Available Copies from Independent Booksellers
Price: US$1000.00 + shipping
Description: 12mo (17 x 10.5 cm). 156 pages. 12 lithographed plates after P. S. Duval. Original red roan-backed printed boards dated 1840. FIRST EDITION, in boards unrecorded by BAL or Heartman & Canny. The upper board on this copy notes that it is for the second edition and is dated 1840. BAL 16131; Heartman & Canny, pp. 41-44; Norman 1720. Joints split but threads holding, leather dry; some occasional pale foxing
Seller: Riverrun Books & Manuscripts, ABAA, Ardsley, NY, U.S.A.
Price: US$1000.00 + shipping
Description: First edition, stated second edition on the upper board. 12 lithographed plates after P. S. Duval. 156 pp. 1 vols. 12mo (17 x 10.5 cm). Variant Binding dated 1840. The text of this book conforms to the first edition (156 pp.) and the title page is dated 1839, but the upper board states second edition and is dated 1840, a binding not noted by BAL or Heartman & Canny. The 1840 second edition (BAL 16132) is dated 1840 on the title page and runs to 166 pp. A third edition is noted with date 1845. The contents are Heartman and Canny's variant "b" (with uncolored plates) and plate 3 in BAL's state "B" reading "Part of Shells" (no priority established). An adaptation of Thomas Brown's The Conchologist's Text-Book (Glasgow, 1833), edited by the financially troubled Poe, and published shortly after he moved to Philadelphia in 1838. Defending himself against accusations of plagiarism, Poe wrote to George W. Eveleth in February 1847: "I wrote it, in conjunction with Professor Thomas Wyatt, and Professor McMurtrie of Pha-- my name being put to the work, as best known and most likely to aid its circulation. I wrote the Preface and Introduction, and translated from Cuvier, the accounts of the animals etc." (see Ostrom, The Letters of Edgar Allan Poe [New York, 1966], no. 249, p. [343]). BAL 16131; Heartman & Canny, pp. 41-44, this copy variant "b" (with uncolored plates), plate 3 in BAL's state "B" reading "Part of Shells" (no priority established); Norman 1720 Original red roan-backed printed boards dated 1840. A bit rubbed, upper cover starting, leather dry; some occasional pale foxing. Very good 12 lithographed plates after P. S. Duval. 156 pp. 1 vols. 12mo (17 x 10.5 cm) First edition, stated second edition on the upper board.
Seller: James Cummins Bookseller, ABAA, New York, NY, U.S.A.