First editions. Two volumes. Finely rebound by Bayntun-Riviere of Bath for Sotherans in elaborately decorated full crushed red morocco, the spines with 5 raised bands and titles in gilt. Gilt decorated inner boards, marbled endpapers and clean tissue-guarded title-pages. Binder's initials stamped in gilt to the lower back boards. All edges gilt. The publisher's original red cloth bindings have been tipped in at the rear of each book, plus the original pale blue ffep in the copy of Alice. Illustrated with frontispieces and 90 illustrations across the two volumes by John Tenniel. Both book covers feature gilt stamped reproductions of John Tenniel's White Rabbit and Red Queen. The books are housed in a snug, sturdy red-cloth slip-case. Additionally, there is a note headed 'Sotheran's detailing the increase in price of both volumes between c.1972 and 1983.
Alice's Adventures in Wonderland is the first published mixed state edition from 1866. It features a strange anomaly with only one of the two necessary typo points present: the 'S' on the last line of the contents page is correctly inverted, but page 30, which should be numbered as page '3' is correctly/incorrectly numbered page '30'. Thus this must be a hybrid of mixed copies with pages from the first and second revised editions, and consequently highly unusual. There are a couple of closed tears p. 23, 115, 117 and what looks like the remains of a small squashed fly on p24/25. This is otherwise a really lovely example of one of the earliest printed versions reset by Richard Clay for this present authorized Macmillan edition, with a faded ownership inscription on half-title dated in the year of publication. Although dated 1866, the edition was in fact ready by November 1865, in time for the Christmas market, and was published in a print run of 4,000 copies.
The copy of Through the Looking-Glass is the 1872 first edition first impression. Much like Alice in Wonderland, it was published for the Christmas market and bears the following year's date in its imprint. It was actually printed and published in December 1871, in an edition of 9,000 copies. As with all other true firsts of TTLG this has the "wade" typo on page 21 that was changed to "wabe" in later editions. The boards remain square, with a few light surface marks. A really lovely companion to the earlier Alice, retaining all original components and text points associated with the first edition.
