Guillaume Chenu De Chalezac, The French Boy: The Narrative of His Experiences as a Huguenot Refugee, as a Castaway Among the Xhosa, His Rescue with the Stavenise Survivors by the Centaurus, His Service at the Cape and Return to Europe, 1686-9 (Van Riebeeck Society Second series, No. 22)

xxii, 174pp, [10]. Tipped in colour frontispiece and occasional further illustrations in text. In brown cloth-covered boards with gilt lettering. 8vo. Cloth gently rounded at corners and spine tips. Upper text block edge dust darkened. Gift plate pasted onto front free endpaper. Very light spotting on front endpapers and next three or four pages. In its original dust jacket, rubbed on upper corners and at ends of a heavily sunned spine.

Guilluame Chenu de Chalezac was brought to the Cape from the Ciskei coast with the survivors of the Stavenisse in 1687, after a year of living in the household of a Xhosa chief. The narrative is based on an account published in 1748. This volume brings together for the first time his family background as a Huguenot refugee, the events surrounding his being marooned on the South Africa coast and his own two parallel accounts of his voyage and its sequels. His later period in the service of the Cape Company, his proposed marriage to the Princess of Orange and his return to a commission in the Prussian Army complete the story.