Visions of America: The Stephen White Collection

12mo (198 x 116 mm). 26pp. publisher's advertisements. 2 folding engraved maps by John Melish, one with route outlined in color. (Some browning and spotting.) Portion of original front and rear boards laid onto modern black cloth, red spine label gilt.

FIRST EDITION recording Birckbeck's immigrant experiences in Illinois. Unhappy with life in his native England, he emigrated to America in 1817 and joined his partner George Flower in a frontier settlement plan in Illinois. Birkbeck became an early advocate of prairie farming, recommended a scientific approach to tilling the soil, and promoted raising cattle. His work describes life on the frontier and reveals his reasons for emigrating. As he writes in Letter XVI: "Liberty is no subject of dispute or speculation among us Back-woods men: it is the very atmosphere we breathe. I now find myself the fellow-citizen of about nine millions of persons, who are affording a sober and practical confutation of those base men, who would pass for philosophers, and have dared to call this unalienable birthright of every human being a visionary scheme" (p. 102).

[With:] BIRKBECK, Morris. Notes on a Journey in America from the Coast of Virginia to the Territory of Illinois. London: for James Ridgway, 1818. Engraved folding map with hand-coloring in outline (separations along folds); 4pp. advertisements at end. ORIGINAL GRAY BOARDS UNCUT. Third London edition.