First Thus n. d. [1916]. xxii, 122pp. plus 12 colour plates and numerous in-text illustrations in black and white. The premise of the book was to bring together stories from each nation that was fighting together as the 'Allies' during the first world war, so there are stories from England, Scotland, Wales, Ireland, France, Italian, Portugal, Japan, Russia, Serbia and Belgium, while acknowledging 'the almost universal distribution of fairy tales' and that 'the "people of peace" have no politics and are ignorant of the elements of patriotism.' Blue cloth with black lettering and gilt fairies on front cover is marked and the spine is very browned; text is hard to read, head and foot bumped. The endpapers are browned and lightly foxed, light foxing in places within the book, which feels well-handled. Chiswick Shop

First Edition iv 270 pp, ltd edition 600 copies, bears the stamps of an Irish school library, foredge uncut, publishers cloth, slight discolouration to endpapers, slight marks on spine. Very clean copy given it's vintage.

Contents: Vol. I: From the beginnings to the age of Henry VIII: 1. The beginnings. 2. From the Dane to the Norman. 3. Early English literature to "Piers Plowman". 4. Anglo-Norman literature, romance, Ballad and history. 5. Chaucer. 6. The successors of Chaucer-the beginnings of cultivated prose.7. The English Bible-the miracle play. 8. The fifteenth century. 9. The literature of Scotland-the Ballad. 10. The age of the first Tudors. Vol. II: From the age of Henry VIII to the age of Milton: 1. The Great Elizabethan prose-writers. 2. The lesser lights of Elizabethan prose. 3. Spenser and minor Elizabethan poets. 4. The predecessors of Shakespeare. 5.Shakespeare. 6. Shakespeare-(Continued). 7. The Jacobean poets. 8. Jacobean drama. 9. Jacobean prose. Vol. III: From Milton to Johnson: 1. The decline-1630-1660. 2. The age of Dryden-1660-1700. 3. The age of Anne-1700-1740. 4. The age of Johnson-1740-1780. Vol. IV: From the age of Johnson to the age of Tennyson: 1. The age of Wordsworth-1780-1815. 2. The age of Byron, 1815-1840. 3. The early Victorian age-1840-1870. 4. The age of Tennyson, 1870-1900. Epilogue. Appendix and index. No. 32320

First Thus 128pp. Black-stamped cloth cover, decorated by Robinson; spine is browned and slightly rolled, and the cover is a bit discoloured. Some bumping to the head and foot of spine. Light foxing to the front, very pretty endpapers. The inside is bright and very pretty, illustrated throughout in colour, both in 18 full-page tissue-protected tipped-in plates and in-text illustrations, and in black-and-white line drawings. Large text, one stanza on each page, is accompanied by a delicate little image. Binding a little shaky, nevertheless a very attractive book. Chiswick Shop