H. Perkins (1873) £260. Earl of Gosford (1884), £275.
Ormerod’s Cheshire, 3 vols., 1819. Large paper.
H. Perkins (1873), plates in three states-etchings, proofs, and proofs on India paper, morocco extra by Lewis, one of six copies, £155.
Plot’s Oxfordshire, 1677. Large paper.
Beckford (1883), £8, 15s. (old red morocco).
—— Staffordshire, 1686. Large paper.
Beckford (1883), £40, 10s. (old black morocco).
Thoroton’s Nottinghamshire, 1677.
Heber (part 9), £11, 5s. Beresford-Hope (1882), £11. Beckford (1883), £14, 10s.
First editions of our English classics have increased greatly in price of late years. Many of Defoe’s works are very scarce, and bring good prices. The late Mr. James Crossley had a fine collection of these, but his library was in such poor condition that the books did not sell well. The British Museum bought at his sale, June 20, 1885, the autograph manuscript of Defoe’s “Compleat English Gentleman,” which had never been printed until Mr. Nutt issued it to subscribers in 1890. The manuscript remained in the possession of Defoe’s relations, the Baker family, for more than a hundred years, as Dawson Turner bought it in 1831 from the Rev. H. D. F. Baker, the descendant of Henry Baker, son-in-law of Defoe, for £69. In 1859, at the sale of Turner’s MSS., Crossley bought the book for £75, 8s.
Robinson Crusoe, first edition, 2 vols., 1719.