New York: Harper & Brothers, Date: 1855. First edition. Modern black cloth, gilt titles. A very good copy, newly rebound in modern black cloth, new endpapers, clean, crisp, and unmarked; first map with several extra folds and tears along folds, with archival repairs to verso, othe maps about fine with slight tears at inner margins.. Map frontis, xvi, 397 pp. Illus. with 5 maps (4 folding), 8 tinted plates with tissue guards, and 3 intext views. 8vo. An excellent work by an early supporter of Central America. Ephraim George Squier (1821-1888) was a journalist and archeology who "sought a diplomatic appointment to Central America as the means to continue his archaeological research in that region....[becoming] the first diplomatic appointee of the Zachary Taylor administration in April 1849, serving as chargé d'affaires to the Central American states. During his tenure, he negotiated commercial treaties with San Salvador, Honduras, and Nicaragua, and he was authorized to sign an agreement with Nicaragua for the construction of an interoceanic canal.... Squier returned to Central America in 1853 as secretary and principal promoter of the Honduras Inter-Oceanic Railway Company. With a corps of engineers, he made a preliminary survey of its projected route, negotiated the necessary concessions from Honduras, and organized at New York a company for implementing the project.... He promoted the American 'rediscovery' of Central America occasioned by the acquisition of Oregon and C ...

Bremen [ME], Date: 1829. Very good, folded, minor punctures and soiling along margins, remnants to verso, contents clean.. 1 sheet. 7.5 x 8.5 inches. Dated and signed August 12th, 1829. by [Commodore] Samuel Tucker who writes to Samuel Thatcher, following a visit from Thatcher's sons, George and Benjamin, who had expressed interest in writing a biography on Tucker's life. Tucker tells Thatcher, "I must say I am heartily sorry, I gave them any encouragement but the moment must be alleged to my imbecility, as I had heretofore declared ever having any such manuscript, go to the press, for such a thing if ever it was to be done, Doctor Moses Shaw has a great claim on me for it..." Tucker had, at some point, submitted a series of papers to Doctor Shaw, of Wiscasset, Maine,; however they had been destroyed in a fire before anything was published. Fortunately, Tucker's grandson, Colonel Samuel Tucker Hinds was in possession of copies of Tucker's logs, journals, and letters, and left them to Harvard Library. Harvard released them to John Hannibal Sheppard, who, published "The Life of Samuel Tucker: Commodore in the American Revolution" in 1868. Samuel Tucker (1747-1833), naval officer and merchant mariner from Marblehead, "who never learned the social graces...first went to sea in the summer of 1760 at the age of twelve, during the Seven Years' War."... In 1776 George Washington appointed Tucker captain and commander of the Franklin ...an armed schooner commissioned in the Contin ...