Missionary Travels and Researches in South Africa; Including a Sketch of Sixteen Years' Residence in the Interior of Africa, and a Journey From the Cape of Good Hope to Loanda on the West Coast, Thence Across the Continent, Down the River Zambesi, to the Eastern Ocean

John Murray : London, 1857 First edition, ix + 687 pp, rare state with three page eights. In the first two issues, the frontispiece and two other plates are tinted lithographs- Livingstone was dissatisfied and had them re-engraved on wood for the rest of the edition in a third state. Folding frontispiece, engraved portrait by William Holl after Henry Phillips, 22 wood engravings, folding printed table with wood-engraved illustration, 1 (of 2) folding lithographed map by John Arrowsmith with route coloured by hand in red (at rear), and numerous wood-engraved illustrations in the text. Contemporary tan half calf, with spine decoratively tooled and lettered in gilt. Marbled endpapers, inner hinges strengthened. Spine laid down. Some wear to corners and to spine. "Perhaps the most famous of all African exploration books, this recounts Dr. Livingstone's travels through South Africa, with the discovery of Lake Ngami, while accompanied by his wife and William Cotton Oswell. Oswell and the author continued their journey, discovering the Zambesi River, and, eventually, the Victoria Falls." - Czech. In the period between 1849 and 1856, his explorations took him to Lake Ngami across the Kalahari Desert, to the Zambezi River, and from there west to the Atlantic Ocean at Loanda (today's Sao Paulo de Loanda, Angola). He turned down a chance to return to England, but entrusted his reports, maps, and letters for transport. The ship went down with all hands except one, and all of Livingstone's papers were lost, forcing him to re-create everything. He followed his track back to Linyanti (in Botswana) and then decided to assess the possibilities of the Zambezi as a highway into the heart of Africa by following it to the Indian Ocean. He reached Victoria Falls in 1855, confirming what he had heard from natives for many years. "Scenes so lovely must have been gazed upon by angels in their flight," he wrote. It was the only site in Africa that he named with English words. Livingstone reached Quilimane on the coast of Mozambique on 20 May 1856, but he got there by cutting across a loop of the Zambezi to Tete, inadvertently missing the Kebrabasa Rapids, a drop of about six hundred feet. Hence, he was unaware that the river was not navigable when he arrived in London at the end of the year to promote its potential to the British government. In the meantime, the LMS had informed him that his expeditions were not the kind of gospel work it expected of him, and he resigned the next year. In England, he was feted as a national hero. The present book, written in six months, became an immediate best-seller, with seven editions published in rapid succession." (Delaney). Czech p97; Mendelssohn I, 908-910; Abbey Travel 347; PMM 341.. 1st Edition. Hardcover. Good.