Novelist and playwright Frances (Fanny) Burney, 1752-1840, was also a prolific writer of journals and letters, beginning with the diary she started at fifteen and continuing until the end of her eventful life. From her youth in London high society to a period in the court of Queen Charlotte and her years interned in France with her husband Alexandre d'Arblay during the Napoleonic Wars, she captured the changing times around her, creating brilliantly comic and candid portraits of those she encountered - including the 'mad' King George, Samuel Johnson, Sir Joshua Reynolds, David Garrick and a charismatic Napoleon Bonaparte. She also describes, in her most moving piece, undergoing a mastectomy at fifty-nine without anaesthetic. Whether a carefree young girl or a mature woman, Fanny Burney's forthright, intimate and wickedly perceptive voice brings her world powerfully to life.

Alexander Mackenzie was the first European to complete a land crossing of the continent of America north of Mexico, preceding the famous Lewis and Clark expedition by twelve years. In his journals he details two separate voyages: one up what is now known as the Mackenzie River to the Arctic Ocean in 1789, and another to what is now Bella Coola on the Pacific Ocean in 1792 and 1793. Both journals provide a detailed description of the many difficulties in navigating and traveling in a country that had yet to be mapped. Having to rely on Native guides and rumors, and enduring hardships that almost beggar belief, Mackenzie and his team were able to achieve their objective of finding an east to west land crossing through the Rocky Mountains and to the Pacific Ocean. Although his route didn’t prove as practical as routes found by later explorers, Mackenzie has cemented himself as a key explorer of Western Canada. This book is part of the Standard Ebooks project, which produces free public domain ebooks.