Ballads, Founded on Anecdotes Relating to Animals, with Prints designed and Engraved by William Blake.
1805. Chichester: J.Seagrave for Richard Phillips, 1805.
Bound with The Death of Abel, "A New Edition," London: Vernor & Hood, 1803, translated from the German of Salomon Gessner by Mary Collyer. 2 vols. in 1. 8vo, (6), 212, (1, index)pp., with 5 plates designed and engraved by Blake; xii, (2), [17]-242 pp. with 4 plates designed and engraved by H. Richter. Contemporary panelled tree calf, rebacked; early ink ownership inscription of Mary Henor(?) on both title pages; small ticket of Subun-so Book Store, Tokyo on front pastedown. Scattered foxing especially to plate margins, board tips rubbed, generally very good.
§ First edition, with plates 1-3 in the second state. See above. Bentley, BB, 465. Easson and Essick, WBBI, Vol. I, VIII. Bindman, Complete Graphic Works of Blake, 403-407. It is bound here with an 1803 edition of Mary Collyer's wildly popular translation of Gessner's The Death of Abel, first published in 1761. Item #124184
Price: $4,250.00