THE POETICAL WORKS. Illustrated. [In Two Volumes.]

Longfellow, Henry Wadsworth

Boston: Houghton, Osgood and Company, 1879 (Vol I) and Boston: Houghton, Mifflin and Company, 1880 (Vol II). Original full brown morocco elaborately stamped in black, front covers with harp design and lettering in gilt, spines lettered in gilt, decorative gilt dentelles, marbled endpapers, all page edges gilt.

The sumptuous "Subscription Edition" of Longfellow's poetical works, with the two volumes properly dated 1879 and 1880 (during which interim Houghton Osgood became Houghton Mifflin). (After his death, there would be a third volume -- his Complete Prose Works -- not present here.) As detailed in Blanck, this edition first came out in 45 paper-covered parts, and then the volumes were available (by purchase or by binding the parts) in cloth, in half-morocco, in "full turkey morocco," or in twice the number of volumes in a "soft flexible morocco." This is the full morocco, with all page edges richly gilt.

During the years preceding and succeeding Longfellow's 1882 death, a lot of "Poetical Works" editions were published -- but this must be the most substantial. The leaves measure 12 by 9-1/4 inches, and there is a plethora of full-page plates with tissue guards, plus other illustrations set among the poems; each volume's "List of Illustrations" is eleven pages long, listing about 30 illustrations per page: do the math!). The very first plate is a portrait of Longfellow.

Condition is just about fine (a few leaves are browned where old newspaper clippings must once have resided). Blanck 12578. Item #15194

Price: $375.00