[Allan Quatermain] Découverte des mines du roi Salomon

Scarce first French edition issued in Hetzel’s Bibliothèque d’éducation et de récréation series.

Translated and adapted by G. Lemaire, with a preface and postface by Bentzon.

Publisher’s red half morocco binding, signed Lenègre at foot, spine with false raised bands richly decorated in gilt and blind, white moiré endpapers, covers framed with blind fillets, light rubbing to edges and corners.
EK catalogue at end.

A few occasional foxing spots and faint browning. A few leaves slightly sprung, otherwise a very good copy.
King Solomon's Mines was first published in London in 1885. The novel recounts the adventures of a party of English explorers venturing into a region of Africa hitherto unknown to Europeans. While searching for a missing relative, they discover a land rich in diamonds. It is considered the first British adventure novel set in Africa. The work enjoyed immense success. The character Allan Quatermain, destined to become the hero of numerous subsequent books, makes his first appearance here. Together with Treasure Island, also published by Hetzel a few years earlier, it ranks among the great classics of children’s adventure literature. The novel was adapted for the screen many times between 1919 and 1986.