Charles Grey – författare

The publications of the Hakluyt Society (founded in 1846) made available edited (and sometimes translated) early accounts of exploration. The first series, which ran from 1847 to 1899, consists of 100 books containing published or previously unpublished works by authors from Christopher Columbus to Sir Francis Drake, and covering voyages to the New World, to China and Japan, to Russia and to Africa and India. This volume contains six narratives by Venetian diplomats of travel to Persia in the fifteenth and early sixteenth centuries. Barbaro's account is given in a sixteenth-century translation; the others were made for this edition. These stories of travel, by land and by sea, to distant destinations are full of engaging detail about the customs of the countries visited, and also about the negotiations by which the Venetian Signoria and Uzun Hassan, the ruler of Persia, tried to form an alliance against the Ottoman Turks.

Originally written for private circulation among the Royal Family, this book, written by Lieutenant-General Charles Grey (1804-70), was first published in 1867. It details Prince Albert's life from his birth in 1819 through to his wedding to Queen Victoria and the first year of their married life. The Queen commissioned Grey, who had been secretary to both Albert and herself, as her husband's biographer, and the book was granted a wider publication, so that all who read it would 'tend to a better and higher appreciation of Prince Albert's great character'. Sourced from letters and memoranda, the book traces the development of Albert from an intelligent and gentle boy to the intellectual and moral compass of a nation. It records Albert's first visits to England, the wedding, his love for his adopted country and life in London, and includes details such as an attempted assassination of the Queen.