The Roly-Poly Pudding

The Roly-Poly Pudding, by Beatrix Potter. London: Frederick Warne and Co. and New York, 1908. First edition, first printing, with the year 1908 and the words 'All rights reserved' at the bottom of the title page (Linder, p.427). Small quarto. Original red cloth, bevelled boards, spine lettered in blue, front cover lettered in blue and gilt, front cover with pictorial label of Samuel Whiskers, illustrated endpapers. Frontispiece, 17 colour plates, outline illustrations to text by the author.

Good plus condition, approaching very good (particularly for age). The cloth is lightly rubbed to corners and joints, and there is a little fraying to spine tips with a slight nick in the fabric to head of spine. The covers are ever-so-lightly darkened and the spine shows light discolouration. The text block has a little lean and there is foxing and tanning to edges, prelims and sporadically throughout, with some of the "worst" cases shown in the photos. The binding is not shaken, nor very tight; pages hold together well with none loose and no spine breaks throughout. There are a handful of thumb marks throughout and a couple of small ear-marks and creases, with one or two nibbles along the extremities,  not affecting plates. Else a very nice, collated-as-complete copy.

This book was later published under the title of "The Tale of Samuel Whiskers" and was produced in the smaller format with paper covered boards. A tale actually written two years earlier in 1906 when Potter was exploring Hill Top, the farm she had recently bought. She described the house in a letter to a friend as "delightful - if the rats could be stopped out!" and said she "never saw such a place for hide and seek and funny cupboards and closets". Here was the author's inspiration for the further adventures of Tom Kitten: an old farmhouse, and her pet rat, to whom the book is dedicated, "In remembrance of Sammy, the intelligent pink-eyed representative of a persecuted (but irrepressible) race. An affectionate little friend and most accomplished thief." 'The Roly-Poly Pudding' tells the tale of Tom Kitten's escape from two rats who plan to make him into a pudding.