THE NARRATIVE OF AN EXPLORER IN TROPICAL SOUTH AFRICA.

xiv + 314 pages, tinted  lithographic frontispiece, coloured folding map of Damaraland with an inset of  Africa, 3 tinted lithographic plates, 1 full page engraved plate of Nangoro  King of the Ovampo, 4 engraved illustrations in the text, original speckled  brown cloth titled gilt on the back and with a gilt vignette on the upper cover. The folding map is frayed at the fore-edge with very slight loss of the printed area, tape stains on the frontispiece and title page, new endpapers.  The cloth is fraying along the lower joint but overall is in unusually good  condition, the contents and lithographic plates are bright.

Mendelssohn (Sydney) South African Bibliography, volume 1,  page 585, 'The first edition of a very reliable account of an expedition to  Damaraland and Ovampoland 1850-1852. The author was fortunate in finding so experienced a traveller as C.J. Andersson to accompany him.' 

According to the Dictionary of South African Biography, volume  3, page 316, 'This book, besides dealing with the events of travel, has much to  say on the histories and customs of the tribes and the nature of the regions  they inhabited. His writing is informative, accurate, lively and shrewd, and it admirably reflects the state of affairs in the country at that period.' Galton  was a Victorian polymath and gained distinction in a number of fields. Amongst  other things he was the inventor of fingerprinting.