LINES, Kathleen (editor). Harold JONES (illustrator). Lavender’s Blue. London; Oxford University Press. 1954

Royal 8vo.; publisher’s ivory cloth-backed pictorial boards, double-page colour- endpapers, in repeat dustwrapper; illustrated with alternate spreads in monochrome and colours; an attractive copy, both externally and internally, with a knock 1cm in depth to upper forecorners, with corresponding relaxed ripple through the text block, with a very small and neat gift inscription, dated 1954, to front free endpaper; the unclipped dustwrapper (15s.) with dusting to spine, small chipping to head, and a nick to tail.

First edition of this comprehensive collection of 155 traditional nursery rhymes with index at the rear.  It remains one of the most loved and enduring of all nursery rhyme collections with Jones’s artwork the salient feature.  A landmark of British mid-century illustration which has remained in print for decades.