Sir Walter Scott (1771–1832)

The Lay of the Last Minstrel, A Poem

London: Longman, Hurst,Rees, and Orme, 1810

8vo., (8 3/8 x 5 inches). Half-title. Fine binding of scarlet morocco, each cover decorated with an elegant border of gilt circles, dots and filets, the spine in six compartments, with five gilt hached raised bands, gilt-lettered in the second and fifth, and tooled in gilt and blind in the others, all edges gilt and gauffered with small flowers and lattice work, in the style of Charles Meyer (extremities a bit rubbed).

Provenance: with the contemporary engraved armorial bookplate of Christopher Willoughby, presumably Sir Christopher William Willoughby, 2nd Baronet (1793–1813), on the front paste-down; childish pencil trials on the preliminaries.

Eleventh edition, and an attractive copy in a fine binding in the style of Charles Meyer (died 1809), (also known as Johan Charles Frederick Meyer), who "was one of a select and influential group of German binders who emigrated to England ...in 1797, and set up shop around the corner in St Martin’s Lane. He was later to become ‘Bookseller and binder to the Queen [Charlotte] and Princesses.’" (P. J. M. Marks, Curator of Bookbindings, British Library).