Published by Exeter: printed and sold by R. Trewman behind the Guildhall, 1777
Seller: Christopher Edwards ABA ILAB, Henley-on-Thames, OXON, United Kingdom
8vo, engraved frontispiece (folded to avoid cropping), and pp. xxiii, [i], 266, [2]; title page foxed, else good; bound in contemporary calf, gilt, neatly rebacked, spine gilt, old red morocco label. First and only edition: a rare provincially-printed guide to Freemasonry, with particulars of meetings and ceremonies held at the Union Lodge in Exeter, of which the compiler was a member. The last half of the book is in verse, in two sections, the first called 'Prologues and epilogues, spoken at plays perform'd at Exeter, by desire of the Union Lodge', and the second 'A collection of anthems, odes, and songs of Masonry'. With an 11-page list of subscribers, mostly from Exeter and other towns in the southwest of England no doubt nearly all the subscribers were Masons (there are no women involved). The engraved frontispiece, folded up to fit, shows both sides of a medal struck for the Union Lodge; there is a leaf of explanation at the end. Rare: ESTC lists five copies only.