Philip Freneau, 1799; with two other works by Freneau

[FRENEAU, Philip (1752-1832).] Letters on Various Interesting and Important Subjects: Many of which have Appeared in the Aurora. Corrected and much Enlarged. By Robert Slender. Philadelphia: D. Hogan, 1799.

Rare first edition, first state of these pseudonymous essays by the “Poet of the American Revolution.” Freneau was the child of Huguenots, born in New York and raised in New Jersey. His colorful career included being a newspaperman, a sea captain, and a nature poet who anticipated the work of the Transcendentalists. This volume contains Freneau’s strong opinions, previously printed in Benjamin Franklin Bache’s opposition newspaper the Aurora—coincidentally sharing a name with the ship Freneau sailed on, and from which he was captured during the Revolutionary War. The last copy recorded at auction by RBH was in 1945. BAL 6450.

Quarto (185 x 115mm). Modern cloth and decorated paper boards with morocco label on upper cover. Provenance: "James Pettyjohn" (signatures and many doodles).

[With two other Freneau works:] * Poems written between the years 1768 and 1794. Monmouth, NJ: by the author, 1795. BAL 6445. Octavo (206 x 118mm). Extra-illustrated. 19th-century green half morocco. Provenance: W. Giles. * "Translation from the Italian of Ariosto's Description of the Gardens in Alcina's Enchanted Island," in MOORE, John. A View of Society and Manners in France, Switzerland, Germany, and Italy. Philadelphia: Robert Bell, 1783. BAL 6427. Two volumes in one, octavo (197 x 124mm). Contemporary calf.