Blood of the Lamb.

New York: Rinehart & Company, Inc., (1946). First Editon. Octavo, khaki cloth (hardcover), burgundy decorations, gilt letters, uncut, 275 pp. Very Good, with light foxing (age darkened spotting) in a Very Good dust jacket with light edgewear. From dust jacket: South of Tobacco Road lies the sun-drenched land of the Florida Crackers -- a domain peopled by some of the most quaint, girm, pathetic and happiest folk of North America. Charles Baker, himself a born Floridian, has observed them with a compassionate eye and records their adventures with a humor as native and salty as Mark Twain’s. Although this book is filled with real belly-laughter it isn’t just another “funny book,” but gives a whole-souled account of the lovers, humors, random courtships, fights, feuds and religious goins-on of these vital characters. Here you’ll find indomitable old Ma Conroy and her daughters: sweet, gentle Romajean, pretty as a pair of red-heeled slippers; and sharp-tongued little Pert who fears nothing alive. You’ll find Love Gudger whose strange, warped mind is destined to twist so many lives --a preacher by his own election who quaintly believes that if he keeps the other nine Commandments God won’t pester him about the Seventh. And Birdie, his huge wife, nearly three hundred pounds of woman with a bull-whip substituting for God’s swift punishment. Here’s sweet Miz Nelliemadge, who can’t say “No,” and her great side beef of a man, Flobert, who is flattered when out-of-town gentlemen seek his wife’s ardent hospitality, but who tartly draws the line when it comes to a local Lochinvar beating his time. And Grandma Guardie Dow, by all odds the toughest Christian nut in town; but finally brought to the Mourner’s Bench and riotous conversion by Preacher Gudger. Mr. Baker gathers all this lusty uninhibited group into a dramatic story filled with rich appreciation of this, thus far, forgotten corner of our continent. And the whole narrative is sustained by a constant, kindly irony. With this robust book the author invites your ripest judgment, your liveliest response and sympathy.