Guy Mannering (Two Volumes). Waverley Novels, 1836 Fisher & Son. Steel engravings.

London: Fisher, Son, & Co., 1836. 3/4 Calf and Marbled Boards. Very Good. 16mo - over 5¾" - 6¾" tall. Steel-engravings. London: Fisher, Son & Co., and Quai Des Grands Augustins, Paris, 1836. Two Volumes; Guy Mannering I & II (Waverley Novels III and IV, after the two installments of Waverley). Three steel engravings in each volume. 16mo, 311, 378 pp.; 3/4 black calf and marbled boards, raised bands, maroon morocco spine labels, gilt titling, dyed page edges, brown endpapers. Some wear at leather extremities (see scans), moderate scuffing to marbled boards, previous owner's stamp in both novels, and a yet earlier owner's signature ("George Smith, 1850") also in each. Contents near fine but for age toning. Binding strong. Scott's second novel [excludes a non-fiction tile and a poetic volume], originally published in 1815, here in the early (1836) Waverley series by Fisher. Scott wrote this tale in a month and a half in late 1814 to satisfy a debt to his publisher. At the time, it was attributed only to "the author of Waverley" (his first novel); Scott didn't "come out" as himself until 1827, by which time he had written some twenty novels. Guy Mannering is a tale believed to have been based by Scott on a Scottish folk tale heard in his youth, about an astrologer who predicts a rocky road ahead for a newborn Scottish baby. Guy Mannering is here that astrologer, though in fact astrology soon takes a back seat to the actual plot action. Scott, a rationalist, didn't have the heart to truly feature what was by that time already viewed with fairly general skepticism (Meg Merilees, the baby's Gypsy nannie, soon becomes more or less the custodian for the art). A departure from the tone of Waverley, since Scott, early in his career, was already concerned with avoiding type-casting. Ah, stardom. l49n