Letters and notes on the manners, customs, and condition of the North American Indians : written during eight years' travel amongst the wildest tribes of Indians in North America in 1832, 33, 34, 35, 36, 37, 38, and 39 : in two volumes, with 400 illustrations, carefully engraved from his original paintings

George Catlin

London: by the Author, by Tosswill & Myers, 1841

2 volume set. Second edition.. viii, 264 p, folding map, illustrated plates; viii, 266 p, map, illustrated plates. Bound in contemporary 3/4 leather. Marbled boards. Marbled page ends and end papers. Some rubbing/loss to exterior marbling paper. Indentation to front board joint to Vol. I.  Light, scattered foxing. Gutter crack on p. 144 of Vol. I. Sir Arthur Gordon's bookplate on pastedown. Gordon was the first governor of Fiji.  His signature and date of 1841 to fep. Wagner-Camp 84:2. Howes C241; Sabin 11536; Streeter 1805. Wheat Transmississippi 453, 454, 455. Clark III:141. 

This is one of the most important works on American Indians published in the 19th century. Besides the descriptions of Catlin's travels throughout the West, the book contains hundreds of line drawings of southern and western Indians, as well as two significant maps of Indian tribes. Catlin first went west in 1830, traveling extensively for the next six years accumulating his "Indian Gallery.