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Details
ALKEN, Henry. The National Sports of Great Britain. London: Thomas McLean, 1825.
8° (255 x 162mm). 50 hand-coloured etched plates by and after Alken, with tissue guards. (Spotting to two text leaves and their facing guards.) Contemporary red half roan (extremities rubbed, lower cover re-hinged). Provenance: FH (crowned monogram stamped on front pastedown).
FIRST EDITION. Despite having the same title as the folio of 1821, this work -- published at three guineas -- contains a different series of plates, some drawn from earlier works. Schwerdt notes the importance of the humanitarian preface which deplores 'the abominable exhibition of baiting animals’ and remarks on ‘the unfeeling state of the public mind and manners, with respect to Animal Diversions’ which ‘continued … throughout the 18th century.’ The collection includes six plates of horse racing, ten of fox hunting, 6 of coursing, 12 of shooting, and two of fishing, together with others of poaching and the baiting sports about which Alken himself was so critical. No doubt he believed that representing them as ‘national sports’ was better than pretending they did not exist. The one sport not involving animals is prize fighting. The plates are dated 1824 and with 1823 Whatman watermark. Melon/Podeschi 121; Schwerdt I, p. 20; Siltzer p. 72; Tooley 43.
8° (255 x 162mm). 50 hand-coloured etched plates by and after Alken, with tissue guards. (Spotting to two text leaves and their facing guards.) Contemporary red half roan (extremities rubbed, lower cover re-hinged). Provenance: FH (crowned monogram stamped on front pastedown).
FIRST EDITION. Despite having the same title as the folio of 1821, this work -- published at three guineas -- contains a different series of plates, some drawn from earlier works. Schwerdt notes the importance of the humanitarian preface which deplores 'the abominable exhibition of baiting animals’ and remarks on ‘the unfeeling state of the public mind and manners, with respect to Animal Diversions’ which ‘continued … throughout the 18th century.’ The collection includes six plates of horse racing, ten of fox hunting, 6 of coursing, 12 of shooting, and two of fishing, together with others of poaching and the baiting sports about which Alken himself was so critical. No doubt he believed that representing them as ‘national sports’ was better than pretending they did not exist. The one sport not involving animals is prize fighting. The plates are dated 1824 and with 1823 Whatman watermark. Melon/Podeschi 121; Schwerdt I, p. 20; Siltzer p. 72; Tooley 43.
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