WYSE, Lucien Napoléon Bonaparte (1845-1909). Le canal de Panama. Paris: Hachette, 1886.

WYSE, Lucien Napoléon Bonaparte (1845-1909). Le canal de Panama. Paris: Hachette, 1886.

First edition, presentation copy, of Wyse’s account of his proposal for a canal across the Isthmus of Panama. Wyse’s plan for the construction of a canal won approval at the International Congress for Study of an Interoceanic Canal in 1879, and work was begun in 1881. The construction attempt brought about great loss of life through disease, but it was financial and technical difficulties that ended the project in 1889 and led to the scandals of the Panama affair.

Large octavo (275 x 190mm). Half-title, wood-engraved frontispiece portrait, title in red and black, large lithographic map, one folding panoramic plan, one folding table, numerous full-page and other wood-engraved illustrations in the text (small tear along one fold of map). Contemporary burgundy half morocco, spine gilt (corners lightly rubbed). Provenance: Joseph Gustave Bonnet (French engineer, 1810-1875; presentation inscription from the author on front endpaper, the author’s bookplate on front pastedown and his card, loosely inserted, inscribed in French: ‘The other evening you seemed to be taking an interest in Panama: permit me to present you with one of my books on this great enterprise, which was in the end so poorly conducted’).

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