LABOULINIÈRE (Pierre Toussaint de) - Lot 210

LABOULINIÈRE (Pierre Toussaint de) Annuaire statistique du département des Hautes-Pyrénées, containing the introduction to the large statistical report for year 9 (1801); the entire chapter on topography; an analysis and extracts from the other four chapters; a supplement on changes since year 9; finally, synoptic tables, etc. etc. Tarbes, Lavigne, 1807. In-8: 12f., 3 tables on 2f. of which one folding, 1f. (errata), 447pp. one folding demographic table, 31f. ½ pastiche speckled basane, ornate smooth spine, red author's piece, fawn title, untrimmed copy. First edition, reprinted in 1813 under the title "Annuaire statistique du département des Hautes-Pyrénées avec un répertoire municipal à l'usage de MM. les Maires". The 1807 is more complete than the 1813, with the exception of the 40pp. "Répertoire municipal à l'usage de MM. les Maires", which is missing from the original. A mine of information and descriptions, from the cultivation of madder for dyeing capulets to climbing the Vignemale. The first 150 pages can be considered "Pyrenean". A rare work (the second is not much more common). Launched in year XI, when LA BOULINIÈRE was appointed secretary general of the H.P. prefecture, these statistics began to take shape in year XIII, but correspondents provided meager memoirs. In XIII, he published an "Extrait du Plan de Statistique Générale... adressé aux sous-préfets et autres fonctionnaires" (Extract from the General Statistics Plan... addressed to sub-prefects and other officials), which served as the basis for this work, but also as a model for all prefectures required to draw up a directory of their departments. The indication on the title of Year IX comes from the fact that the Ministry had ordered the prefects to draw up a statistical directory of their department for Year IX, and so all those who were behind schedule - i.e. many departments - found themselves obliged, four years later, to design their yearbook for this date, i.e. to retrieve, a posteriori, the data of the time and to update them from year to year up to the date of publication, hence the additional work to be carried out and the explanation of the "supplement" to our edition.