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Albert Lunel. A Novel ... In three Volumes ... London, Charles H.

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First edition, Sadleir’s ‘really scarce’ fourth state, of a touching memorial to the author’s daughter, with the undated Charles H. Clarke cancel titles.

A philosophical roman á clef, ostensibly set in pre-revolutionary France, Albert Lunel is about a real group of friends who stayed with the grieving author (1778–1868) in his château at Cannes shortly after his daughter’s death from consumption; he himself would die at the Château Eleanor-Louise (named for his daughter) in 1868. Brougham was Lord Chancellor from 1830 to 1834 and had played a vital role in the establishment of the University of London.

In place of the half-titles is the following notice: ‘“Albert Lunel” was written by the late Lord Brougham in the year Eighteen Hundred and Forty-four, but for private reasons of his Lordship’s, was not published’. The novel was printed and immediately suppressed in 1844, leaving, according to contemporary surmise, only five surviving copies. After Brougham’s death a stock of sheets was discovered, sold off, and subsequently issued in boards with the original half-titles, titles, and labels, turning the first edition into ‘one of the false rarities whose legends haunt the book trade’ (Sadleir). Then the sheets were reissued in cloth, and finally in this uncommon fourth state.

Sadleir 353; Wolff 848.

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