A Silent Witness

Freeman, R. Austin

Published by Hodder & Stoughton, London, 1914

About this Item

First UK Edition. Publisher's bright scarlet-red (as opposed to brick-red) cloth with first issue gilt lettering to the spine and title and gilt design to the front board. 328 pp. Offsetting to both sets of end-papers; a contemporary gift inscription to the front free end-paper; rear hinge starting but still holding firm; spine tips soft; spine lightly faded. Overall about VG (no dustwrapper). NB: According to Donaldson this is a variant binding - but his first issue is, he says, lettered in black. This is nonsense. The first issue should be lettered in gilt as this copy is. H & S would not put out a book lettered in BLACK (cheap process) as a first issue then a book lettered in GILT (expensive process) as a second issue. "An early example of the body that is discovered and then vanishes when help comes. Told in the first person by Dr. Jardine, whose life is attempted for what he unsuspectingly knows, who weaves his own romance out of murder and other machinations and who is loved and guarded by the villain's wife. She dies in saving him, and all ends well, after an orgy of complexity in which Thorndyke, Polton, and Jervis work like beavers" (BARZUN & TAYLOR 900). HUBIN, p.157. Further photographs available upon request.

Seller Inventory # 355490725018

Bibliographic Details

• Title: A Silent Witness
• Publisher: Hodder & Stoughton, London
• Publication Date: 1914
• Binding: Hard Cover
• Edition: First Edition.