3 



PREFACE. 



^T^HE "first edition" has been a favourite theme 

 jf for the scorn of those who love it not. " The 

 first edition and the worst /" gibes a modern 

 poet, and many are the true lovers of literature 

 entirely insensitive to the accessory, historical or 

 sentimental, associations of books. The present writer 

 possesses a copy of one of Walton's Lives, that of 

 Bishop Sanderson, with the author's donatory in- 

 scription to a friend upon the title-page. To keep 

 this in his little library he has undergone willingly 

 many privations, cheerfully faced hunger and cold 

 rather than let it pass from his hand ; yet, how often 

 when, tremulously, he has unveiled this treasure to 

 his visitors, how often has it been examined with 

 un dilating eyes, ana cold, un envious hearts ! Yet so 

 he must confess himself to have looked upon a friend's 

 superb first edition of " Pickwick" though surely not 

 without that measure of interest which all, save the 

 quite unlettered or unintelligent, must Jeel in seeing 

 the first visible shape of a book of such resounding 

 significance in English literature. 



Such interest may, without fear of denial, be claimed 

 for a facsimile of the first edition of" The Compleat 

 Angler" after " Robinson Crusoe" perhaps the most 

 popular of English classics. Thomas Westwood, whose 



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