The Coaching Age by Harris, Stanley. John Sturgess (illustrator) - 1885

London: Richard Bentley and Son, 1885. First edition. Octavo (8 5/8 x 5 1/2 inches; 218 x 141 mm.). Bound ca. 1930 by Rivière & Son (stamp-signed on verso of front free end-paper) in full red morocco, covers with gilt border and horse-shoe corner-pieces, spine with five raised band, decoratively tooled and lettered in gilt in compartments, top edge gilt, decorative gilt turn-ins, dark blue coated end-papers. viii, 468 pp. Sixteen full-page sepia plates by John Sturgess after Hanhart. A Fine copy.

"The favourable reception accorded to my book on Old Coaching Days has emboldened me, in the phraseology of the road, to put on another coach, and ask for it the same kind indulgence and patronage as were bestowed on my previous undertaking... Setting out with our old Highways, some of which were partially used by coaches, I have proceeded to show how our roads were improved, and the results of such improvement as regarded speed in travelling; then, giving some account of the use that was made of the roads, and the various persons who managed the traffic on them, I have gone on to 'the change,' when railways superseded the coaching system, and thus brought me into the position of being a chronicler of reminiscences of past things which can no longer be seen in actual existence." A beautifully bound history of transportation.