From the West Indies
London: G. Humphrey, 1824. Engraving with hand coloring in watercolor on cream wove paper, 6 3/8 x 8 1/4 inches (162 x 210 mm); sheet 10 x 14/14 inches (255 x 362 mm), full margins. In very good condition with three tabs of cellophane tape remnants at the top margin, well outside of the image area, and three or so very small areas of discoloration in the lower sheet quadrant, including a 1/4 inch ink smudge in pink, and an associated smaller smudge in at the left platemark. Colors remain fresh and saturated. Second and final edition, published June 5, 1824.
Signed and in the plate by Cruikshank, and bearing Frederick Marryat's anchor moniker. Perhaps introduced to each other by their mutual friend, Charles Dickens, George Cruikshank and Captain Frederick Marryat became fast friends, political confidants, and artistic collaborators, working together many times over the course of their late careers. Marryat, a novelist, caricaturist and captain in the Royal Navy, first went to sea in 1806, and served throughout the Napoleonic Wars. After Napoleon’s defeat, having had a brilliant career at sea, Marryat found his Naval exercises uninspiring, and decided to resign his commission. In November 1830 he left the Royal Navy and took up writing full time. Some of Marryat’s most well loved novels include "Frank Mildmay" (1829), "Peter Simple" (1834), "Mr. Midshipman Easy" (1836), and "Japhet in Search of a Father" (1836). Marryat was also a well known author of children’s books, having penned "The Pacha of many Tales" (1836), "The Phantom Ship" (1839), "Poor Jack" (1840), "Masterman Ready" (1841), and "The Settlers in Canada" (1844). He is also known for some unrelated remarkable achievements, including having developed the first general system of flag signaling for merchant vessels (Marryat’s Code of Signals), as well as being credited with describing a previously unrecorded gastropod genus Cyclostrema with the type species Cyclostrema cancellatum, and having drawn Napoleon’s deathbed portrait. Originally issued in an oblong folio with 11 sheets and 12 hand-colored plates by Cruikshank after Marryat, this image is signed in the plate, and dated June 1820. The impression, from the second (and final) edition, was published in London by Thomas McLean in 1835.
Item number: 2266
Price: $200.00
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