The Cruise of the Daring, Armstrong 1861 Maritime Fiction. This set of books is titled “The Cruise of the Daring. A Tale of the Sea”, written by C.F. Armstrong, who also wrote “The Two Midshipmen”, “The Warhawk”, “The Lily of Devon”, and “The Young Commander”, the set was published in London by Thomas Cauley Newby in 1861, and the books are first editions, according to WorldCat. The books have gilt lettering on the spine, olive green embossed covers with designs in the corners and the center, pale yellow endpapers, the owner’s name “Wm Fabian” and “4 May 1861” inscribed on the page before the half-title in Volume I and “Fabian” inscribed on the front flyleaf in Volume III, then the title page, and Volume I has 273 pages of text, Volume 2 has 279 pages of text, and the third volume has 276 pages of text. All three volumes have a 24-page catalogue of books published by Newby - “Mr. Newby’s New Publications” with uncut pages - and they all have misspellings on the title page or first page of text. Volume I spells the title “The Cruise of the Daring” on the title page and “The Cruize of the Daring” on the first page of the text, Volume II has “The Cruize of the Daring” on the first page of the text, and the last Volume has “The Cruize of the Daring” on the title page and first page of text. We don’t know why, but that’s the way it is. The first volume is also dated 1861 and the last two are dated 1860, and we don’t know why, unless the publisher withheld all three to be sold as a set in 1861, and the set is exceedingly rare. There are no original sets listed for sale on the rare book website we use, only modern reprints; there is one book published by Ward Lock in 1863 and that seems to be three volumes-in-one, and another volume published by Lever Brothers from 1877 is offered online, but there are no first edition sets offered for sale except the one we have here. The other titles written by Armstrong are exceedingly rare too. There are no original copies for “The Young Midshipmen”, “The Two Buccaneers", ‘The Warhawk”, “The Lily of Devon”, or “The Young Commander” offered for sale on the rare book website we use, only modern reprints, which makes this set one of the rarest sets we have ever offered. The books all measure 8 x 5 1/8 ins wide, with tight bindings and clean pages and text, but there are brown spots at the bottom of some pages in the first volume, faint toning in the margins of some pages in the second volume, the front gutter in Volume I has wear, and there are small white specks on the back cover of Volume III; the spine for Volume I has a slant to the right, bumps on the heel, and modest loss at the crown, Volume II has bumps at the heel, light wear on the crown, and wear and loss along the back edge of the spine, and the last volume has spine chips at the crown and at the heel; the spines are browned on all three, and there is modest wear at the tips and the tips are turned in. Still, an interesting set of maritime fiction from about the time of the American Civil War, and exceedingly rare. #163 #1608