This book is titled "Our Old Home, A Series of English Sketches", written by Nathaniel Hawthorne and published by Ticknor and Fields in 1863, and a first edition first state. (It is a first edition because the dates on the title page and copyright page match, and it is a first state copy because "mysterious" is misspelled "myterious" on page 145 and there is only one page of ads at the rear. (Later states have more than one page of ads or no page of ads at all, and "mysterious" is correctly spelled in the later states.) The book has the original blindstamped brown cloth with gilt lettering on the spine, reddish brown endpapers, a Contents page, then a three-page dedication to Franklin Pierce (a friend of Hawthorne's and 14th President of the United States), 398 pages of text, and one leaf of ads at the rear for books by Hawthorne published by Ticknor and Fields. The book is a collection of Hawthorne's essays on life in England, including selections from his diary when he lived in Liverpool as the American consul to England, and the British and American first editions were published simultaneously on September 19, 1863, with only 3500 copies of the first edition printed in the first state. See BAL 7626. The book is 8vo. and measures 7 1/2 x 5 1/2 in. wide, with a tight binding and clean pages, very light bumps on the heel and crown of the spine, some pages stick out in the middle of the book, but they are not loose or detached, there's a small chip in the margin on page 393 and a tear on page 395, and an attractive copy of this first state first edition by Hawthorne. #19 #7036