Tales for Youth; in Thirty Poems: to which Are Annexed, Historical Remarks and Moral Applications in Prose.

London: Printed by J. Crowder, for E. Newbery, 1794 First edition of this uncommon Thomas Bewick-illustrated title. Contemporary sheep, neatly rebacked with a gilt lettered and gilt ruled black morocco label. . Twelvemo. Engraved frontispiece and thirty other engravings of various scenes (travelers, farms, animals, etc.) by Thomas Bewick. Binding extremities rubbed with some wear and chipping to boards. Minor foxing, toning, and the occasional small stain. Light pencil annotations on front pastedown and front flyleaf. A very good copy. John Huddlestone Wynne (bapt. 1742-d. 1788) was an English historian and writer. He experienced a precipitous decline from gentility to indigence, but continued his literary output. In his preface to Tales for Youth, Wynne writes, "...these Tales are divided into two classes; that the first are designed chiefly for Children, while the latter, in which as well the style as the choice of subjects, will be found a little more elevated, are more immediately addressed to the riper understandings of Youth: the former consist, for the most part, of fabulous stories; the latter of subjects drawn, either in the Tale or in the Moral, from History and Experience. An unaffected simplicity, however, it is hoped, will be found to pervade the whole, connected at the same time with such a vein of morality as may serve imperceptibly to instruct those whom it appears intended only to amuse, which, as it is the avowed design, has been the serious endeavor of the public's obliged humble servant, J.H.W.