The material within this collection comprises of correspondence and publications by and about Richard Francis Burton and his wife Isabel Burton (nee Arundell). There are also two photographs of Burton and artefacts.

Also included within this Collection are correspondence concerning the acquisition of the material by the RAS and some supplementary material regarding Oscar Eckenstein, its original collector.

These are pamphlets and offprints covering many different areas of his interest. Some are rare editions whilst others are typed reprints of material held elsewhere.

"The First Four Chapters of Goa, and the Blue Mountains: or, Six Months of Sick Leave by Richard F. Burton, Lieut. Bombay Army. Author of a grammar of the Mooltanee language; Critical Remarks on Dr Dorn's Chrestomathy of the Pushtoo, or Afghan Dialect etc. etc. With the articles which recently appeared in the Madras Mail and Madras Times on the coming exposition at Goa, &c., with frontispiece". Extracts from the Madras Mail: Goa and the Goanese, parts 1 and 2 (publ. Oct. 6, 1890). Extracts from the Madras Times: No.1 - The Rise of the Jesuits (pub. Oct. 25, 1890); No.2 - Old Goa (pub. Nov. 4, 1890) and No.3 - Francis Xavier (pub. Nov. 15, 1890). London: 1851. (Madras: Higginbotham & Co.: 1890). "Booklet produced for an exposition [i.e. public display of the relics of the Saint for veneration] “proposed to be held in connection with the tomb of St Francis Xavier, in December next [1891]”.This event, the first such for many years, marked the beginning of regular decennial expositions.