This volume contains two early references to the completion of the Lewis & Clark expedition. The first reference is Jefferson's message to Congress in the American State Papers section (pages 79-84). Jefferson reports on the success of the Lewis & Clark expedition while acknowledging that the Freeman expedition to the Red River “has not been equally successful.” The second reference is a poem by Joel Barlow “On the Discoveries of Captain Lewis” (Poetry section at the end, page 198).

Joel Barlow was a poet, diplomat, land speculator and genuine American character. Born in Connecticut and educated at Yale, he was a patriot in the American Revolution and later was involved in the French Revolution, receiving French citizenship and election to the French Assembly. A friend of Thomas Paine, he helped Paine publish the Age of Reason while Paine was in a French jail. Likely the most prominent American poet of his time, his grand work was expected to be “The Columbiad,” a lengthy work intended as a national epic. Publication was announced and excerpts are provided by the publisher at the end of this volume. It initially drew comparisons to the epics of Virgil and Milton and the lavishly illustrated first edition sold for the princely sum of $20 in 1807. History has not treated the epic poem kindly, but some of his other poems have fared better and continue to appear in American anthologies.

Octavo, hardbound in quarter leather over marbled boards with gilt title on spine.

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Condition: B

Contents are lightly toned with scattered foxing. There is a library stamp on the title page and bookplate on the front pastedown marked "officially discarded." Covers are heavily worn with loss of the marbled paper and the spine is chipped at bottom.