Land Sharks and Sea Gulls

London: Richard Bentley, 1838. With Six Fine Engraved Plates by George Cruikshank

CRUIKSHANK, George, illustrator. GLASCOCK, Captain [William Nugent]. Land Sharks and Sea Gulls. By Captain Glascock, R.N. In Three Volumes. London, Richard Bentley, 1838.

First edition. Three octavo volumes (7 3/4 x 4 3/4 inches 197 x 121 mm.). [iv], [1-3], 4-307, [1, imprint]; [ii], [1-3], 4-309, [1, imprint]; [ii], [1-3], 4-329, [1, imprint] pp. Six engraved plates by George Cruikshank.

Late nineteenth century three quarter olive green morocco over marbled boards ruled in gilt. Spines with five raised band decoratively tooled and lettered in gilt, marbled endpapers, top edge gilt. With the engraved bookplate of George Shaw on each front paste-down. S[pine of volume I with some light chipping at head and tail, some light staining to top blank margins at end of volume III. A good set.

William Nugent Glascock (c. 1787-1847) was an Irish officer in the Royal Navy and a novelist. He saw service during the French Revolutionary and Napoleonic Wars, and later in the years of relative peace. Glascock wrote a two-volume work, The Naval Sketch Book, or The Service Afloat and Ashore, published in 1826. This was followed by the three-volume Sailors and Saints, or Matrimonial Manœuvres in 1829, Tales of a Tar, with Characteristic Anecdotes in 1836, and the three-volume Land Sharks and Sea Gulls in 1838. He also wrote a two-volume work entitled Naval Service, or Officers' Manual, published in 1836. This useful manual for young officers passed through four editions in England. The last, published in 1859, had a short advertisement by Glascock's daughter, stating that "the work has been translated into French, Russian, Swedish, and Turkish, and adopted by the navies of those powers, as well as by that of the United States." Laughton remarked that the work was "of course, quite obsolete, though still interesting to the student of naval history and customs."

Cohn 353; Wolff 2564; not in Sadleir.