The Wind in the Willows

A handsome 1923 Methuen edition of Kenneth Grahame's enduring children's classic, The Wind in the Willows, published just fifteen years after the book first appeared in 1908.

This is the Fourteenth Edition, issued in March 1923, as confirmed by the publisher's edition statement. It retains its original dark blue publisher's cloth, with a particularly attractive pictorial gilt spine featuring Mr. Toad surrounded by reeds, flowers, and dragonflies. More than a century after publication, the elaborate spine decoration remains remarkably bright and gives the book

wonderful shelf presence.

The volume includes the frontispiece by Graham Robertson, whose illustration had accompanied the story from its earliest Methuen editions. The top page edge is gilt, with the remaining edges left untrimmed in the manner of the period.

The copyright page provides an unusually interesting record of the book's early publishing history, listing Methuen editions from the first publication in October 1908 through this Fourteenth Edition of March 1923.

A pleasing early British edition of one of the great classics of children's literature—old enough to retain the character and presentation of the early Methuen issues while remaining considerably more approachable than the earliest printings.