Jack London, "The Cruise of the Snark" Annotated Manuscript & Signed Check

The lot consists of a 3pp first revision typed manuscript of "The Cruise of the Snark" with 20+ handwritten edits/words in Jack London's hand; along with a signed check dating from the era of the ship's construction. In the spring of 1907, Jack London (1876-1916), accompanied by his wife Charmian (1871-1955) and a small crew, set out for a modern maritime adventure aboard the 'Snark,' their 45' long custom built sailboat. Over the next two years, the Londons would sail west and south across the Pacific Ocean, exploring Hawaii, the Solomon Islands, Fiji, Tahiti, Australia, and other tropical locales.

London later recounted his travel experiences in a non-fiction illustrated account called "The Cruise of the Snark," published by The Macmillan Company in New York in 1911. These typed manuscript galleys correspond to pages 333-339 of London's final first edition of "The Cruise of the Snark." In this excerpt from Chapter XVII: "The Amateur M.D." and the epilogue, called "Backward," London writes about his and his crew's continued poor health. London was suffering from an unidentified illness (later diagnosed as a condition resulting from excessive exposure to tropical sunlight) which caused swelling, stiffness, and peeling of the extremities. London concludes his tale by relating how the final days of his voyage were spent in an Australian hospital.

The galley proofs are over-sized, measuring 9.25" x 12" on average overall, and have generously sized margins to accommodate handwritten author's edits. The pages are in very good to near fine condition with expected wear including paper folds, isolated light soiling, chipped edges, and a few minor closed tears.

The manuscripts date circa spring 1911. London's edits throughout the manuscript are in pencil and blue pen. On the first page, London has deleted three words, "by diametrical opposition," from the first paragraph of the third postscript. He has deleted the word "of" and added the margin note: "don't like off of." London noted two spelling mistakes in the fourth postscript relating to the navigational term "losing-error." On the top of the second page, London has added the word "an"; he inserted two commas on the third page. London also hand-inscribed an incredible black and white photograph that would become Illustration 119: "The Trader's House at Lua Nua, Lord Howe Atoll." The author drew an arrow pointing to the text block where he wished the illustration to appear. Other possibly publisher's edits in red are found throughout.

The manuscript pages correspond to the following published text found in "The Cruise of the Snark":

"--accident ever befalls them, and they grow larger and more carnivorous day by day, gnawing our finger-nails and toe-nails while we sleep. P.S. Charmian is having another bout with fever. Martin, in despair, has taken to horse-doctoring his yaws with bluestone and to blessing the Solomons. As for me, in addition to navigating, doctoring, and writing short stories, I am far from well. With the exception of the insanity cases, I’m the worst off on board. I shall catch the next steamer to Australia and go on the operating table. Among my minor afflictions, I may mention a new and mysterious one. For the past week my hands have been swelling as with dropsy. It is only by a painful effort that I can close them. A pull on a rope is excruciating. The sensations are like those that accompany severe chilblains. Also, the skin is peeling off both hands at an alarming rate, besides which the new skin underneath is growing hard and thick. The doctor-book fails to mention this disease. Nobody knows what it is.

P.S. Well, anyway, I’ve cured the chronometer. After knocking about the sea for eight squally, rainy days, most of the time hove to, I succeeded in catching a partial observation of the sun at midday. From this I worked up my latitude, then headed by log to the latitude of Lord Howe, and ran both that latitude and the island down together. Here I tested the chronometer by longitude sights and found it something like three minutes out. Since each minute is equivalent to fifteen miles, the total error can be appreciated. By repeated observations at Lord Howe I rated the chronometer, finding it to have a daily losing-error of seven-tenths of a second. Now it happens that a year ago, when we sailed from Hawaii, that selfsame chronometer had that selfsame losing-error of seven-tenths of a second. Since that error was faithfully added every day, and since that error, as proved by my observations at Lord Howe, has not changed, then what under the sun made that chronometer all of a sudden accelerate and catch up with itself three minutes? Can such things be? Expert watchmakers say no; but I say that they have never done any expert watch-making and watch-rating in the Solomons. That it is the climate is my only diagnosis. At any rate, I have successfully doctored the chronometer, even if I have failed with the lunacy cases and with Martin’s yaws.

P.S. Martin has just tried burnt alum, and is blessing the Solomons more fervently than ever. P.S. Between Manning Straits and Pavuvu Islands. Henry has developed rheumatism in his back, ten skins have peeled off my hands and the eleventh is now peeling, while Tehei is more lunatic than ever and day and night prays God not to kill him. Also, Nakata and I are slashing away at fever again. And finally up to date, Nakata last evening had an attack of ptomaine poisoning, and we spent half the night pulling him through.

BACKWORD The Snark was forty-three feet on the water-line and fifty-five over all, with fifteen feet beam (tumble-home sides) and seven feet eight inches draught. She was ketch-rigged, carrying flying-jib, jib, fore-staysail, main-sail, mizzen, and spinnaker. There were six feet of head-room below, and she was crown-decked and flush-decked. There were four alleged water-tight compartments. A seventy-horse power auxiliary gas-engine sporadically furnished locomotion at an approximate cost of twenty dollars per mile. A five-horse power engine ran the pumps when it was in order, and on two occasions proved capable of furnishing juice for the search-light. The storage batteries worked four or five times in the course of two years. The fourteen-foot launch was rumored to work at times, but it invariably broke down whenever I stepped on board. But the Snark sailed. It was the only way she could get anywhere. She sailed for two years, and never touched rock, reef, nor shoal. She had no inside ballast, her iron keel weighed five tons, but her deep draught and high freeboard made her very stiff. Caught under full sail in tropic squalls, she buried her rail and deck many times, but stubbornly refused to turn turtle. She steered easily, and she could run day and night, without steering, close-by, full-and-by, and with the wind abeam. With the wind on her quarter and the sails properly trimmed, she steered herself within two points, and with the wind almost astern she required scarcely three points for self-steering.

The Snark was partly built in San Francisco. The morning her iron keel was to be cast was the morning of the great earthquake. Then came anarchy. Six months overdue in the building, I sailed the shell of her to Hawaii to be finished, the engine lashed to the bottom, building materials lashed on deck. Had I remained in San Francisco for completion, I’d still be there. As it was, partly built, she cost four times what she ought to have cost. The Snark was born unfortunately. She was libeled in San Francisco, had her cheques protested as fraudulent in Hawaii, and was fined for breach of quarantine in the Solomons. To save themselves, the newspapers could not tell the truth about her. When I discharged an incompetent captain, they said I had beaten him to a pulp. When one young man returned home to continue at college, it was reported that I was a regular Wolf Larsen, and that my whole crew had deserted because I had beaten it to a pulp. In fact the only blow struck on the Snark was when the cook was manhandled by a captain who had shipped with me under false pretenses, and whom I discharged in Fiji. Also, Charmian and I boxed for exercise; but neither of us was seriously maimed. The voyage was our idea of a good time. I built the Snark and paid for it, and for all expenses. I contracted to write thirty-five thousand words descriptive of the trip for a magazine which was to pay me the same rate I received for stories written at home. Promptly the magazine advertised that it was sending me especially around the world for itself. It was a wealthy magazine. And every man who had business dealings with the Snark charged three prices because forsooth the magazine could afford it. Down in the uttermost South Sea isle this myth obtained, and I paid accordingly. To this day everybody believes that the magazine paid for everything and that I made a fortune out of the voyage. It is hard, after such advertising, to hammer it into the human understanding that the whole voyage was done for the fun of it. I went to Australia to go into hospital, where I spent five weeks. I spent five months miserably sick in hotels.

The mysterious malady that afflicted my hands was too much for the Australian specialists. It was unknown in the literature of medicine. No case like it had ever been reported. It extended from my hands to my feet so that at times I was as helpless as a child. On occasion my hands were twice their natural size, with seven dead and dying skins peeling off at the same time. There were times when my toe-nails, in twenty-four hours, grew as thick as they were long. After filing them off, inside another twenty-four hours they were as thick as before. The Australian specialists agreed that the malady was non-parasitic, and that, therefore, it must be nervous. It did not mend, and it was impossible for me to continue the voyage. The only way I could have continued it would have been by being lashed in my bunk, for in my helpless condition, unable to clutch with my hands, I could not have moved about on a small rolling boat. Also, I said to myself that while there were many boats and many voyages, I had but one pair of hands and one set of toe-nails. Still further, I reasoned that in my own climate of California I had always maintained a stable nervous equilibrium. So back I came. Since my return I have completely recovered. And I have found out what was the matter with me. I encountered a book by Lieutenant-Colonel Charles E.--"

In addition to the hand-corrected manuscript is an unnumbered check inscribed overall and signed “Jack London” on the payee line. Issued from the Central Bank of Oakland, California on August 28, 1905 in the amount of $8.50 payable to “Charles E. Lauriat Co.” The plain cream check is stamped in purple and bears a y-shaped cancellation mark at right. In near fine condition. Check measures 6.5" x 2.75". Charles E. Lauriat Co. was a Boston-based bookseller. Company founder Charles E. Lauriat, Sr. (1842-1920) was formerly a book publisher. Lauriat's son Charles E. Lauriat, Jr. succeeded as head of the business after surviving the sinking of the Lusitania in May 1915, and upon his father's death in 1920. Jack London grew up in Oakland, California. He attended elementary school through high school there, and studied at a local waterfront bar named Heinold's First and Last Saloon; the proprietor later lent him tuition money to Berkeley. Jack London wrote dozens of poems, short stories, essays, and novels over a prolific career curtailed by chronic ill-health. With income generated from adventure classics like "Call of the Wild" (1903) and "White Fang" (1906), London was able to purchase a ranch in Glen Ellen, California around 1905, and outfit his two-masted sailboat, the "Snark".

This item comes with a Certificate from John Reznikoff, a premier authenticator for both major 3rd party authentication services, PSA and JSA (James Spence Authentications), as well as numerous auction houses. 

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