A Tour Through the Whole Island of Great Britain

Published in the 1720s, this circuit of Britain records what Defoe saw, or claimed to have seen, of England, Wales, and Scotland: markets, ports, manufactures, agriculture, roads, and the character of towns. The itinerary moves county by county, noting trade, building, and the condition of the poor and the prosperous. It is less a picturesque tour than an economic and topographical survey, interested in how goods and people move. Scotland and the north receive extended attention. The work belongs to early eighteenth-century descriptive travel: a prose map of a commercial island rather than a personal adventure.

Quarter bound in dark green buckram with cloth sides blocked with a gilt map. Dark green pictorial slipcase.