Details
[SMOLLETT, Tobias, 1721-1771]. The Expedition of Humphry Clinker. London: W. Johnston and B. Collins, 1671 [i.e. 1771].
3 volumes, 12o. Half-titles. (Title-page of vol. III laid-down.). Contemporary speckled calf (some minor wear at joints, front cover slightly bowed). Provenance: Irvin family (armorial bookplate with motto: "Haud ullis labentia ventis").
FIRST EDITION, generally corresponding with Rothschild's variant A3. Smollet may have written Humphrey Clinker intermittently from 1768 to 1770, and probably completed it while he was staying at his villa in the mountains near Leghorn, in a vain attempt to regain his health. Of the eighty-two letters in the novel, twenty-seven are written by the Welsh squire, Mathew Bramble. Bramble, his servant Clinker, and the rest of their party are on a tour round the country, with the scene shifting from Wales to the west country towns of Bristol and Bath, then to London, and eventually to Smollet's native Scotland, before finally returning to the ordered life of the English countryside. Grolier English 56; Rothschild 1925. (3) (3)
3 volumes, 12
FIRST EDITION, generally corresponding with Rothschild's variant A3. Smollet may have written Humphrey Clinker intermittently from 1768 to 1770, and probably completed it while he was staying at his villa in the mountains near Leghorn, in a vain attempt to regain his health. Of the eighty-two letters in the novel, twenty-seven are written by the Welsh squire, Mathew Bramble. Bramble, his servant Clinker, and the rest of their party are on a tour round the country, with the scene shifting from Wales to the west country towns of Bristol and Bath, then to London, and eventually to Smollet's native Scotland, before finally returning to the ordered life of the English countryside. Grolier English 56; Rothschild 1925. (3) (3)