MASEFIELD, JOHN. Salt-Water Ballads. London: Grant Richards, 1902. 8vo, original lighter blue buckram, t.e.g., others uncut, spine a trifle faded, natural discoloration to free endpapers, cloth folding case. FIRST EDITION of the author's first book, one of 500 copies, FIRST ISSUE (a portion of the edition appeared later with a cancelled title-page bearing the Elkin Mathews imprint); a handful of copies are known in a trial binding of mid-night blue buckram; INSCRIBED BY THE POET with a line of verse on front free endpaper: "The luck will alter & the star will rise. John Masefield." Simmons 1; Hadley-Taylor, p.27. Contains the well-known poem "Sea-Fever" (beginning "I must down to the seas again").