HARDY, Thomas (1840-1928). A Laodicean; or, The Castle of the de Stancys. A Story of To-Day. London: Sampson Low, Marston, Searle & Rivington, 1881.

3 volumes, 8vo. Half-titles. (Hinges starting, a few free endpapers reglued, toning to titles.) Original slate gray cloth decorated in blind, spine gilt-lettered (spines skewed and a bit darkened with some wear at ends, few stains to upper cover of vol. III). Provenance: Vi Troubridge (ownership signature dated 1883); John Ciardi (1916-1986), American poet and translator of Dante's Divine Comedy (signature in vol. I, dated December 1963).

THE TRIPLE-DECKER OF THE FIRST ENGLISH EDITION IN BOOK FORM, "presumably one of 1,000 copies" (Purdy) that appeared three weeks after the first American edition. First printed serially in Harper's New Monthly Magazine from December 1880 to December 1881, the manuscript of the novel was burned by Hardy, presumably because it was largely in the hand of his first wife, to whom he had dictated it from his sickbed. Purdy, pp.35-40; Sadleir 1109; Wolff 2980.