1784.a.14

Imprint: Washington, D. C. Philp and Solomons [c. 1865].

Oblong folio measuring 325 x 443 mm, full leather binding, with decorative gilt border and stamped 'Rays of Sunlight from South America,' with cartouche enclosing publisher's initials 'P. & S.' on upper board; edges gilt, marbled endpapers. The prints are mounted one to a page (recto only), on light card within a tinted border, with printed captions beneath each image. Although the photographs are credited to Gardner in the title, the printed legend beneath each image makes it clear that the photographer was Henry Moulton. This reads as follows: 'Negative by H. Moulton. Entered according to Act of Congress, in the year 1865, by Alex. Gardner, in the Clerk's Office of the District Court of the District of Columbia. Positive by A. Gardner.' The one-page preface introducing the album records a desire to capture the sights of South America in the face of inevitable change: 'The beautiful remains of Spanish architecture have not yet given place to modern innovation; the heavy, drooping roofs of the fountains have not yet disappeared, to make room for light iron railings ... But if it be desirable to 'catch the living manners as they rise,' it can be no less so to preserve a record of the past. There is a fine moral in the representation of things that have passed away, if viewed aright. We gaze on the pictured glories of Tyre, and Sidon, of Nineveh, and Carthage, and the lesson is a salutary one. In after years, in like manner, when the Lima and Santiago of to-day shall have changed into cities of brown stone houses, and marts, and repositories, it will be a reposing place for the spirit to dwell upon the semblance of that which they once were ... ere the progress of events, political as well as moral, swept away with the unsparing besom of reform the web which the spider of antiquity had woven about the palaces of the Incas. This collection comprises all the most remarkable objects of attraction in the city of Lima, and presents a panoramic view of the public edifices, monuments, churches, convents, tombs, public squares, and famous places, which constitute the pride and ornament of that stupendous city. To these are added a variety of views of those celebrated islands situated within the rainless region of the Peruvian Coast, and which furnish the richest fertilising material known to agriculture. The aggregate superficial extent of the three Cincha Islands, of which we give ample illustrations, including views of the various fleets of vessels waiting for guano, and the mode of conveying it on board the ships, is about seven square miles ... In after times, these sketches of the Cincha Islands will have a peculiar interest, and it is more than probable that the deposits of guano will soon be swept away by the constantly increasing demand for the article ... '