"WRITTEN BY ONE LOAFER FOR A BROTHER LOAFER": FIRST EDITION OF TWAIN’S A TRAMP ABROAD

TWAIN, Mark. A Tramp Abroad. Hartford, Connecticut: American Publishing Company; London: Chatto & Windus, 1880. Octavo, publisher's three-quarter brown morocco, raised bands, marbled endpapers and edges. Housed in a custom clamshell box. $1500.

First edition of Twain’s wonderful account of his walking trip through the Black Forest and the Alps, profusely illustrated.

"Besides his accounts of Germany, Switzerland, France and Italy, Twain includes local folklore (some of which he made up) and slips in several sketches that have little or nothing to do with Europe, including one of his most famous comic tales, 'Jim Baker's Bluejay Yarn'" (MacDonnell, 42). Twain called the work "a gossipy volume… written by one loafer for a brother loafer to read" (LeMaster & Wilson, 743). Illustrated with over 30 full-page wood-engravings, as well as nearly 300 in-text vignettes (including, as the title page states, "three or four pictures made by the author of this book without outside help"). The illustrations comprise "an integral part of [the book's] humor" (Rasmussen, 489). With second state frontispiece (captioned "Titian's Moses"), state B of the portrait frontispiece (no definite sequence), and state B of the text-block. BAL 3386. Johnson, 33-35. MacDonnell, 41-43. McBride, 60-61.

Interior fine, light wear to morocco extremities. A handsome copy.