JAMES, EDWIN. 'ACCOUNT OF AN EXPEDITION FROM PITTSBURGH TO THE ROCKY MOUNTAINS, PERFORMED IN THE YEARS 1819, 1820...UNDER THE COMMAND OF MAJ. S.H. LONG'. LONDON: LONGMAN, HURST, REES, ORME, AND BROWN, 1823

3 volumes, 8vo (8 7/8 x 5 5/8 in.; 224 x 142 mm). Three frontispieces, five uncolored plates by J. Clark after S. Seymour, one folding map; scattered foxing throughout, vols. I and III lacking half-titles, vol. I with closed tear to folding map, paper flaws to T5 and T6: vol. II with closed marginal tear to T2: vol. III with closed marginal tear to D7, paper flaw to margin of H6. Original brown paper covered boards, paper labels to spines; joints of vol. I weak but holding, chips to heads and tails of spines, some loss to labels, rubbing to extremities.

J. Radcliffe Esq. (signature to title-pages) — Richard M. Brown (bookplate to front pastedowns)

Abbey 'Travel' 650; Howes J-41; Sabin 35683; Wagner-Camp 25

3 volumes, 8vo (8 7/8 x 5 5/8 in.; 224 x 142 mm). Three frontispieces, five uncolored plates by J. Clark after S. Seymour, one folding map; scattered foxing throughout, vols. I and III lacking half-titles, vol. I with closed tear to folding map, paper flaws to T5 and T6: vol. II with closed marginal tear to T2: vol. III with closed marginal tear to D7, paper flaw to margin of H6. Original brown paper covered boards, paper labels to spines; joints of vol. I weak but holding, chips to heads and tails of spines, some loss to labels, rubbing to extremities.
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First London edition, published in the same year as its Philadelphia counterpart, containing a few additions to the text and three new plates.An account of the US government expedition under Major Stephen Long, originally named the "Yellowstone Expedition" and designed as the most ambitious expedition to date of the trans-Mississippi West. The reality was a much reduced party which James accompanied as botanist and geologist. The expedition travelled up the Missouri and then followed the Platte to its source in the Rocky Mountains before moving south to Upper Arkansas. From there the plan was to find the source of the Red River, but this being missed, the Canadian River was explored instead. This London edition was published in the same year as the Philadelphia first edition and differs in some respects from the American edition in both text and illustration.