[APPERLEY, Charles James.] ‘NIMROD’, and Henry ALKEN (illustrator).
The Chace, the Turf, and the Road.
London, A. Spottiswoode for John Murray, 1837.
8vo, pp. [2], xx, 301, [1], with stipple-engraved frontispiece portrait after D. Maclise and 13 woodcut plates, each with tissue guard; title slightly dust-stained; a very good copy in early twentieth-century half red morocco with buckram sides, borders filleted in gilt, spine tooled in gilt and lettered directly, top-edge gilt, marbled endpapers, red ribbon place-marker, sewn on 4 sunken cords; rubbed and lightly bumped at extremities, upper joint split, head-cap chipped.
First edition of a series of articles first published in the Quarterly Review, illustrated by Henry Alken. A sporting writer who ‘may even be said to have created the role of gentleman hunting correspondent’ (ODNB), Charles James Apperley (1778–1843) published widely on hunting and horsemanship, from 1822 under the pseudonym ‘Nimrod’. In the course of his work he travelled widely to partake in hunts, reportedly driving the coaches on which he was a passenger and riding his own horses in race meetings. When his generous salary from the Sporting Magazine was stopped in 1828, however, his fame did not support him and he fled to Calais to avoid debt in 1831, remaining there for the next decade.
Mellon 152.
