80 - RÉTIF DE LA BRETONNE (Nicolas-Edme). THE LAST ADVENTURE OF A FORTY-FIVE-YEAR-OLD MAN; A Short Story Useful to Many Readers. Geneva and Paris, Regnault, 1783. Two parts with continuous pagination bound in 2 in-12 volumes in marbled fawn sheepskin, smooth spine entirely decorated with a set of gilt motifs, title and volume number labels (garnet and green), red edges (contemporary binding). Volume 1: frontispiece, 264 pp., 1 plate—Volume 2: frontispiece, [265 to] 528 pp., 1 plate, 8 pp. of the publisher’s catalog. Bindings of both volumes restored (spine, head and foot caps, corners, leather covering on one side), faded volume number labels, faint water stain at the bottom of the plate in Vol. 1 and on the following 6 pages (pp. 51–56), minimal worm damage at the bottom of the first few leaves of Vol. 2 (just below the frontispiece engraving and below the frame on the title page), which, starting on page 273, becomes a pinhead-sized hole at the bottom of the quire, barely visible and continuing until the end of the volume. FIRST EDITION. It is illustrated with 4 BEAUTIFUL ENGRAVINGS, out of text, engraved by Giraud the Elder and Pauquet after Louis BINET, including 2 as frontispieces for each part. Paul Lacroix considers this work a masterpiece and ranks it above *Manon Lescaut*. GOOD COPY, despite the noted flaws, complete with the engravings and the catalog at the end of vol. 2, with a fresh block of text on good-quality laid paper, free of foxing. From the LIBRARY of the Burgundian scholar Ernest PETIT (1835–1918), with an ex-libris, and subsequently from the “Restivienne Collection” of Léon LAMBERT (1928–1987), with an ex-libris. A GOOD COPY, despite the noted flaws, ¶ Rives Childs, p. 282, XXV-1 - Lacroix, p. 212, XXVI - Cohen, 878.