See also:JOHN See also:LLOYD See also:STEPHENS (1805–1852)
, See also:American traveller, was See also:born on the 28th of See also:November 1805, at See also:Shrewsbury, New See also:Jersey
.
Having been admitted to the See also:bar, he practised for about eight years in New See also:York See also:City
.
In 1834, the See also:state of his See also:health rendering it advisable that he should travel, he visited See also:Europe, and for two years made a tour through many countries of that See also:Continent, extending his travels to See also:Egypt and See also:Syria
.
On his return to New York he published in 1837 (under the name of " See also:George " See also:Stephens) Incidents of Travel in Egypt, See also:Arabia Petraea, and the See also:Holy See also:Land
.
This See also:work was followed next See also:year by the publication of Incidents of Travel in See also:Greece, See also:Turkey, See also:Russia and See also:Poland
.
In 1839 Stephens arranged with See also:Frederick Catherwood of See also:London, who had accompanied him on some of his travels, and illustrated the above-mentioned publications, to make an exploration in Central See also:America, with a view to discovering and examining the antiquities said to exist there
.
Stephens, meantime, was appointed to a See also:mission to Central America
.
The See also:joint travels of Stephens and Catherwood occupied some eight months in 1839 and 1840
.
As the result of these researches Stephens published in 1841 Incidents of Travels in Central America, See also:Chiapas and See also:Yucatan
.
In the autumn of 1841 the two travellers made a second exploration of Yucatan, and a work followed in 1843—Incidents of Travel in Yucatan
.
This work describes the most extensive travels executed till that date by a stranger in the See also:peninsula, and, as the author claims, " contains See also:account of visits to See also:forty-four ruined cities or places in which remains or vestiges of See also:ancient populations were found." It enjoyed a wide popularity, and Stephens was urged to See also:prose-cute his researches of American antiquities in See also:Peru, but was disinclined to so distant an expedition
.
He became a director of the newly-formed American Ocean See also:Steam See also:Navigation See also:Company, which established the first American See also:line of transatlantic steamships
.
He visited See also:Panama to reconnoitre the ground with a view to the construction of a railway across the See also:isthmus, and, first as See also:vice-See also:president and then as president of the Panama Railway Company, spent the greater See also:part of two years in superintending the project
.
His health was, however, under-See also:mined by exposure to the See also:climate of Central America, and he died at New York on the loth of See also:October 1852
.
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