The American Claimant

New York: Charles L. Webster & Co. / Jenkins & McCowan, 1892. First Edition. Hard Cover. Good/No Jacket. 9x6x3. Beard, Dan. First edition (BAL 3434, Johnson p. 111). Former library copy with usual marks on endpapers and remnants of marks on spine, corners slightly exposed. Binding tight and square, text clean and unmarked. 1892 Hard Cover. xv, [16]-277, [9] pp. 8vo. Olive cloth, gilt titles, black stamped decorations on front board and spine. Black-and-white frontispiece and illustrations in text by Dan Beard. The complete text of Twain's novel The American Claimant, together with five short stories from Merry Tales, three from the 1,000,000 Bank-Note and Other Stories, and nine others. "Twain wrote the novel with the help of phonographic dictation, the first author (according to Twain himself) to do so. The American Claimant is a comedy of mistaken identities and multiple role switches. Its cast of characters include an American enamored of British hereditary aristocracy and a British earl entranced by American democracy.