March 2021 Catalogue

28 I m a g i n e d W o r l d s E a r l y M a r c h 2 0 2 1 “At Once Took Their High Place In Humorous Literature” 26. INGOLDSBY, Thomas. The Ingoldsby Legends. London, 1855. Three volumes. Octavo, early 20th-century full brown calf gilt; original cloth bound in. $1500. Click for more info Later edition of these comical collections of light verse, myths, historical lore and supernatural tales, wildly popular among Victorian readers, illustrated with engraved title pages, in-text decorations and 20 plates after George Cruikshank and John Leech, handsomely bound by Morrell. Richard Barham’s rollicking Ingoldsby Legends , “when published collectively in 1840… at once took the high place in humorous literature which they have ever since retained” (DNB). Their “lively rhythms and inventive rhymes, their comic and grotesque treatment of medieval legend and their quaint narratives made them immensely popular” (Drabble, 66). First published beginning in 1837 in Bentley’s Miscellany and, later, in The New Monthly Magazine . “A second series was added in 1847 and a third was edited by [Barham’s] son in the same year” (DNB). Faint, scattered foxing to interior, binding beautiful. “Twas now the very witching time of night / When churchyards groan, and graves give up their dead…”