Full Title:

Title page recto: [decorative script] Between | Dawn and Sunrise | SELECTIONS FROM THE WRITINGS OF | [decorative script] James Branch Cabell | CHOSEN WITH AN INTRODUCTION | & INITIATORY NOTES BY | JOHN MACY | [decoration] | [decorative script] New York | ROBERT M. McBRIDE & COMPANY | 1930 (see image above).

Title page verso: COPYRIGHT, 1930, BY | ROBERT M. McBRIDE & COMPANY | FIRST PUBLISHED, SEPTEMBER, 1930 | PRINTED IN THE U. S. A. BY | THE QUINN & BODEN CO., INC., RAHWAY, N. J. (see image above).

Publication:

New York: Robert M. McBride & Co., 1930

Collation:

Medium octavo [24.4 cm. (9⅝ in.) x 14 cm. (5½ in.)]; Pp. xxviii + 292. (i) half-title (verso blank); (iii) title page; (iv) publication data; (v) dedication (verso blank); vii-viii The Contents; ix-xvii The Introduction (verso blank); (1) fly-title; (2) quotation from John Macy; 3-291 text (verso blank). Pages (1), (39), (75), (95), (113), (169), (211), (235), (253), (267), and (281) are fly-titles. Pages (94), (134), (252), and (266) are blank.

Binding:

Tan cloth, cover blank, lettering and decorations on spine in dark brown, covers blank. Top edge trimmed and stained red, else untrimmed. Spine: [decoration] | [decorative script] Cabell | [decoration] | Between | Dawn and | Sunrise | [decoration] | MACY | [decoration] McBRIDE (see image above).

This particular issue serves as a cautionary tale for bibliographers - use terms like "rare" and "unique" at your peril! Chance plays a huge part in what every collector sees, and barring hard evidence necessarily colors his view as to what is perceived as scarce or unusual. Hall notes that he had not seen this color variation, but took his description from Nelson Bond. He then goes on to state "[t]his is the only copy thus that I have ever heard of; it may very well be unique."

With the explosion of books available in the internet, we now know that this binding is far from unique, and seems to be offered at least as often as the brick variation, BDS-A1a. Shown above are two examples of this binding. The one far left is the copy Bond described for Hall, formerly in the Nelson Bond Collection and purchased from him by one of the present compilers (Thorne) in the 1980s. Next to it is another example. This copy has been protected by its dust jacket since new; comparing the two gives one a feel for the effects of sun and wear. Of particular note is the difference in the color of the spine printing. In the Bond copy, it is definitely brown. Under the pitiless light of the scanner, it looks brown on the second copy as well. In person, though, examined under ordinary light, the lettering and decorations on that copy are so dark that they appear black.

Dedication:

FOR | [decorative script] Virginia Randolph Ellett | WITH THE AFFECTIONATE ADMIRATION | ALIKE OF BOTH THE EDITOR AND THE EDITED (see image above).