( HOWES D233. SABIN 19349. SHAW SHOEMAKER 40635. HILL 463. RICH, pp.92-93. FORBES 463. NAYLOR 64.) First edition. Amasa Delano, whose Voyages and Travels (1817) was the source for Herman Melville’s Benito Cereno (1855), was born in Massachusetts. After serving briefly in the Continental army during the American Revolution, Delano began a lifelong career as sailor, ship captain, and occasional shipbuilder, often in conjunction with his brother Samuel. Delano gave significant space to an account of his capture of the Spanish ship Tryal off the coast of Chile in 1801 and to the events subsequent to the capture. Seeing the ship in apparent difficulty, Delano went aboard, was told that the ship was long without provisions, remained on board while a boat went for food and water, and learned that the slaves had revolted and captured the ship only when its captain, Benito Cereno, jumped into his boat as it was leaving. Melville’s rewriting of that account is one of his most famous narratives, “ Benito Cereno .” Voyages and Travels focuses on his experiences in the Pacific and Indian Oceans from 1790 until 1807, during which time Delano several times circumnavigated the globe. In Voyages and Travels Delano clearly wants to be both informative and entertaining. He offers advice

• Binding: Hardcover

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