"NO CHRISTMAS WAS COMPLETE WITHOUT A NEW RACKHAM GIFT BOOK": SIGNED LIMITED EDITION OF RACKHAM'S BRITISH BALLADS, 1919, BEAUTIFULLY BOUND IN FULL MOROCCO BY BAYTUN RIVIERE

RACKHAM, Arthur. Some British Ballads. London: Constable, [1919]. Large quarto, contemporary full crushed blue morocco, decorative endpapers, elaborately gilt-decorated spine, raised bands, all edges gilt. $2200.

Signed limited edition, number 354 of only 575 copies signed by Rackham, with 16 beautiful full-page mounted color illustrations and 24 in-text line cuts, a splendid copy bound by Bayntun Riviere in full crushed morocco gilt.

"For many years, no Christmas was complete without a new sumptuous Rackham gift book," of which Some British Ballads is an excellent example (Dalby, 76), a splendid production with exquisite full-color illustrations of such traditional ballads as "Lord Randal," "Chevy Chase," "The Twa Corbies" and "Sir Patrick Spens." "Never did old poems appear so gayly bedecked than Some British Ballads, which Arthur Rackham has gorgeously illustrated with 16 paintings… It is hard to decide which the more attractive feature of this book—Mr. Rackham's paintings or the ballads themselves" (New York Times contemporary review). Latimore & Haskell, 50-51. Riall, 137. Hudson, 170.

A fine copy.