This fable is titled "The Most Delectable History of Reynard The Fox", a first edition edited by Joseph Jacobs, published by Macmillan in 1895, and illustrated by W. Frank Calderon, and it's based on a medieval fable about Reynard the Fox that originated in Europe in the 12th and 13th centuries, and versions can be found in Latin, Dutch, German, French and other languages. The book is a retelling of the medieval fable about a fox named Reynard who outwits all of his enemies by using his cunning and wit. He is a trickster who deceives other animals for his own advantage, his main enemy and victim is his uncle, a greedy wolf named Isengrim, and the fox overcomes brute strength by using his sharpness and intelligence. "Reynard" is the French word for "fox", and like the figures in Aesop's Fables, the fox is sly and cowardly and becomes a sympathetic hero who uses his cunning to survive. The book is 3/4 bound, with five raised bands, six gilt-ruled compartments with gilt lettering, gilt tooling, and "1895" in gilt at the bottom of the spine, marbled boards, marbled endpapers, "Bound by MacDonald" stamped in small letters at the top of the first blank endpaper, the half title, the illustrated frontispiece titled "The Court of King Noble" and initialed "W.F. C." ( William Frank Calderon), then a tissue guard, the title page, a three-page Preface, a twenty-one page Introduction (xi - xxxi), five pages of Contents, 245 pages of text, fourteen pages of Notes that run from 247 to page 260, and all the edges are gilt. The preface by Jacobs also mentions Aesop's Fables, which is fitting. Joseph Jacobs (1854 - 1916) was born in Sydney, Australia and was of Jewish descent. He was a writer and translator who became a notable collector and publisher of English folklore, and he popularized some of the world's best known fairy tales, including "Jack and the Beanstalk", "Goldilocks and the Three Bears", "The Three Little Pigs, among others, and he edited the journal "Folklore" from 1899 to 1900 and multiple collections of fairy tales from 1890 to 1916; he was inspired by the Brothers Grimm, and he edited this version of Reynard the Fox in 1895. W. Frank Calderon (1865 -1943) was a British painter of portraits, landscapes, and sporting pictures. He came from a family of painters and exhibited at the Royal Academy for forty years (1881 - 1921), and he had his first Royal Academy painting bought by Queen Victoria. The book is 8vo. and measures 7 1/8 x 5 in. wide, with a tight binding and clean pages, clean text, and clean illustrations. There are faint brown spots here and there, light rubbing at the heel and crown and along the edges of the spine, light wear near one tip at the top and light rubbing or wear near the other tips, small white marks on the back cover, a couple of pages stick out a bit from the binding - we're not sure why, because the rest of the binding is very tight - the pages that stick out are not loose - and overall an attractive book about a fable that has entranced people for centuries. The editions from 1701 go for a high four figures - $5300 to $9500 - so you're getting a bargain here. #106 #1642