Thomas Y. Crowell & Co., NY, nd. (1892, New Red Line Poets Binding.) B&W frontis + 1 full-page plate. Brown cloth, ornate illustrated front cover & spine, gilt letters. Gilt edges all-around. Spine bumping, hd & ft, corners. Small frays & rubs hd & ft of spine, corners. P.O. signature, middle of fff. No other markings. Gilt is bright. Tightly bound; both hinges are sound. 369 pages.
Owen Meredith was the pen name for a renowned diplomat and Lord of the British Empire, Robert Bulwer-Lytton, 1st Earl of Lytton, who from 1849 until he died in 1890 was in constant motion in the foreign service. He served in Washington, D.C., Paris, Madrid, Lisbon, the Hague, Belgrade, Constantinople, Vienna, St. Petersburg and India, the latter as governor general and viceroy. His career was a marked success, with two bothersome exceptions: the Indian famine of 1876 that claimed 6-10 million victims, and a futile war in Afghanistan that the Brits won, to their lasting regret. In any case, through his long career, the Earl was publishing highly-stylized, romantic and extremely popular poetry under his bland, inoffensive pseudonym.
Thomas Y. Crowell & Co., New York, 1876-1979. Publisher located at 744 Broadway in 1876; moved in 1881 to Clinton Hall (13 Astor Place?); to 46 East 14th, in 1893; and when the Boston bindery and 46 East 14th leases expired together in 1900, moved to 426-428 Broadway [where it remained until 1926 when removed to 27th Street and 4th Avenue].
LUCILE’s ISSUED BY Thomas Y. Crowell & Co.: Between 1876 and 1931, the Crowell Company issued "Lucile" and "Meredith's Works" (containing Lucile) in a great variety of printings and bindings -- on the order of 200 identifiably different issues. The Red Line Poets Edition, with a new binding, was issued in 1892 in both brown & lime green cloth, with gilt edges all-around, at $1.25 per volume.
