2 volumes, 8vo (177 x 114 mm). Engraved portrait frontispiece portraits of La Fontaine and Eisen, 57 vignettes by Choffard, 80 engraved plates after Eisen. Late 18th or early 19th century dark purple straight-grain morocco elaborately gilt, palette roll tool border, large central lozenge within a stippled panel, the lozenge with a central wheel tooled in gilt and blind, spines in 5 compartments with 4 raised bands, one longer central panel with central lozenge gilt, gilt-lettered in one panel, the rest with central fleuron tooling, board edges and turn-ins gilt, edges gilt. Provenance: John Brymer (armorial bookplates and ownership stamps on title-pages).

Fermiers Generaux Edition, FIRST ISSUE, with both "Le Cas de Conscience" and "Le Diable de Papefiguière" in the decouvertes state, and with several other "figures refusées" as originally published. The Goncourts call this edition "the great monument and triumph of the vignette, which dominates and drowns all the illustrations of the age" (see Ray, pp.54-5). According to Ray, "Eisen's eighty designs for La Fontaine are the liveliest and most adroit that he ever drew. Thoroughly at home with the varied action of these lusty stories -- their love passages, their intrigues, their practical jokes -- he is also expert in choosing the moment in each that will best serve his purpose as an illustrator." In a fine binding, with design influenced by the Scottish "Wheel" bindings of the period, the blind-tooled "spokes" giving the medallion a delicate lacy effect. Brunet III:759; Cohen-de-Ricci p. 558; Ray French 26. A BRIGHT COPY.