THE FIRST FRENCH CIRCUMNAVIGATION

"Voyage autour du monde . . . helped popularize a belief in the moral worth of man in his natural state, a concept of considerable significance in the French thought of [Bougainville's] day."

-- Encyclopedia Britannica

[BOUGAINVILLE, LOUIS ANTOINE DE.] VOYAGE AUTOUR DU MONDE, PAR LA FRÉGATE DU ROI LA BOUDEUSE ET LA FLÛTE L'ÉTOILE; En 1766, 1767, 1768 & 1769. Paris: Saillant & Nyon, 1771. 4to. Contemporary half calf. Half-title. [iv], 417, [iii] (Errata, directions to binder, Approbation) pages. Eighteen folding maps, two other maps, three engraved plates, engraved tail-pieces. Short crack at head of lower joint, boards lightly scuffed, text offset onto one map. Otherwise, a fine unrestored copy with the maps in excellent condition.

FIRST EDITION of Bougainville's account of "the first French expedition to sail around the world" (Cox). "This expedition had considerable repercussions on the history of voyages, not only for its discoveries in the Pacific, but also for having been organized with true scientific precision" (Borba de Moraes). Bougainville was a "chivalrous and intrepid spirit" (Beaglehole, The Exploration of the Pacific, p. 3) who had earlier distinguished himself against the British in the French and Indian War. Bougainville still sought to serve France after the end of the War, so in 1763 "[a]t the age of thirty-four years he embraced a maritime career, and a few years sufficed for him to inscribe his name among the ranks of the most illustrious navigators" (Tr. from Nouvelle Biographie Générale).

In the heat of 18th century colonial competition, both France and Great Britain saw the Falkland Islands "as the key to the Pacific Ocean; and the French had no desire to see the British hand clasped on that key. Bougainville offered to found a settlement there at his own expense" (Beaglehole, p. 214). However, not only the British but the Spanish claimed the Falklands and, after only three years, Bougainville was ordered to turn the nascent colony over to Spain.

At the same time, this sad news was tempered by the opportunity for Bougainville to make a voyage to the East Indies. "Among the objectives of the voyage was the collecting of all kinds of natural history curiousities" (Cox), and "[f]or this expedition he was given the frigate Boudeuse, a newly built vessel, to be joined at the Falklands by the store-ship Etoile. He sailed in November 1766, with eleven officers, three volunteers and a crew of two hundred" (Beaglehole, p. 214). It took Bougainville fifty-two days to navigate the treacherous Strait of Magellan and round Cape Horn, and then he was into the open Pacific. Despite winds which were frequently unfavorable, shortages of provisions and lack of suitable anchorage wherever he tried to make land, Bougainville disproved the existence of the previously reported continent of Davis Land, and made his way to Tahiti, Samoa and the New Hebrides. Seeking to confirm whether the Torres Strait lies between Australia and New Guinea, Bougainville then headed west "into waters not previously navigated by any European ship. On the fringes of the Great Barrier Reef, he turned north without sighting Australia, passed the edge of the Solomon Islands, and went on to New Britain. Because his men were by then suffering from scurvy, and the ships needed refitting, he stopped at Buru in the Moluccas . . . and at Batavia (now Jakarta) in Java" (Encyclopedia Britannica).

Bougainville returned to Brittany in March of 1769. "He had the honor of being the first french captain who had gone around the world; but what assures him another whole claim to immortality is having reported the geography of several lands completely unknown before him, a few of which form important archipelagos" (Tr. from Nouvelle Biographie Générale). Voyage Autour du Monde, "the account that Bougainville published of his journey . . . two years after his return, written in a brisk style, graceful and full of action, completed the success of this expedition" (Id.).

It is less-known, but also of historical interest, that Bougainville inadvertantly brought with him on his voyage the French girl Jeanne Baret who, accordingly, "seems to have been the first woman to circumnavigate the globe" (Delpar, The Discoverers). Baret "saw no other way of escaping into the free world of adventure enjoyed by men than by pretending to be one" (Id.), and in this disguise served as assistant to a botanist on Bougainville's expedition. "It was not until the ships arrived at Tahiti some 3 months after leaving Rio [de Janeiro] that her secret was discovered by the perceptive islanders of that South Seas paradise" (Id.).

Bougainville left the navy in 1790, "to devote himself solely to the sciences. In spite of his great age, he preserved until the last moment all the faculties of his spirit and his jaunty humor. He died after ten days from a serious illness" (Tr. from Nouvelle Biographie Générale) in 1814. The brilliant flowers of the Bougainvillea, known to visitors of tropical islands throughout the world, are a poignant namesake for a man who displayed both his brilliance as a navigator, and a humanity toward the indigenous peoples he encountered on his voyage; a man of whom Beaglehole says: "In that age of classicism and politeness none was more classically polite than he; but he had also greater qualities - talent, a warm heart, a generous energy, enterprise, a faith in the capacities of his countrymen which defeat could not diminish" (p. 214). Borba de Moraes I, p. 115. Brunet I, p. 1167. Kroepelien 109. BT000025.

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