Fresh, clean copy of Salt's very fine large format views. A fresh, clean copy of the set of Salt's very fine large format views of India, Abyssinia, Egypt and elsewhere.

Salt visited the Cape, India, and the Red Sea. In Calcutta, the party was entertained by the Governor-General, Lord Wellesley (the dedicatee of the present work) and then travelled to Benares, Lucknow, Ceylon and Madras. Salt then explored the Red Sea, returned to Bombay and Poona, to the Red Sea again, before making an extensive excursion into the Abyssinian highlands, here represented by six views. Contemporary advertisements make clear that the work was designed to be similar in size and presentation to the plates of Thomas and William Daniell's great work, Oriental Scenery (1795-1808): the undoubted artistry of Salt and his engravers has ensured that this work is a worthy successor. A quarto text volume, with the same title, was published by Miller in the same year.

First edition; broadsheet folio (86 x 60 cm); aquatint title incorporating dedication, printed in sepia, 24 hand-coloured aquatint plates by D. Havell, J. Hill and J. Bluck, supervised by Robert Havell, after Salt, on thick Whatman paper (watermarked 1806), mounted on guards and interleaved throughout, these watermarked 'Ruse & Turners 1805', contemporary half morocco, rebacked and recornered, large morocco lettering piece to upper cover, light scratches to boards, very good.

Abbey (Travel), 515; Bobins 112; Tooley 440 (the text 'is not important and the work is usually to be found without it').