The Poetry of Witchcraft.

Brixton Hill: printed for private circulation only,, 1853. Victorian interest in the witch craze First edition thus, one of 80 copies only. Halliwell reproduces two 17th-century comedies featuring the Lancashire witches, executed in 1612: The Lancashire Witches by Thomas Shadwell (1682) and The Late Lancashire Witches by Thomas Heywood and Richard Broome (1634). Halliwell (1820-1889) was devoted to "antiquarian research and publication, at once diverse and profuse" (ODNB) and co-founded the Percy and Shakespeare Societies. He is one of the most significant figures in the codification of English nursery rhymes. As a collector of rare books, he is a controversial character due to his practice of cutting up works, including First Folios, to paste into personal notebooks, now housed at the Shakespeare Birthplace Trust library. Provenance: Sir Charles Clow Tennant (1823-1906), Scottish politician, his bookplate on the front pastedown; listed in the Catalogue of the Library Collected by Sir Charles Tennant (1896) alongside seven further Halliwell titles. Quarto (283 x 217 mm). Contemporary tan calf by Francis Bedford, neatly rebacked with original spine laid down, spine elaborately tooled in gilt in compartments, raised bands ruled in gilt, red morocco title label, triple fillet frame on boards, edges and turn-ins tooled in gilt, top edge gilt, marbled endpapers. Spine darkened, a couple of scuffs to leather, contents clean. A very good copy. Justin Winsor, Halliwelliana: A Bibliography of the Publications of James Orchard Halliwell, 1881.