Missionary Travels and Researches in South Africa David Livingstone first 1857

LIVINGSTONE, David. 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. London: John Murray, 1857.
F
irst edition, second issue according to the generally accepted Bradlow sequence, distinguished by the engraved plates facing pp. 65 and 225 in black and white rather than tinted, and by the additional leaves signed 8* and 8+. Thick octavo. x, 687 pp., [6] pp. publisher's advertisements dated "November 1, 1857". Complete with engraved portrait frontispiece, numerous illustrations in the text, folding plates, two maps including the folding "Map of South Africa" at rear, and Livingstone's route map retained loose in the rear pocket; all 47 illustrations and maps present as called for. Original brown publisher's cloth, covers and spine elaborately blocked in blind, spine lettered in gilt.
A very good copy overall. Spine a shade faded and gilt dulled, cloth lightly rubbed and marked, corners softened. Internally generally clean with sporadic spotting and handling marks. Binding cracked with webbing exposed in several places though still structurally sound and holding firmly. Folding maps with expected creasing from use. 6 pages of adverts at the rear, rather than the usual 8, so either a variant or the final leaf not present, although no signs of removal. A respectable and complete example of one of the great nineteenth-century African exploration narratives.
 
Livingstone's account of his travels across southern and central Africa rapidly became one of the defining travel books of the Victorian period. It contains the first published description by a European of the Victoria Falls ("Mosi-oa-Tunya"), extensive observations on geography, trade, indigenous societies and missionary activity, and helped cement Livingstone's extraordinary public reputation in Britain. The work also played a major role in shaping later imperial and missionary attitudes toward central Africa.