Country versus Town. Designed and Etched by D.T. Egerton

London: Published by Thomas M'Lean, 1823. Excessively Rare Egerton Title
A Colorful Country Life in Comparison to an Exhausting Urban Life

EGERTON, Daniel Thomas. Country versus Town, Twelve Plates, Designed and Etched by D.T. Egerton. London: Published by Thomas M'Lean, 1823.

First edition. Oblong quarto (9 1/4 x 14 inches; 235 X 356 mm.). Printed title-page and twelve interleaved hand-colored aquatint plates. The plates watermarked "J. Whatman 1823. Title-page 1/4" short at lower edge (not affecting print area).

Bound ca. 1900 by Tout of London. Three quarter red morocco over marbled boards ruled in gilt. Spine with two raised bands lettered horizontally in gilt, marbled endpapers, top edge gilt. Ink name and address on verso of front free endpaper. An excellent example of a very rare book.

One of Egerton's rarest satires, the twelve plates depict a colorful country life in comparison to an exhausting urban life.

Daniel Thomas Egerton (1797-1842) was a British landscape painter and engraver. Egerton was a founding member of the Society of British Artists where he exhibited his work in the years 1824-1829 and 1838-1840. He spent much of the later part of his life in Mexico, and in 1840 published Egerton's Views in Mexico, a portfolio of lithographs described in the subtitle as "being a Series of Twelve Coloured Plates, executed by himself from his Original Drawings, accompanied with a short Description. Having abandoned his family in England, Egerton returned to Mexico in 1841 with Alice Edwards, the teenaged daughter of another British painter. He and the eight-month pregnant Alice were murdered in the village of Tacubaya (present day Mexico City), Mexico, where they had rented a house, on 27 April 1842. Egerton was carrying large amounts of money, and both he and Alice were wearing jewelry which was untouched, although the murder was attributed to a robbery. British diplomatic pressure to solve the crime led to the arrest of three local petty thieves, two of whom were hanged, and one of whom was allowed to escape from prison. There has been speculation that Egerton's alleged involvement in fraudulent land sales in Texas, his ties to a Masonic order, or an unknown jealous lover of Alice was behind the killing. (Wikipedia).

The Plates:
1. COUNTRY.
Instead of being awoke from your rosy slumbers on a beautiful morn by "the Cock's shrill clarion, or the echoing horn."

2. TOWN.
You are disturbed, after having been tofs'd with distempered dreams half the night, by the clang of pewter pots; the cry of soot ho! The pafsing knell of the Dustman, and other melodious sounds equally agreeable.

3. COUNTRY.
How sweet to take your morning repast, beneath the shade of clustering Roses; to inhale the "Incense-breathing morn"; and to listen to the early carols of the Lark.

4. TOWN.
On the contrary, how enervating - having resorted to stimulants to recruit exhausted nature after the intemperate excefses of the preceeding night, still unrefreshed to take an unsocial meal in your room, half obscured from the rays of a noon-day sun.

5. COUNTRY. The very appearance of a Country Church and the simplicity of it's attendants inspire devotion; to witnefs the serene contentment, the unruffled bloom of health depicted on every countenance fills the heart with that gratitude...

6. TOWN.
How widely different every thing that relates to the Metropolitan Church, where people resort with as much parade as if they were about performing a Pilgrimage to Mecca, to gaze at painted windows, new fashions & pretty faces...

7. COUNTRY.
When the heat of the weather prevents your partaking of the more robust exercises of the Country, make up a water party - who would not prefer spreading the cloth for a collation beneath a shady grove of trees, and within sound of a murmuring water fall.

8. TOWN.
To partaking of Eel Pies in a well-smoked room at Putney, or to steering below Bridge, amid groves of masts, and deriving amusement from the native slang of contending watermen...

9. COUNTRY.
Who would leave the gaieties of the Race-course, where all that is pleasing is concentrated, and resign the sight of the contesting emulation of the High mettled Racer.

10. TOWN.
To be suffocated with dust in Hyde Park, and have, at least, your limbs endangered by every Blade, who chooses to convert his Tilbury into a Break.

11. COUNTRY.
With what pleasure may you dispense with your equipage on an evening, and ramble home lighted by the silver beams of Cynthia, thro' fertile vales, watered by rippling brooks; whilst - "all the air a solemn stillnefs holds."

12. TOWN.
In town your nocturnal rambles if lefs pleasing may be more diversified for there whilst pausing at your own door to relieve a suffering Fair one you may find others active in administering to their own necefsities at your expense.


Bobins II, 641; Not in Abbey, Tooley or Prideaux, and no copies located in BM, NUC, OCLC, or RLIN.