"LIFE IS ALL A VARIORUM, WE REGARD NOT HOW IT GOES; LET THEM CANT ABOUT DECORUM WHO HAVE CHARACTERS TO LOSE"

BURNS, Robert. The Poetical Works. London: Macmillan, 1879. Two volumes. Small octavo, later full marbled calf, elaborately gilt-decorated spines and boards, watered silk endpapers, top edges gilt. $950.

Limited edition of the poems of Burns, one of 500 copies, with two frontispiece plates, very attractively bound.

"No one even approaches Burns… in concentrated utterance of passion" (DNB). This two-volume set brings together the hundreds of poems, ballads and songs by 18th-century Scottish poet. His poetical works, including the major poems "Tam o' Shanter" and "The Jolly Beggars," were first collected in 1800, edited by James Currie, a Liverpool physician, in order to raise funds for Burns' family. "As a poet Burns stands in the front rank… He is the poet of freedom as well as beauty" (Allibone I:303).

Interior fine, light rubbing to spine ends and joints of attractive binding.