Copy number: N-076(1)

Binding: Contemporary blind-tooled calf over wooden boards. Two metal catches and clasps and four metal corner-pieces on each cover lost. A modern manuscript title on a rectangular paper label at the head of the spine. Triple fillets form an intersecting double frame. Diagonal triple fillets divide the inner rectangle into lozenge-shaped and triangular compartments, decorated with a small floral stamp at each corner. Rebacked.

Size: 300 × 225 × 40 mm.

Size of leaf: 290 × 205 mm.

Bibliographical note by an eighteenth-century(?) French owner pasted onto the upper cover. Early manuscript signatures. Some marginal notes, mainly correcting the text, and ‘Ex^m’ marks, in an early hand.

On [a1r] and [a4r] four-line initials ‘P' and ‘V' are supplied in blue with reserved white decoration and red, green, and purple pen-work decoration extending into the margin to form a border. Similar initials at the beginning of each book. Other initials are supplied in red with reserved white decoration; paragraph marks and underlining of chapter headings are also supplied in red; capital strokes in red.

Provenance: Inscription(?) in a contemporary hand on [p12v], unread under ultraviolet light. France (eighteenth century); see bibliographical note on front pastedown. Richard Heber (1773-1833); stamp on [p12v]; see Catalogue, 2 (1834), lot 4425, sold for £0. 2. 0. J. T. Hand (fl. 1834-1837); signature on [a1r] and [p12r]; purchased at his sale, lot 228 (paper label at the tail of the spine), for £0. 6. 0: see Books Purchased (1837), 27.

SHELFMARK: Auct. 6Q 2.9.