Beschreibung:

VIRGINIA] The lawes of Virginia now in force: collected out of the Assembly records, and digested into one volume. Revised and... . London: printed by E. Cotes, for A. Seile, 1662. Full brown pebbled morocco, edges sprinkled red, 19th or early 20th century. 9 1/8 x 6 1/2 inches (23.5 x 17 cm); [6], 82, [4] p., collating [A], B-Z^2, where A1 bears the royal arms on the recto and the imprimatur on the verso, and A2r is the title. In this issue, B2 is correctly signed (unlike the Lenox copy), but p. 13 is misnumbered 14. Light binding wear and rubbing, Bar Association stamps on a1 and A2r, B1r and v, C1r and Z2r, occasional neat pencilled notes in a modern hand. The title has a neat restoration in the gutter margin, just entering the title (but without loss); both A1 and A2 are a little short, and may be supplied from another copy. The top edge has been trimmed, just clipping a few of the running heads. There is reinforcement to the fore-margin of the final leaf. A considerable rarity, this is the second collection of the Laws of Virginia (the first was published in 1612 in Strachey's Laws Divine, Morall and Martiall). Sabin notes that "[Francis] Moryson, acting governor, and Henry Randolph, clerk of the House of Burgesses, prepared the above revisal under an order of the General Assembly." The laws include provisions for a college (XVIII), a reward for the killing of wolves (LIX), against secret marriage and fornication (LXI, LXII) and, among the most interesting and important of the contents, Acts concerning the Indians (pp.76-79, CXXVI). The last copy we can locate at auction was the Harmsworth example, sold in 1948 for 160 pounds. ESTC R7787; Wing (CD-ROM, 1996), M2849; Sabin, 100380; Cole Library of E.D. Church, 578, p. 1311. C The New York City Bar Association