Pride and Prejudice. Illustrated by Hugh Thomson. With a Preface by George Saintsbury. London: George Allen, 1894. First Edition, First Issue. Pp xxvii, 476, all edges gilt. Publisher’s green cloth boards with spectacular gilt peacock design to upper board and spine. A particularly fine copy, the gilt retaining its vivid sheen, with minimal shelf-wear. Housed in custom-made solander box.

The first illustrated edition of Jane Austen’s classic romantic novel in the spectacular peacock binding (one of the most striking examples of late-Victorian pictorial cloth) was published in October 1894.

Hugh Thompson was an Irish Illustrator born at Coleraine near Derry. He created 160 line drawings to produce this the first and still finest illustrated edition of Austen’s second novel. The George Allen editions, published between 1894 and1906 are the most desirable copies of ‘Pride and Prejudice’ published other than the original edition of 1813.

The success of Allen’s ” Peacock Edition ” launched Thompson’s career as a first class and prominent illustrator who is best known for his pen-and-ink illustrations of works by authors Charles Dickens and J. M. Barrie among others.