Voyage to New South Wales, 1790

White, John. Journal of a voyage to New South Wales. London, 1790. Quarto, engraved title with vignette and 65 hand-coloured plates of natural history subjects on wove paper. With, Gilbert, Thomas. Voyage from New South Wales to Canton in the year 1788. London, 1789. Quarto, engraved title with vignette and 4 large folding plates of coastal views, with the half -title. Two volumes in one, the four advertisement leaves (two inserted and two integral) bound at the end, contemporary speckled calf well rebacked. Tissues in the first work foxed but the plates scarcely affected, plates in the second foxed, as often. A desirable original pairing: the superior, coloured issue of White's Journal together with the work intended as a companion to it. In the advertisements with Gilbert's Voyage, Debrett, the publisher of both works, offers them either together or separate, but they are now rarely found combined. Surgeon White's Journal, much enhanced with the natural history plates, is one of the most attractive of the First Fleet books, especially in the coloured issue, and Gilbert's book is of note as an account of the first trading voyage from the colony, during which he sighted and named a number of Pacific island groups, including the Gilbert and Marshall Islands.