A Christmas Carol

Limited edition, copy number 69 of 135 copies: London: David Paradine Developments Ltd, 1978. Small octavo. Original full dark burgundy leather, the upper board blocked in gilt with a holly wreath enclosing the title and author after the original binding of 1843, within a blind-stamped border with foliate corner ornaments repeated on the lower board, the spine lettered in gilt, gilt-tooled turn-ins, all edges gilt, red and white headbands. Housed in the publisher's burgundy cloth slipcase, blocked in gilt with the same wreath to the front panel. A fine copy: the binding square, the leather fresh, clean and without rubbing, the gilt bright on the boards, spine and edges alike, and the contents clean and unmarked throughout. The slipcase fine, square and unfaded, and without shelf-wear to the edges. A Christmas Carol was first published on 19 December 1843 in an edition of six thousand copies, which sold out by Christmas Eve. The Paradine imprint took its name from the middle name of David Paradine Frost, and issued a short series of deluxe limited facsimiles in the later 1970s, among them Caxton's Reynart the Foxe, Langland's Piers Plowman, Jefferys's American Atlas and Anna Sewell's Black Beauty.