LAUGH and be FAT, or, The MERRY COMPANION; CONTAINING Great Variety of Comical and Diverting STORIES: A Curious Collection of POEMS: A Curious Collection of EPITAPHS: A long String of out oÂ’thÂ’ Way Conundrums and Answers: And a Choice Collection of Songs, sung at the public Places of Diversion. by [Handel, George Frideric] - [1795]

Near Fine. London: Printed for the Booksellers in Town and Country. Price ONE SHILLING. [1795?] 96 pages, in-12. ESTC T37602. Bound with THE MERRY JESTER; OR, Wits in high Glee. Title page lacking. 48 pages, in-12. No place , no date. [18th century]. Also bound with Budget of Wit. Scottish Prudence. 16 pages. [Early nineteenth century]. Bound in quarter brown calf on nineteenth century marbled boards .Front hinge cracked and reinforced. Top page edge gilt, the first two eighteenth century chap books are printed almost entirely on bluish paper. Of special interest were the career woes and personal foibles of George Frideric Handel in The Merry Jester: "There was a short time when Mr. Handel, notwithstanding his merit, was deserted, and his opera at the Haymarket neglected by almost every body but his m---y, for that of Porpora at Lincolns-Inn-Fields; at this time another nobleman asking the Earl of C------d if he would go one night to the opera. No, my lord, said the earl, I have no occasion for a private audience of his m----y to-night." Book plate of H.S.K. Edwardes: Get Wisdom, And With All Thy Getting, Get Understanding. Booksellers tag of Kerr & Richardson of Queen Street, Glasgow. Two fine 18 century titles, and the third is good, but trimmed close across the top.