STAUNTON, Sir George

An Authentic Account of an Embassy...

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for Robert Campbell, Philadelphia, 1799. Two volumes in one, octavo, engraved frontispiece for eachvolume, plates and a folding table; one leaf with a crude, early, stitched repair; some spotting and dusting but a good copy in contemporary marbled calf, neatly rebacked. First American edition: eighteenth-century American voyage publications are almost without exception rare on the market.

This is a condensed version for the American market of the official narrative of the important Macartney embassy to China of 1792, by which the British sought to establish formal diplomatic and commercial relations.

Staunton, a medical doctor and friend of Dr Johnson, had already served in many diplomatic posts, some as aide-de-camp to Lord Macartney, when governor of the Caribee Islands in the West Indies. When Macartney was appointed governor at Madras, Staunton accompanied him as secretary. After a period of retirement he was again called to serve Macartney, as secretary to the embassy to China. He compiled this book chiefly from the papers of the Ambassador and his fellow envoys. His work was remarkably successful: fifteen editions were issued in seven countries in thirty years.

The appendix concerns the importation of teas from China to the United Kingdom; the folding plate shows the amount of tea imported from 1776.

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