Humphry Clinker

First published in 1771, this epistolary novel follows the Welsh squire Matthew Bramble, his sister Tabitha, their niece Lydia, nephew Jery, and the servants as they travel to Bath, London, Scotland, and home again. Letters from several hands contradict one another: Bramble rails at crowds and diet; Jery reports comic incidents; Tabitha hunts a husband. Humphry Clinker, a ragged ostler they pick up, becomes a Methodist preacher and a member of the party. The book is a comic tour of Britain in letters, not a single-narrator travel diary.

Bound in white linen with a repeat pattern in blue by Harris, red leather spine label. White dust-jacket printed in blue and black. There were two variants of this book, with the pages collated in different ways. In the first, the list of engravings is after introduction; in the other variant the list of engravings is before the introduction. This second impression also has two variants, one bound in white cloth, the other bound in grey cloth.