Potter (Beatrix) The Tale of Peter Rabbit, first trade edition, second or third printing, with "wept" for "shed" on p.51, colour frontispiece and 30 illustrations by the author, grey leaf patterned endpapers, contemporary postcard in an unknown hand addressed to "Mrs Amphlett" loosely inserted ("I am sending Dorothy some Peter Rabbit Sketches"), ink ownership inscription to front free endpaper dated Christmas 1902, some light soiling, light browning to endpapers and very slightly to half-title and verso of final f., faint cockling to fore-edge, hinges neatly repaired, original dark green boards, mounted colour illustration to upper cover, light rubbing to spine and corners, [Linder p.421], 16mo, Frederick Warne and Co., [November or December 1902].

⁂ The first trade edition of the first book written and illustrated by Beatrix Potter. Originally published in two privately printed editions of 250 and 200 copies (December 1901 and February 1902, respectively), this first trade edition was the first in which all of Potter's designs are printed in color. Leslie Linder records that "green boards were introduced after the first printing" but aside from this "there are no recongizable differences between the first three printings". The words "wept big tears" on p.51 were changed to "shed big tears" in the fourth printing of April 1903.