8vo. xxii, 294, [2]. With half-title, an engraved title page, an engraved portrait frontispiece, and 15 further engraved plates.

[Uniformly bound with:] LAMB, Charles. The Last essays of Elia. London. J. M. Dent & Co., 1902. Fourth edition. xi, [1], 254pp, [2]. With half-title, an engraved title page, an engraved portrait frontispiece, and 15 further engraved plates.

Finely bound for H. Sotheran & Co. (stamp-signed to verso of FFEP of each volume) in contemporary gilt-ruled morocco, marbled boards. Marbled endpapers, T.E.G. Spines sunned. Bookplates to FEPs. Very light spotting to initial leaves of Vol. I, else internally clean & crisp.

The fourth and fifth editions, finely bound for Sotheran's of publisher J. M. Dent's collected essays of Charles Lamb (1775-1834), illustrated by eminent line artist C. E. Brock (1870-1938). The essays had initially appeared in John Scott's London Magazine between 1820 and 1825 under the pseudonym 'Elia', a pen name first used by Lamb for an essay on the South Sea House. Lamb drew upon his own experience and correspondence for the pieces, with his dramatic persona allowing for the representation of a more naive and whimsical take on contemporary events.