The Argosy, Volume I, Issues 1 to 6,1865-1855, Summer 1866

The first six issues of The Argosy, from December 1865 to May 1866, bound in one volume. Marbled text block edge. 530p, with occasional full page engravings, decorative head and tailpieces. Half-bound in tan calf's leather over marbled paper boards, red spine labels with gilt lettering. Tan endpapers. 8vo. Covers worn and rubbed at edges, with some scuffing, rubbed at corners, rounded at spine ends. Intended as a serious monthly literary magazine, with tales of travel, essays, and poems, but its early serialisation of Charles Reade's Griffith Gaunt - a novel about bigamy - made it a racier production. These first six issues contain contributions by Charles Reade, Isa Craig, George MacDonald, Alexander Smith, Frances Power Cobbe, Christina Rossetti, John Banks, Henry Kingsley, Dutton Cook among many others. Nice volume.