2 volumes. xv, [3], 230 pp. + 37-pg publisher's catalogue; [iii]-xix, [1], 208 pp. + 16-pg publisher's catalogue. 7½x4½, red cloth, spines gilt-lettered, top edges gilt, others uncut. Seven Seas is First Edition.

This copy of Seven Seas is heavily illustrated with watercolors, pen & ink drawings, and pencil sketches in an accomplished period hand. There are some 43 original drawings and paintings in the margins of the text plus at least a dozen further light pencil sketches. The drawings depict scenes and characters relating to the text, by an unidentified artist who was evidently quite familiar with Kipling's world and military life by the good detail of the uniforms and various ships. There is a wonderful 5¼" caricature of Kipling as Homer with lyre, "When 'Omer smote 'is bloomin' lyre / He'd 'eard men sing by land an' sea". Barrack-Room Ballads has a three-page period transcription of "The Absent-minded Beggar" on front endpapers. Both volumes were purchased in Colchester in the 1960's, where there was an active barracks in Kipling's day. The original owner seems to have been a soldier and there are some tropical leaves laid in.