[HUGO, Victor].

Bug-Jargal, by the author of Han d'Islande. Paris : Urbain Canel, 1826 ; large in-16 brown calf with blue highlights, spine and boards decorated with relief decorations, gilt lace inside, burgundy silk linings and endpapers, untrimmed (L. Dézé). First edition with an etched frontispiece after Devéria, [frontispiece, (2) ff., IV pp., 386 pp., (1) f. of publisher's advertisement] Published without author's name, Victor Hugo's first novel deals with the tragic destiny of Bug- Jargal, a black slave, during the Saint-Dominique revolt in 1791. Curious decorated binding by Louis Dézé in calf with embossed and tinted decoration. Dézé's creations usually cover books without much interest: this literary first edition is an exception. Author in 1870 with Jean Valmy-Baisse of a bibliography of Gustave Doré, Louis Dezé (1857-1930) was a singular bookbinder whose decorations executed with embossed and tinted leather are characteristic of the period.