L. W. Currey, Inc.

Dickens, Charles. "No. 1 Branch Line. The Signal-man." In: MUGBY JUNCTION, THE EXTRA CHRISTMAS NUMBER OF ALL THE YEAR ROUND, CONDUCTED BY CHARLES DICKENS, FOR CHRISTMAS, 1866 ... [cover title]. London: Chapman and Hall, 1866. Octavo, pp. [1] 2-48, double columns, publisher's blue wrappers printed in black, sewn. First edition. The "Mugby Junction" story cycle written by Dickens, Andrew Halliday, Charles Collins, Hesba Stretton and Amelia B. Edwards, includes the first appearance in print of Dickens's classic ghost story "No. 1 Branch Line. The Signal-man." "Dickens's most conventional ghost tales --- without humor and with moral purpose kept to a minimum -- were written for the Christmas extra issues of 1865 and 1866 ... In 'The Signal-man' a railway employee in a lonely outpost keeps seeing a warning specter just before fatal accidents on the line" (Silber/Sullivan). "The signal-man tells the narrator of supernatural warnings that have occurred just before train accidents in his area. On this third occasion the signal-man himself is the victim, in circumstances like those of his visions" (Bleiler). Bleiler, The Guide to Supernatural Fiction 538. Sullivan, ed., The Penguin Encyclopedia, p. 126. Several short splits along spine fold, a very good copy. (#171395).

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