HOOPER, William Hulme (1827-1854). Ten Months among The Tents of the Tuski, with incidents of an Arctic Boat Expedition in Search of Sir John Franklin, as far as the Mackenzie River, and Cape Bathhurst. London: John Murray, 1853.

8vo (220 x 140 mm). 2 maps [one folding]; 4 tinted lithographic plates, 2 lithographed plates. (A few gatherings roughly opened, a few with marginal repairs.) Publisher's maroon cloth gilt (rebacked preserving original spine). Provenance: Collector's bookplate, a few pencil marks.

FIRST EDITION of Hooker's endearing narrative of the HMS Plover's Franklin Search Expedition of 1848-1851. Hooper's health was irreversibly weakened by three Arctic winters and he wrote this narrative to relieve his own boredom while bedridden in London. He described befriending Chukchi children and one of the text illustrations is his own portrait: "a specimen of Tuski drawing, being in fact my Likeness, drawn by Enoch, the Canny lad. Like most portraits, it is too flattering" (p. 211). Arctic Bibliography 7395; Lada-Mocarski 140; Sabin 32883; Staton & Tremaine/TPL 3176; Tourville 2177; Wickersham 6591.