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This is the first edition of the first book-form printing, with most of the recipes having previously appeared in issues of Harper’s Bazaar.

Provenance:  Bookplate of Henry H. Bynam, Pittsburgh, partly chipped away.

•  Bitting 351; Brown, Culinary Americana, 2479; Cagle & Stafford 581.   Publisher’s olive pebbled cloth, spine with gilt-stamped title; edges and extremities rubbed, spine slightly darkened with head and foot chipped. Front pastedown with private collector's bookplate as above; front fly-leaf, with pencilled annotations, now separating. Two pages with small areas of offsetting from now-absent laid-in item, one page with inkstain (affecting but not obscuring text), pages otherwise clean. A good copy of an evocative cookbook.  (28524)

•  Original printed wrapper mimicking needlework. A pleasantly clean copy.  (29889)

This is the genuine first edition, not a modern reprint.

•  Bitting 11; Brown, Culinary Americana, 4021. Not in Cagle & Stafford.   Publisher's aubergine cloth, front cover with gilt-stamped title; spine and edges rubbed. Hinges (inside) tender; sewing just starting to loosen. Front free endpaper with inked numerals, a column of figures relating to eggs; otherwise unannotated. Pages with intermittent light spots of staining, largely but not entirely in outer portions; used but not abused.  (28523)

•  New, in dust jacket.  (29379)

•  New, in dust jacket.  (29380)

Provenance:  Flourishing old signatures of “J. Lowry” to pastedown and title-page.

Clavijo did not know how to write so Pedro Arias signed for him.

•  Very good conditon. Written in a clear, easy-to-read hand.  (27601)

Binding:  This is in a simply elegant binding of publisher's brown cloth, front cover and spine each with decorative gilt-stamped title; front cover with author's facsimile signature in gilt, and publishing information.

Presentation copy: Front fly-leaf inscribed in pencil, “Compliments of Juliet Corson Apr. 1880.” The signature matches the facsimile signature on the front cover.

•  Not in Bitting; not in Brown, Culinary Americana; not in Cagle & Stafford.   Extremities mildly rubbed (head of spine moreso), small spots of very faint discoloration to sides. Fly-leaf with inscription as above. Pages age-toned, otherwise clean. It's quite fair to call this “lovely.”  (28479)

•  Publisher's textured cream paper wrappers, with a little light soil; top edges of booklet darkened. Generally a clean, good copy.

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•  Drake 707; Shaw & Shoemaker 13185.   Removed from a nonce volume and resewn.  (9489)

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NO copies of this item were located in searches of WorldCat and NUC Pre-1956; but we do find an 1886 listed in WorldCat.

•  Contemporary half calf over boards, all quite worn and abraded, spine leather peeled or peeling entirely away to show signatures. Shaken with hinges cracked, most signatures loose; pages age-toned with small stain (possibly of insect origin) to bottom of a few. Ownership inscription pencilled on front free endpaper. Volume fragile, indeed "broken" and now housed in a simple phase box; contents fascinating.

Binding:  Publisher's red cloth, front cover with gilt-stamped title and samovar vignette, drawn from a real samovar in the author's possession.

•  Not in Brown, Culinary Americana or in Cagle & Stafford (in either form).   Binding as above; minimal shelfwear, dust jacket lacking. Front free endpaper with inked ownership inscription. Pages very clean. A fresh, solid copy.  (30357)

Evidence of Readership: An early owner of this copy who seems to have sided with Jeffrey has made occasional annotations in pencil, one of which decries “these commentators [who] will never allow poor Shakespeare any invention, always endeavoring to prove him pilfering . . . “

Both volumes are illustrated with wood engravings by J. Berryman, reproducing medieval and Renaissance images; vol. II also includes a total ofnine plates, one being an oversized, folding rendition of a fanciful 15th-century engraving of a Flemish morris dance. The title-pages are printed in red and black.

Provenance:  Front fly-leaf of vol. II with pencilled ownership inscription of prominent 20th-century Philadelphia collector E.M. Boyle.

•  NSTC D1619; NCBEL, III, 1644.   Period-style quarter calf and marbled paper–covered sides, spines with gilt-stamped red morocco title-label, compartments with blind-tooled and gilt-stamped decorations, back pastedowns with binder's tickets. All edges marbled. Regular but not heavy early pencilled annotations, some offset onto opposing pages; a few scattered small smudges, pages otherwise clean. One leaf with small central hole affecting about four letters. A very attractive copy, with interesting and engaging signs of readership.  (30112)

It is notable that despite its light theme and touch, this book offers serious instruction to men wanting seriously to achieve real competence in its era's arts of entertaining. Those seeking a gamesmanship guide suggesting ways merely to appear competent, or those cheerfully assuming that it is charming for men to be incompetent in this realm, had best look for support elsewhere.

•  Brown, Culinary Americana, 3337 (for first ed.).   Publisher's black cloth, front cover with eggplant- and gilt-stamped vignette of a mustachioed man hoisting a drink tray, spine with eggplant-stamped stripes and gilt-stamped title; dust jacket lacking, minor shelfwear to extremities and lower edges. A clean, solid copy.  (30269)