The Diary of Samuel Pepys, M.A., F.R.S., Clerk of the Acts and Secretary to the Admiralty, For the First Time Fully Transcribed from the Shorthand Manuscript in the Pepysian Library, Magdalene College, Cambridge, by the Rev. Mynors Bright, M.A., Late Fellow and President of the College, with Lord Braybrooke's Notes; Edited, with Extensive Additions, in Eighteen Volumes

New York: George E. Croscup, 1892. Limited Edition. Hard Cover. Very Good/No Jacket. Signed by author. Autograph Edition, #38 of 125 sets signed by the editor on an inserted leaf in volume 1, with special illustrations not included in other Wheatley editions. Bookplate of U.S. Secretary of State Robert Lansing on front endpaper of each volume (these were purchased from a family library in Henderson Harbor, NY, near his birthplace in Watertown, which included many other works owned by him). Spines faded with a few light spots of discoloration to boards, spine labels toned with some loss, empty envelope with printed address of Eleanor Lansing Dulles (Robert Lansing's niece) laid in. 1892 Hard Cover. Complete in eighteen hardcover volumes, with each pair of volumes paginated continuously (likely reset from a nine-volume edition). lix, 342; 407; 371; 424; 424; 385; 387; 313; 500 pp. Turquoise cloth, paper spine labels. Engraved frontispieces and plates. This edition includes a Pepysiana volume with appendices and an index, plus a fold-out map of London in Pepys's time, three fold-out genealogical tables, and plates, including a photograph of the six manuscript volumes that composed the original work. Samuel Pepys was an English naval administrator and Member of Parliament, who is now most famous for the diary he kept for a decade while still a relatively young man. Although Pepys had no maritime experience, he rose by patronage, hard work and his talent for administration, to be the Chief Secretary to the Admiralty under both King Charles II and subsequently King James II. His influence and reforms at the Admiralty were important in the early professionalisation of the Royal Navy. The detailed private diary Pepys kept from 1660 until 1669 was first published in the 19th century, and is one of the most important primary sources for the English Restoration period. It provides a combination of personal revelation and eyewitness accounts of great events, such as the Great Plague of London, the Second Dutch War and the Great Fire of London. The diary was written in one of the many standard forms of shorthand used in Pepys's time, in this case called Tachygraphy and devised by Thomas Shelton. Though it is clear from its content that it was written as a purely personal record of his life and not for publication, there are indications Pepys actively took steps to preserve the bound manuscripts of his diary. Apart from writing it out in fair copy from rough notes, he also had the loose pages bound into six volumes, catalogued them in his library with all his other books, and must have known that eventually someone would find them interesting.