GABRIEL CONROY ... Issued by Subscription Only .. by Harte, Bret (i.e. Francis Brett Harte) - 1876

Hartford, Conn.: American Publishing Company, 1876. Octavo, pp. [i-v] vi-ix [x] xi [xii-xiv] [15-16] 17-466 [467] [468: blank], double flyleaves at front and rear, 33 inserted plates, full legal sheep, spine panel ruled in gold, black leather title label printed in gold, brown sprinkled edges, salmon coated endpapers. First U.S. edition. BAL notes two states of the title leaf, with no sequence determined. This copy has the integral title leaf with copyright notice reading "COPYRIGHTED," a copyright deposit copy thus. This book was issued by subscription in various binding formats, this being one of the more costly deluxe formats. Harte's only long novel, first published in SCRIBNER'S MONTHLY, November 1875 - August 1876. "While it cannot be said to have been completely successful, it hardly deserves the general condemnation under which it has fallen. Harte did not have the constructive ability for a novel, and the plot becomes at times confused, but the character of Gabriel Conroy is not by any means his worst creation, and the opening scene describing the castaways in the snow is in his very best manner." - Quinn, American Fiction, p. 239. Pattee considers GABRIEL CONROY to be "that chaotic book which has in it the materials for the greatest of American romances ... the description of the snowstorm at the opening of GABRIEL CONROY reminds one of Thomas Hardy" (A History of American Literature Since 1870, pp. 69; 79). BAL 7285. Wright (III) 2539. Baird and Greenwood 1097. Leather rubbed at edges, 30 mm split at upper front joint, else a very good copy. Uncommon in this binding. (#107189)