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THE LONG ARM by Mary E. Wilkins AND OTHER DETECTIVE STORIES by George Ira Brett, Professor Brander Matthews, and Roy Tellet.
London: Chapman & Hall, Ld. 1895. Octavo, pp. [1-8] [1] 2-249 [250-252: blank] [note: last leaf is a blank], inserted frontispiece, original pictorial navy cloth, front and spine panels stamped in gray, light blue and gold, t.e.g., other edges untrimmed, light blue coated endpapers with Chapman & Hall monogram and floral designed printed in brown. First edition. Issued in paper wrappers and cloth (as here) as the first book of "Chapman's Story Series," which included "tales of action, incident, and adventure." Collects "The Long Arm" by Mary E. Wilkins Freeman, "The Murder at Jex Farm" by George Ira Brett, "The Secret of the Treaty" by Roy Tellet and "The Twinkling of an Eye" by Brander Matthews. "An important book -- the first legitimate detective-story anthology ever published. Never published in the U.S." - Queen, The Detective Short Story, p. 121. Freeman's story does not appear to have been reprinted in any of her story collections, at least during her lifetime. [Reference: Glover and Greene, Victorian Detective Fiction, p. 119 (mis-dating the book 1894). BAL 6341. Topp, Victorian Yellowbacks & Paperbacks, 1849-1905, III, p. 459].
COLLECTED GHOST STORIES ... With an Introduction by Edward Wagenknecht.
Sauk City, Wisconsin: Arkham House, 1974. Octavo, cloth. First edition. 4155 copies printed. Freeman, a New England writer, best known for her regional fiction, wrote approximately 200 short stories, of which the eleven collected here comprise all of her major supernatural tales. Only six of these stories are present in her 1903 collection, THE WIND IN THE ROSE-BUSH AND OTHER STORIES OF THE SUPERNATURAL. "Neat stories, crisply told." - Brian Stableford. [Reference: Tymn, (ed), Horror Literature 3-258].