THE YANKEE ENTERPRISE, OR THE TWO MILLIONAIRES; AND OTHER THRILLING TALES by Anonymously Edited Anthology - 1855

Boston: Dayton and Wentworth, 1855. Octavo, pp. [i-iii] iv [v] 6 [25] 26-334 [note: text complete despite gap in pagination, flyleaves at front and rear, engraved frontispiece by George B. Ellis after a painting by R. W. Buss, head and tailpieces in text, original decorated cloth, front, spine and rear panels stamped in blind, First edition? The contents page lists story titles and chapter titles indiscriminately, thus giving the false impression that this volume contains some forty stories. The actual contents are "Two Millionaires" (novella by Sarah Fry with German setting), "'I Owe You Nothing, Sir'" (short story among English high society), "Notes of a Journey Across the Isthmus of Panama" (sketch), "The Two Passports" (short story with an intercalated adventure tale set during the Napoleonic wars), "Australia and Van Diemen's Land" (long sketch), "The Fairy Cup" (a short fairy tale by Alfred Crowquill) "The White Swallow" (novelette set among American Indians), "Fowling in Faroe and Shetland" (sketch of Scottish rural life), "A Fuqueer's Curse" (humorous story about an Indian fakir), "The Deserts of Africa" (long geographical sketch), "Life in an Indiaman" (naval novelette), "The Dealer in Wisdom" (Arabian Nights story with a dollop of fantasy), "The Key of the Street" (sketch about being a hobo for a night in London). The material, all with exotic or foreign settings, is oddly at variance with the book's title, which (as the preface explains) alludes to the entrepreneurialism of the New Englander. Wright, American Fiction 1851-1875, cites Wentworth & Co. as the primary imprint, noting that this book was also issued by Dayton & Wentworth (as in the present copy); he notes subsequent re-titled editions by Wentworth & Co. (1856) and by Wentworth and Company (1857). The book is copyright 1855 by Dayton and Wentworth. The absence of Dayton from the three other imprints, two of which were obviously later, suggests that Dayton and Wentworth was the original imprint. This book appears to be of British, not American, origin. Wright (II) 2828. Re-cased in the original cloth with new headbands and new endpapers, light scattered foxing, else a very good copy. (#114902)