MARTINEAU, Harriet (1802-76). The Rioters ... Second Edition, London, 1842, 12mo, engraved frontispiece (some staining), original cloth (upper cover detached, spine torn with loss).

MARTINEAU, Harriet (1802-76).  The Rioters. A Tale ... Second Edition. London: Houlston and Stoneman, 1842. 12mo (138 x 90mm). Engraved frontispiece dated March 13 1827 [i.e. the date of the first edition], 4-pages of publisher's advertisements at the end (some staining to the frontispiece, frontispiece very lightly offset onto the title, some very light mainly marginal browning). Original pale burgundy textured cloth, the spine lettered in gilt, yellow endpapers (worn, the upper cover detached, part of the spine torn away with loss of letters). This short novel, which describes the effects of mechanical industrialisation and poverty in Manchester, was first published in Wellington, Shropshire, in 1827, when its title page bore the subtitle 'A Tale of Bad Times', absent from the present edition. "[Harriet Martineau] seems to have to come to the conclusion in later life that her escape from the risks of marriage was on the whole fortunate. During 1827, however, her health suffered. She wrote some melancholy poems, and sent some 'dull and doleful prose writings' [as the author describes them in her autobiography] to an old Calvinistic publisher named Houlston of Wellington, Shropshire. He accepted 'two little eightpenny stories', sent her 5l., her first literary earnings, and asked for more copy. She sent him several short tales, one of which, called 'The Rioters,' dealt with the wages question; it was republished without her consent by Houlston's successors, after some machine-breaking, about 1842" (DNB). Goldsmiths'-Kress 25365 (citing the first edition).