Memoirs of Samuel Pepys, Esq. F.R.S. . Comprising his Diary from 1659 to 1669, Deciphered by the Rev. John Smith, A.B. from the Original Shorthand MS. in the Pepysian Library, and a Selection from his Private Correspondence. Edited by Richard Lord Braybrooke. Second Edition. . . . Vol. I. Diary [--Vol. II. Diary; --Vol. III. Diary; --Vol. IV. Diary; --Vol. V. Correspondence].

5 volumes, octavo (215 x 136mm), pp. I: lx, 376; II: [4], 451, [1]; III: [4], 446, [2]; IV: [4], 461, [1], [2]; V: [4], viii, 485, [1], [2]. Engraved portrait frontispieces by T. Bragg, T. Thomson, and R. Cooper after Sir Godfrey Kneller, John Hayls, and Derby. One folding engraved facsimile by Sidney Hall, one folding engraved chart by Sidney Hall after John Evelyn, 4 engraved plates by R. Cooper after Sir Peter Lely, Harraden, Lady Charlotte Neville, et al., 2 folding. Wood-engraved tailpiece. (Variable, generally light spotting, light offsetting from engravings, occasional light marking, map with small hole and short tear.) Mid-19th-century British calf gilt, boards with borders of single gilt rule and gilt roll, spines gilt in compartments, gilt morocco lettering-pieces in two, others richly decorated with central gilt flower tool surrounded by various tools, board-edges roll-tooled in gilt, turn-ins roll-tooled in blind, marbled endpapers, all edges speckled red. (A few light marks, slightly rubbed and scuffed, spines faded, corners bumped.) A very good set. Provenance: Edward Harold Morris, Bryn Myrddin, Carmarthenshire (1850-1929, pencilled ownership inscription 'Morris. B. Myrddin' on front flyleaves of all vols) -- 'Valuable. H.V.' (pencil annotation on front flyleaves of all vols (twice in vol. III) by the Welsh writer, historian, and bibliographer Herbert Millingchamp Vaughan (1870-1948), Morris's kinsman). Second (first octavo) edition. Samuel Pepys (1633-1703) was educated at Huntingdon grammar school, St Paul’s School, London, and Magdalene College, Cambridge, to which his library was bequeathed (with the stipulation that it would remain with his heir, John Jackson, until the latter's death). After Jackson's death in 1724, the library of 3,000 printed books and manuscripts, together with their accompanying presses commissioned by Pepys, were transported to Magdalene College, where they remain. In the library were six manuscript volumes titled 'Journal', which contained Pepys's diary from 1659 to 1669 (when his failing eyesight forced him to end it), written in an apparently undecipherable shorthand. The diary remained unread at Magdalene for nearly a century before an undergraduate of St John's College, Cambridge was commissioned to decipher the manuscript, leading to the first publication of the diary. This edition was issued in 1825 by Colburn in two quarto volumes at £6 6s. (a small number of large-paper sets were also printed). Sir Walter Scott reviewed the first edition for The Quarterly Review and contrasted Pepys's correspondence with the journal entries, commenting that '[t]he reader may be amused with comparing the style of Pepys and his sentiments as brushed and dressed, and sent out to meet company, with his more genuine and far more natural effusions of a night-gown and slipper description [in the Diary]' (W. Scott, The Miscellaneous Prose Works . . . Vol. XX. Periodical Criticism. Vol. IV. Miscellaneous (Edinburgh and London, 1848), p. 151). Following the first edition of 1825, which was issued in an expensive quarto format, this second edition of 1828 was the first to be published in octavo format and was accordingly priced at £3 10s. The encouraging reception of these first two editions led to further work on the Diary and Colburn issued significantly enlarged and revised editions in 1848-1849 (third edition) and 1853 (fourth edition), which initiated a series of revisions which continued into the twentieth century and culminated in Latham and Matthews's definitive edition of 1970-1982. Lowndes p. 1828. FURTHER INFORMATION: this is a heavy set, so please contact us for further information and prices for shipping.…