Discoveries in Australia; with an Account of the Coasts and Rivers Explored and Surveyed during the Voyage of H.M.S. Beagle, in the Years 1837-38-39-40-41-42-43. By command of the Lords Commissioners of the Admiralty. Also A Narrative of Captain Owen Stanley's Visits to the Islands in the Arafura Sea

First edition: a most attractive copy of this account of the Beagle's great Australian survey voyage, the last great voyage of Australian coastal discovery.

John Lort Stokes, who joined the Beagle in 1824, served on her for eighteen years, starting as a midshipman and sailing with Darwin, Fitzroy, P.P. King, and Wickham, whom he eventually replaced as commander in 1841. From 1837 to 1843 the Beagle was in Australian waters, her personnel completing the survey of the northwest coast, and charting rivers and exploring inland where appropriate. It was Stokes who charted and named Victoria River and Port Darwin, the latter in commemoration of his former shipmate. Stokes time in command of the Beagle confirmed his reputation as a fine marine surveyor, and many of his charts of the northern Australia coast remained in use for over a century.

'Stokes is noted as an engaging, vivacious and entertaining writer. As the official account of the last major expedition of Australian discovery, his book is essential to a collection relating to coastal voyages. It is also of considerable interest to collectors of inland exploration journals, since Stokes and the crew of the Beagle undertook many expeditions inland from the coast which are recorded in his book...' (Wantrup).

With a bookseller's blind-stamp showing that this was sold by William Piddington, the Sydney bookseller who opened his George Street premises in 1844 but by the 1850s had begun a political career that would include two terms as Colonial Treasurer of New South Wales.