Windsor Castle: An Historical Romance. (THE AUTHOR'S COPY)

Henry Colburn Publisher, London, 1843. Book. Very Good. Hardcover. 1st Edition. First edition, the original three-volume set here bound into a single volume. The author's own copy, with his armorial bookplate to the front pastedown, and some correspondence. 8vo. Period binding of half red leather with cloth sides, with hand- and tail bands, five raised bands and decorative gilt rule and lettering. Top edge gilt. With the three George Cruikshank-illustrated frontispieces retained (these are the only illustrations which were included in this original edition; later issues included further drawings by Cruinshank and others). Laid in is an autograph letter from the author to the noted Irish painter Daniel Maclise, R.A.: "My dear Maclise, Not half what you deserve, but perhaps it may serve you better than stranger praise. At all events if you are satisfied my aim will be accomplished. At all times calculate upon the best devices of your sincere friend - W.Harrison Ainsworth. Kensal manor House, Harrow Road, May Thirty. 1844" (a decade earlier Maclise had painted a portrait of Ainsworth, now held by the National Portrait Gallery, which was included in later editions of this text). Mounted on a blank preliminary is an envelope addressed in Ainsworth's hand to W.Alfred Delamotte who would produce illustrations for a later edition of this work. An engraved portrait of the author is also tipped into the second volume. Some light chafing to the gutters, and the leather a little rubbed and chafed at the corner tips and several other extremities. The front hinge cracked. An area of staining to the head of one text leaf. A very good copy of the author's gothic historical romance, detailing the pursuit of Anne Boleyn by Henry VIII. It was originally serialised in 'Ainsworth's Magazine' between July 1842 and June 1843, with this three-volume bookform edition following shortly after the conclusion of the serial..