LIFE OF GEORGE WASHINGTO
1889 · New York
by Irving, Washington
New York: G.P. Putnam's Sons, 1889. Five volumes. Frontispiece portraits and numerous plates. Quarto. Original half morocco and green cloth boards. Spine extremities heavily chipped, backstrips scuffed, minor shelf wear. Small bookplates on rear pastedowns. Edges of text block tanned, otherwise internally clean. Good plus. Later limited printing, with numerous extra illustrations, of a popular biography of George Washington, first published in New York in 1855, styled as the "Limited Centennial Edition" on the titlepage, with this copy being number 205 of 300. This was Irving's last work, "elaborately researched and agonizingly completed as his health failed.... The book was designed - incongruously, given its length - for both scholars and average American readers. It tended to reaffirm standard conceptions of the nation's most revered patriot, who, for Irving, was a nearly perfect hero" - ANB. HOWES I84 (ref) (Inventory #: WRCAM52023)