This is a fine example of one of John Cary’s rarest works. The ‘Inland Navigation’ is the FIRST ENGLISH ATLAS ON CANALS. Despite the year on the title page being 1795 it was in fact issued in parts. Each one contained four maps and can be seen by the dates on the plates; 1795, 1796 and 1798. A fourth part was issued much later in 1808 and is like here not always present. The scale of the plates is good at about half an inch to the mile and they provide much local detail. The accompanying letterpress contains abstracts of the Acts of Parliament relative to the canals and details of length, width, number of locks, falls etc. Cary (c.1754-1835) was one of the most successful map and globe publishers of the late eighteenth and early nineteenth centuries. The first of his important atlas contributions is the ‘New and Correct English Atlas’ first published in 1787. Cary was the first map maker to use Greenwich as the meridian. The clarity of his style sets him apart from the competition. Fordham ‘John Cary’ pp. 49-51; Shirley BL T.Cary 5a.