Beschreibung:

POTTER, Beatrix. The Fairy Caravan by Beatrix Heelis ("Beatrix Potter") . [Ambleside, Westmorland: George Middleton for the author], [October], 1929. Large 8 o (224 x 173mm). Text on two paper stocks: the first quire on laid paper watermarked "Abbey Miller/Greenfield," the remainder on unwatermarked wove papper; 6 color plates (including frontispiece), 21 full-page line block illustrations (including the additional illustration of seven dogs on p. [5], present only in the English issue), and 42 line block illustration in text. (Some light foxing, mostly at beginning.) Original cloth-backed lettered green boards, uncut (hinges cracked, corners bumped, spine ends rubbed); quarter morocco folding case. Provenance : Madelein Douglas Davidson, Potter's governess (presentation inscription from the author on the title-page: "M.D.D. with love from Beatrix Potter ," and numerous ink and pencil annotations by Potter throughout [see below]); Mrs. Arthur Loftus Onslow (bookplate). THE RARE ENGLISH COPYRIGHT ISSUE, INSCRIBED BY POTTER TO HER GOVERNESS, AND WITH THE AUTHOR'S EXTENSIVE PERSONAL ANNOTATIONS THROUGHOUT. Potter was persuaded by the Philadelphia publisher, Alexander McKay, to produce another book, containing her own amusement 'scribbles' about her own farm animals. Its stories and illustrations feature her own pets and animals, as well as landmarks, farms and the real people who inhabited her rural Ambleside. "It was intended that this book should be printed only in America, anD would contain some of the writings about her farm animals in a fairy caravan setting, pieced together with fragments of her miscellaneous unpublished work. Beatrix Potter did not wish for an English edition of The Fairy Caravan , because she felt that the stories were 'too personal--too autobiographical' to publish in this country" (Linder, p. 292). In the privately bound English issue of The Fairy Caravan , the first eighteen pages of the American issue (containing the title-page, preface and dedication) were replaced with a new set of pages printed at Ambleside. These include a cancel title, a page of illustrations identifying her dog friends, and "The Tale of Tuppeny." The cancel title bears Potter's married name, Beatrix Heelis. She gave copies of this privately bound edition to her relations and Lakeland friends, including some of her shepherds and farmhands. These special presentation copies were numbered and inscribed, with some of the typographical errors corrected and many identifications of locations. This copy contains more than 30 marginal notes in Potter's hand (mostly in ink) which give personal insight beyond the McKay family copy (see Linder, pp. 296-302, for a transcription of these annotations). These include: front pastedown: "No. 39-" p. [4]: "In memory of Dolly - my dogs - and the sheep-" p. [5]: Beneath the illustration of dogs she has written "Eheu Fugaces" [translates "Alas! the departed"] p. 11: "Beswick market place" p. 17: "Hawkeshead" p. 35: "A lane near Sawrey in winter" p. 42: "= law pipes = mark horsetail" p. 43: "Old Sergeant Scholis's cat" p. 44: "The Pound in Troutbeck- The farmhouse is Long green head - My farmhouse Troutbeck Park is hidden by the pound, it is at the foot of the round hill called the Tongue. The farm follows the skyline, except the hump of..." p. 45: "Thimble Hall in Hawkshead" p. 55: "He came for many years - summers - in winter he retired to the ... One spring he came not-" p. 60: "One of my grandmother's old servants is still living. She told me the cedar had blown down" p. 84: "The old spring song sung at the shepherds meets" p. 85: "Skiddow and Derwentwater" p. 90: "Anthony Benson's Bess" p. 94: "Copied from one of Bertram's etchings, near Keswick, but it is very like the Fox ... at Broad How in Troutbeck" p. 95: "...I watched them - more concerned for the sheep than for the climbers - who deliberately choose to risk their necks" p. 97: "The gap in the falls is Thresthwaite Mouth - between T