The Natural History and Antiquities of Selborne, in the County of Southampton

Description:

First edition. Gilbert White (1720-1793) is widely regarded as the father of ecology and the forerunner of all modern natural historians. The present work is one of the most popular books in the English language and it has never been out of print since it was first published in 1789. Numerous great English naturalists have been influenced by Gilbert White, chiefly among them Charles Darwin, who went on ‘a pilgrimage to Selborne’ in June 1857, and claimed that he ‘stood on the shoulders’ of White. Gilbert White was also admired by the great poet Samuel Taylor Coleridge, who called ‘The Natural History of Selborne’ a ‘sweet delightful book’.

Martin, p. 103. [Bibliographical note: p. 292 is misnumbered 262, pp. 441-2 omitted from pagination but text is continuous.]

Condition

4to (265x205mm), cont. full speckled calf by Kalthoeber, London, with their ticket to verso of endpaper, gt ruled border to both boards, gt rules to spine with motifs to compartments, leather title piece (scuffed), git tooling to edges of boards and turn-ins; rubbed and scuffed with some wear, marbled endpapers. A little browning/offsetting from plates; a few spots/splash marks to margin of several pages. Good. An undated press cutting from the Farnham Herald, tipped in at flyleaf, records the sale of a 'first edition of the Natural History and Antiquities of Selborne, 1789 … traditionally said to be bound in the skin of a spaniel, which belonged to Gilbert White - £39 (Quaritch)'.