Letters on Egypt, Edom, and the Holy Land.
London: Henry Colburn, 1838 Stock Code: 139479
First edition of this appealing epistolary narrative of an expedition conducted in 1836-7. Lindsay (1812-1880), book collector and writer on art, was the eldest son of James Lindsay, twenty-fourth earl of Crawford and seventh earl of Balcarres. He inherited a substantial legacy from a relative and this, "combined with his family's vast incomes derived from coalfields in Lancashire, was more than sufficient to give him financial independence" (ODNB). He travelled from Cadiz to Palmyra, taking in Egypt, Israel, Jordan, Lebanon and Syria, in company with "my friend and near relation" William Wardlaw Ramsay, who receives a heartfelt tribute in the preface, having died at Damascus in June 1837; Lindsay includes extracts from Ramsay's private journal in his notes. Volume II concludes with a 100-page letter from the book's dedicatee, John William Farren, the British consul-general in Syria, giving an overview of the present state of that country, with particular regard to its conquest in 1831 by Muhammad Ali of Egypt.
Description
2 volumes, octavo. Original slate-green fine diaper-grain cloth, gilt lettered spines, the title within a cartouche of palm trees, sides with blind fillet border enclosing an arabesque block, pale primrose-yellow-coated endpapers.
Illustrations
Lithograph frontispiece to each volume by William Wardlaw Ramsay, printed by R. Martin & Co.
Condition
Spines lightly sunned, some loss of fabric to joints, light abrasions and marks to covers, fore-edge of bindings bumped, frontispieces foxed, a slightly battered but honest copy, the original cloth bindings sound, the text clean, with the publisher's 6-page catalogue at the end of vol. II.
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