This is my collection of books about exploration written by travelers. Many are out of print, so I'll include info about the writer, what countries visited, when visited, and interesting quotes. If the view ephemera link is available, then you can view any marginalia, cards, or relics that were left in the pages of the book. Enjoy!

Paris Foundlings: The official returns of the hospitals of Paris show that of the fifty-five thousand births in the city during the past year, fifteen thousand three hundred and sixty-six were illigitimate. The proportion of illegitimates to the number of inhabitants is not quite up to that of Vienna, which has ten thousand for one million ihabitants, whilst the population of Paris is nearly two million. In various parts of Paris boxes called tours are established, each of which revolves upon a pivot, and, on a bell being rung, is turned around by the person inside to receive the child that may have been dispositioned in it, whithout attempting to ascertain who the parents are. The child is taken to a hospital and cared for, and so soon as a nurse from the country can be procured, it is given into her charge. Nurses from the country, of good character, are always applying for these infants. The nurses are paid by the city from four francs to eight francs per month, according to the age of the child, care being taken to assign the children to nurses living as far as possible from their birth places. After the second year, the nurse may give the child up, when , if no other nurse can be found for it, it is transfered to the Orphan Department. Sometimes the nurses become so attached to the children that they retain them. The number of children thus placed out in the country to nurse about four thousand annually. The abolition, in some of the departments, of this humane custom of receiving these little waifs and asking no questions has caused infanticide to become very frequent. As for infanticide before birth, the number is said to have doubled and trebled in some districts, and to have risen to four and five times the usual amount in others. The average number of foundlings maintained at the Paris Hospital is four thousand four hundred. At the age of twelve the boys are bound apprentice to some trade at the expense of the city. A portion of one hundred and forty-eight francs is awarded by the city to the female foundlings when they marry, provided their conduct has been unexeptionable throughout.