The Poetical Works. Including all the poetry contained in Dr Currie's edition, and many other pieces not printed in the copy-right edition. To which is prefixed a highly interesting life of the author.. This item is unavailable.The Poetical Works. Including all the poetry contained in Dr Currie's edition, and many other pieces not printed in the copy-right edition. To which is prefixed a highly interesting life of the author.

A unique copy, demurely bound by one of the best Glasgow binders of the day, with a pencil note on a preliminary blank: "This copy belonged to the Foreman who had been in Khull, Blackie & Co's office from 30 to 40 years and was used by him in getting up their beautiful Book 'The Land of Burns'". Some 29 leaves are interspersed throughout the text, either entire leaves from a double-column edition printed in a minuscule type or footnotes neatly excised and pasted to a sheet (sometimes inset, so as to read from both sides, some bearing manuscript ink annotations). At the beginning of the book the text of the first five poems (pp. 1-38) has been removed and replaced with these leaves. The Land of Burns mentioned in the note was published by Blackie in 1838 and was illustrated with engravings of landscapes familiar to the poet or mentioned in the poems. The binder John Carss was described by Thomas Frognall Dibdin as "the favourite book-binder among the cognoscenti at Glasgow". Egerer 246. T. F. Dibdin, A Bibliographical, Antiquarian and Picturesque Tour in the Northern Counties of England and in Scotland, Vol. II, 1838. Duodecimo (176 x 104 mm). Engraved frontispiece based on the Nasmyth-Beugo portrait and incorporating a view of Burns's birthplace in Alloway, 3 plates, all engraved by R. Scott. Contemporary red morocco by J. Carss and Co., of Glasgow, spine lettered and dated in gilt, compartments and sides with a border of gilt paired fillets, gilt dotted edge roll, gilt scrolling turn-ins, Serpentine pattern marbled endpapers, top edge gilt. Binding just a little rubbed at extremities, short closed tear to pp. 167-168. A very good copy. …