Charles and Mary Lamb. Illustrated by Arthur Rackham. 
 
The Temple Press: 1909. Later edition. Large octavo. Folds and small tears along the top and bottom of the jacket, especially on the corners of the panels and the spine. Minor bumping on the crown and heel of the spine. Fading of the gilt on the spine. Slight smudging on the boards. Leaves are sunned but the text is clean. 304 pages. Very good. 
 
The ultimate combination of literary sensibilities. This unique copy has Rackham's illustration of Perdita from The Winter's Tale on its jacket and the more standard full cloth red boards. 
 
The Lambs retold and preserved for everyone the enchantments of Shakespeare, and their writings have charmed their way into the canon. Rackham combined the spirit world and the world of the flesh in his late Victorian paintings inspired by the Bard. The greatest introduction you could get to Shakespeare through a book, with color illustrations taking up full pages and black and white line drawings beginning and ending each chapter, each of which retells a play. 
 
"Diligent care has been taken to select such words as might least disrupt the effect of the beautiful English tongue in which he wrote."