Nimrod, pseud. [Charles James Apperley]

The Chace [presentation copy to Florence Dibble, with separate note addressed to her]

New York: William Farquhar Payson, 1931. First edition thus. Hardcover (boards, cloth spine). Introd. by Owen Culbertson. xi, 64p + several pls. by Edward P. Buyck. Pages uncut; lacks the jacket. Laid in: undated 2-page handwritten note to Mrs. Dibble from "Celeste," headed by a watercolor head portrait of Celeste's horse Poker. Very good (unopened; small stain to fox head on cover). Item #31005

The first separate publication of this 1832 essay, of which Surtees wrote, "It...will stand its ground to the end of time." Chapters on early fox hunting and the horse of 1700, Melton Mowbray and the Thoroughbred hunter of 1830, Hugo Meynell and the Leicestershire Hunts, Squire Osbaldeston's Quorn Hounds, etc. A nice association copy: presentation from Culbertson to Florence Dibble, Boston, December 1934. Mrs. Dibble was a famed four-in-hand whip, who in 1936 set a time record for coaching from New York to Atlantic City--118 miles in a little over 10 hours. From the legendary coaching library of Deirdre H. Pirie. Can be sent outside the US for less than the default shipping rate.

Price: $40.00