The Book of Invention

London: George G Harrap and Company Ltd,. Very Good+ in Very Good+ dust jacket. 1925. First Edition; First Printing. Hardcover. One of the most gloriously preserved bindings I've had in 40 years of trading. Green cloth-covered boards with SUMPTUOUSLY BRIGHT gilt titling, gilt borders and pictorial paper onlay to the front cover and similarly superbly bright gilt titling, gilt decorative blocks and a gilt owl illustration to the spine. In the original identically designed dust-jacket, on heavy card stock. The dust-jacket has some clear archive tape 'strengthening' to the inside, mainly to the head/tail of the spine, but no major tears just a few small chips to the foot of the d/j. The dust-jacket is now in a new protective clear - removable - bookfilm plastic cover and looks Near Fine. The page fore-edges are lightly foxed and internally the plain endpapers have a small corner loss to the front free endpaper where the paper was caught in the printing - subsequently losing a small part of the now proud edge - pretty negligible. Some pale foxing (pale lemon spotting/patching) , here and there throughout the book, some pages a little more affected than others. Apart from this, the book is clean, tight and bright with NO Inscriptions or other Marks. 287 pp. Plus, unpaginated, a full colour (ballooning) frontispiece, numerous b/w full page plates, b/w illustrations in line and half-tone in the text, and 3 other full colour plates in the book. Contents include : - Primitive Inventions; Discoveries of the Ancients; Iron, Tin, and Steel; The Beginning of Clocks and Watches; The coming of Steam; Gas-Lighting and the Safety Lamp; The Electric Telegraph; Submarine Telegraphy; The Sewing Machine; Diving-suits and Diving Bells; Photography; Modern Printing, The Telephone; The Development of the Motor Car; Electric Light and the Phonograph; Balloons and Airships; The Aeroplane; Moving Pictures; Radium and the X-Ray, etc, etc. Superb covers - sadly I can't grade it Fine due to the pale foxing inside, but the covers are a marvellous example of a binding fron the first quarter of the 20th Century, before they became more utilitarian in general. See Images. ; Romance of Knowlege Series; Thick 8vo 8" to 9" tall .