FRANCIS MASSON'S ACCOUNT OF THREE JOURNEYS

First Edition: 183 pages, frontispiece portrait of Masson (repeated in colour on the front cover), 2 maps, 4 colour plates, 1 other portrait of William Aiton, pictorial wrappers (paperback), a fine copy signed by Frank Bradlow on the title page.

Editor's note: 'Francis Masson's Account Of Three Journeys At The Cape Of Good Hope 1772-1775, is the first descriptive narrative of the Cape to be written in English. Despite its comparative brevity it is an important document from the points of view: botanical, historical and geographical. Over 10% of the world's flora is represented in the living collections at Kew. Masson was amongst the foremost of all the botanical collectors who enriched the collections of the Royal Gardens. Masson's contributions to Cape botany are shown by the fact that the famous Linnaeus named a new genus, Massonia, after him. Towards the end of 1785 Masson who had in the meantime made journeys of botanical collection to the Canaries and the West Indies, returned to the Cape where he stayed for 10 years. Unfortunately he left only a very short account of this period in his book Stapeliae Novae a rare item of Africana today.

Frank Bradlow's comprehensive introduction to the present volume traces, from letters and other material in various archives, some of his activities at the Cape and elsewhere between 1774 and 1796. Masson is placed firmly in the background of his times, and meticulous annotations to the account of the first three of Masson's Cape journeys enable the modern reader, whether layman or botanist, to appreciate the importance of this short but significant contribution to our knowledge of the early Cape and its flora.'