FIRST EDITION OF C.J. APPERLEY’S MEMOIRS OF THE LIFE OF THE LATE JOHN MYTTON, ESQ. OF HALSTON, WITH 12 LOVELY HAND-COLORED AQUATINT PLATES

APPERLEY, Charles James. Memoirs of the Life of the Late John Mytton, Esq., of Halston, Shropshire; Formerly M.P. for Shrewsbury; High Sheriff for the Counties of Salop and Merioneth, and Major in the North Shropshire Yeomanry Cavalry. With Notices of His Hunting, Shooting, Driving, Racing, and Extravagant Exploits. London: Rudolph Ackermann, 1835. Slim octavo, early 20th-century full red morocco, elaborately gilt-decorated spine, raised bands, top edge gilt. Housed in a custom cloth slipcase.    $2400.

First edition, with 12 beautifully hand-colored aquatint plates by T.J. Rawlins and H. Alken, handsomely bound by Riviere & Son.

Apperley “forwent his aspirations towards ‘moral tone’ in this lively account of a rugged, hard-living, devil-may-care country squire, greatly to the improvement of his narrative” (Ray 48). “Though containing only 12 plates, this first edition is more rare and valued higher than the second edition, which contains 18 plates… Three plates of this first edition, namely 2,8, and 9, don’t appear in the second edition. A most valuable and important book for the sporting life of the period, aptly description by Newton as ‘a biography of a real man that reads like a work of fiction’” (Tooley 66). “As an illustrator of sport, coaching, and racing, whether in Memoirs of John Mytton or the National Sports, [Alken] possesses an importance” (Prideaux, 309). With original cloth bound in.

Fine condition.