12mo. In four volumes. [2], 364; [2], 360; [2], 378; [2], 363pp, [1]. Contemporary gilt- tooled calf, supralibros of a swan and dragon to upper boards. Rubbed and marked, spines sunned, surface loss to lower boards of Vols. I and II, and upper board of Vol. III. Very occasional light spotting, very small hole to leaf O10 of Vol. I, not touching text, some loss to upper corners of leaves M7-8 of Vol. II, small hole to leaf N5, touching text without loss of sense.

A handsome set, in contemporary bindings, of the second edition (printed in the same year as the first) of novelist and socialite Sidney Morgan [née Owenson], Lady Morgan's (bap. 1783, d. 1859) second novel, set in sixteenth- century France, and based on the memoirs of the Duc de Sully (1560-1641), French statesman and trusted minister of Henry IV.

Owenson's working-title for this work was initially The Minstrel, though it eventually emerged, in a much-abridged form, under a title more evocative of its Gothic narrative. Replete with rhetoric and occasional explanatory footnotes, the book has been viewed as anticipatory of Walter Scott's historical novels.