THE GOLDEN LION OF GRANPERE. A Novel by Trollope, Anthony - 1872

1872. Fraser, F. A.. With Illustrations. New York: Harper & Brothers, 1872. 4 pp preliminary ads plus 4 pp at rear, undated. Original light brown printed wrappers.

First American (and first illustrated) Edition, later issue, being No. 579 in Harper's Library of Select Novels. This tale takes place at the Lion d'Or, the only hotel in the small Lorraine village of Granpere; it is "not only Trollope's very best shorter book, but one of the most charming idylls in English literature" [Walpole]. THE GOLDEN LION was initially published serially in "Good Words" in Britain (Jan.-Aug. 1872) and in "Harper's New Monthly Magazine" in America (Feb.-Sept. 1872) -- both with 24 illustrations by F.A. Fraser. The London book edition was published right in the middle of this, in May 1872, but without illustrations; later in 1872 this Harper's edition was published, with all 24 of the Fraser illustrations that had appeared serially. (Tinsley's unillustrated London edition sold poorly, so he tried it again, illustrated, in 1873.) Initially offered in cloth at $1.25 or in pictorial wrappers at 75¢, this copy is in the secondary (unillustrated and undated) wrappers: "Later in the year [1872], unsold sheets of the first edition were bound in a secondary paper binding and sold for 40¢" [Smith]. But this copy is much later than that: the rear wrapper bears the date Feb. 1887, and the inside rear wrapper advertises BEN-HUR. Condition is about very good -- not bad except that the front wrapper, once detached, is affixed via a strip of wrapper-border borrowed from some other wrappered Harper volume. Smith pp 157-163 (Notes 2 & 3).