This book is titled "Totemwell" written by George Payson and published in New York by Riker, Thorne & Co. in 1854, and it is a first edition in a fine binding by Ringer. The book has five raised bands, six compartments with gilt-ruled borders, gilt lettering and "1854" in gilt on the spine, full crushed levant and double-gilt fillet borders with gilt decorations on the covers, gilt dentelles with tooled leather doublures, turquoise colored silk moire endpapers, the title page, the copyright page is dated 1854, which makes the book a first edition (the dates on the title page and copyright page match), a page with a quote from Goldsmith, 519 pages of text, and all the edges are gilt. We don't know much about the author. George Payson (1824 - 1893) was born in Portland, Maine. He graduated from Bowdoin College in 1843 and studied law in New York. In 1856, he moved to Chicago and established his own law firm "with unvarying success", and after 1874, he focused on patent law and was viewed as a patent lawyer "second to none". He was retained by the Western Railroad Association as their general counsel and defended their interests in all matters relating to patents, and he was described as "rich in scholarly attainments, a true gentleman, the purest of men …", he married Margaret Almira in 1857, and that's all we know about his personal life. He wrote Golden Dreams And Leaden Realities in1853 under the pseudonym of Ralph Raven, and The New Age of Gold, or, The Life and Adventures of Robert Dexter Romaine in 1856, which was about life in the mines and mining camps out west, and a note with one copy of that title said "Payson came to California on the 'Magnolia', arriving here August 28, 1849, and this story of his voyage and of his experiences in the mines, whether fictional or not, presents a highly entertaining picture." Totemwell is a novel about life in a small town in New England and the adventures of the people who lived there … the town consisted of two streets, a river, and salmon swam there … and we don't know if Payson was a character in the novel, if the main character moved out west searching for gold and finding his dreams, and it seems like the novel might have been in the same vein as his other two books. The book is 8vo. and measures 7 1/4 x 5 in. wide, with a tight binding and clean pages and an occasional brown spot. with a touch of rubbing on the the heel and crown of the spine, light fraying on the silk moire endpaper on the right, and overall an attractive first edition of an obscure title and an author who had dreams of making it big. #27 #7033