Fairyland of Ida Rentoul Outhwaite. Verses by Annie R. Rentoul. Stories by Grenbry Outhwaite and Annie R. Rentoul by OUTHWAITE, Ida Rentoul - 1926

Melbourne: Ramsay, 1926. First Edition. Hardcover. Very Good. Melbourne, Ramsay, 1926 [first edition]. Folio, [iv], 166 pages with several illustrations and 51 tipped-in plates (including 19 colour plates with captioned tissue-guards) plus pictorial endpapers. Original blue cloth blocked in gilt (the primary binding), top edge gilt, others uncut; covers a little marked, sunned and rubbed, and slightly worn at the extremities; boards slightly bowed; bottom edge a little marked; scattered foxing (generally light); monochrome plates generally a little offset; occasional signs of age and use; overall a very good copy. Number 222 of 1000 copies signed by Ida Rentoul Outhwaite. Provenance: 'Freida Ruth Heighway | 22/10/26 | Burwood' is written in ink on the verso of the front free endpaper. The name 'F. S. Heighway, Esq.' appears in the list of subscribers at the end of the volume, marked with a small pencilled cross. There are 271 names on the list, accounting for 298 copies.

Printed on the verso of the half-title is the statement of limitation ('one thousand copies, numbered and signed by the Artist'). Marcie Muir notes that 'Some copies ... have been seen, unsigned and bound in a cheaper binding with col[our] instead of giltlettering &c., suggesting that they may have been bound up later and sold as remainders'. We have handled several of these variants, unsigned, some numbered, some unnumbered. Some of these copies did not have a gilt top edge; some did not have captions on the tissue-guards. In any event, a subscriber's copy (we purchased it from a family descendant) is clearly a desirable rarity: as Ida Rentoul Outhwaite put it so eloquently, 'The Subscribers are the god-parents of the Fairies in this Book' (see page [162]).

Muir 5600.