CONRAD, Joseph (1857-1924). The Rescue, London, 1920, 8vo, original blue cloth, dust-jacket (frayed with slight loss, the backstrip darkened). FIRST ENGLISH PUBLISHED EDITION. Please see the note below.

CONRAD, Joseph (1857-1924).  The Rescue. A Romance of the Shallows. London & Toronto: J. M. Dent & Sons Ltd., 1920. 8vo (195 x 130mm). Half title, woodcut printer's device on the title. Original green cloth, the upper cover with the Aldine device stamped in blind, the spine lettered in blind, dust-jacket (the upper wrapper of the jacket frayed at upper edge with slight loss, corners frayed, the backstrip darkened, lightly browned, some creasing to upper wrapper). Provenance: The Property of a Collector. FIRST ENGLISH PUBLISHED EDITION. Cagle A49b; Keating 133; Wise 57: "For this edition of The Rescue the novel received its final corrections." According to Wise, this edition was preceded by the first American edition, issued in New York on May 21, 1920 (Wise 55) and a "privately printed" edition, issued in London in June 1920 (Wise 56: "Of this edition of The Rescue forty copies only were printed, and were distributed privately"). These were followed by the present edition. Of the development of the novel generally, Wise writes, "The Rescue was planned and commenced so long ago as 1896, when, under the tentative title of The Rescuer, a considerable portion of the novel (about two-thirds of the whole) was written and partly set up in type. Mr. Conrad has stated that by successive diminutions and corrections these two-thirds were reduced to a very little more than half when at last the book was ready for publication. By such conscientious and continued labour does the work of Joseph Conrad attain its final wonder."