Thomas Prest - The Magazine of Curiosity and Wonder: A Weekly Miscellany of the Surprising, Remarkable, and Astonishing. - G. Drake, 1835-1836, First Edition.

London, G. Drake, 1835-1836. First Edition. First Impression. Hardback. A good copy only, as far as the book is concerned, the individual issues are very good. 30 issues bound, with title page. An important collection of Penny Dreadfuls, though I guess Penny Bloods would be more accurate. Prest is of course best known for co-authoring The String of Pearls (Sweeney Todd) and Varney the Vampire. The volume appears to be complete, Haining [2007] notes 29 issues, though there are 30 here as expected [Summers, p116]. Prest's editorship of the Drake publication was his first step into journalism [Haining, p114]. The issues cover a remarkable selection of 'horrors' and 'oddities' from dwarves, to a 'gigantic fat woman', 138-year-old men and bearded, female hermits. One copy located at the BL, one at auction. Condition: separated at spine, pretty ugly binding - could've been done at any time (though likely contemporary). Two owner's plates and a number of pencil sellers's annotations. [8065, Hyraxia Books].