Non-fiction

Polar Exploration Cards – John Player – First Series Complete -1916

A complete set of 25 cards of the sought after First Series of Polar Exploration cards issued by John Player & Sons of Nottingham, England. Good condition front and back.

Includes – Lieut. Sir E.H. Shackleton C.V.O.; The Northern Party at the South Magnetic Pole; The Aurora Borealis; The Aurora Australis; The British Antarctic Expedition 1910; Dr Fridjof Nansen; The “Nimrod” Picking up the Northern Party; A Remarkable Fumarole in the Old Crater of Mount Erebus etc

First series Complete and getting scarce

$120.00

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Polar Exploration Cards – Players Series 2

A complete set of 25 cards in very good condition of the 2nd series of Polar Exploration cigarette cards by John Player. Elusive complete.

The Terra Nova Expedition – Scott, Evans, Oates, Wilson (Uncle Bill) and the victorious Norwegian Expedition including “Amundsen at the South Pole”

$120.00

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Discovery – The Quest for the Great South Land – Estensen

Miriam Estensen’s very readable book about the hunt for land in the Southern Hemisphere.

Published by Allen & Unwin in 1998. Octavo, 286 pages including and index and extensive bibliography. Nicely illustrated very good condition.

Estensen employs a much wider and very much earlier time frame for this work. Despite this we have the Spanish, Dutch and Portuguese activities before the French and the English … and a good balance is achieved regarding the relevance of all.

The Quest well researched nicely written

$20.00

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The Cruise of the “Cachalot” Round the World after Sperm Whales – Frank Bullen – 1899

Published by Smith and Elder, a second edition, London 1899 in the more upmarket binding with the striking gilt whale to the front board.

Large octavo, 380 pages with 7 pages of plates and a folding map.

Bullen, a homeless waif, went so sea at twelve years old. After six years he landed at New Bedford, Massachusetts where he secured a berth on the “Cachalot” a whaler that would be his home for the next three years. A ripping yarn of fact and fiction actually based on the authors experiences on the “Splendid” of New Bedford in whaling grounds off “the Solanders, Vau Vau and the Australian Gulf”.

Admired by Rudyard Kipling as the best Whaling Narrative.

Best Whaling Story according to Kipling

$140.00

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Rebecca – Daphne Du Maurier

Published by Victor Gollancz, London a 1956 edition. We simply love these yellow jacketed “Cheap editions” very collectable in this condition … very good and a very good jacket. First published in 1938 and then again every year (sometimes multiple times) except 1945 until 1956 one of the great years of all time.

Daphne du Maurier’s Rebecca one of the greatest romantic novels of all time … a young bride is thrust into the house of the dead former wife … this “’Cheap Edition” has become iconic and is collected for its near absurd popularity.

“Last night I dreamt I went to Manderley again”

$60.00

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Fiji and The Fijians (1835-1856) – G.C. Henderson

A first edition on Henderson’s book on Fiji and the Fijians a volume published to elucidate the Journal of Rev Thomas Williams who has spent the period !840-1853 as a Missionary in Fiji. Williams being regraded as the principal authority on the state if society among Fijians when European first came upon them.

Published by Angus and Robertson, Sydney in 1931.

Large octavo, 33 pages nicely illustrated throughout with images from early engravings, early photographs and charts. Very good condition and with the author’s “Compliments”’ stamp on the end paper ad his manuscript note “To dear old Jeff – from the Author”

A very useful Preface sets the scene and purpose for the book. The first chapter proper refers to the “Mitchellian Manuscripts” the Williams Journal and paper held at the Mitchell … and other primary materials held elsewhere including in the UK. Very good chapters on the Discovery of Fiji … the Duff, James cook and often overlooked Bellingshausen among them. The Bellingshausen journals had yet to be translated to English at the date of this book. The work then moves on to a description of the archipelago, centres of interest and the people. Mission work, medical practices and a chapter on Ono-I-Lau first visited by Calvert. Language and literature etc etc.

Well written account regarding an important historical period. A very good copy.

$120.00

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Polar Exploration Cards – John Player – First Series Complete -1916

Polar Exploration Cards – Players Series 2

Discovery – The Quest for the Great South Land – Estensen

The Cruise of the “Cachalot” Round the World after Sperm Whales – Frank Bullen – 1899

Rebecca – Daphne Du Maurier

Fiji and The Fijians (1835-1856) – G.C. Henderson

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