8 unnumbered pages, 496 pages: 4 illustrations designed by Edward Burne-Jones. Decorated initials; chapter headings in red; text in double columns; some pages within wood-engraved compartments. Signatures: [a]⁴ b-2i⁸ Limited edition of 350 copies printed on paper, 8 on vellum. See Peterson and Sparling. Colophon: 'Here ends the Well at the world's end, written by William Morris, with four pictures designed by Sir Edward Burne-Jones. Printed by William Morris at the Kelmscott Press, 15, Upper Mall, Hammersmith, in the County of Middlesex, and finished on the 2nd day of March, 1896' (p. 495). In red at foot of text on page 495: 'Sold by William Morris at the Kelmscott Press.' Binding: bound in limp white vellum; silk ties. Gold lettering on spine.
A romance of old England, The Well at the Worlds End recounts the travels of Ralph and his three brothers, sons of the modest King Peter. An exercise in the manner of Malory, it is colored by what William Morris's daughter May called his "passion for the soil and loving observation of famil- iar country mingled with marvels beyond the sea No doubt the charm is rather a special one for the members of the writer's family, as the King's sons start on their adventures from the very door of Kelmscott Manor transformed into the palace of a simple-living kinglet." 1 Remarkably, Morris began overseeing the first proofs at the Kelmscott Press in April 1892, before he had finished writing the book. It was first announced in December 1892, "with 4 woodcuts, designed by C. F. Murray," but by the following spring Morris had assigned these to the Birmingham artist Arthur Gaskin (1862-1928), who made nineteen designs in all, some of which were engraved by W. H. Hooper. 2 Dissatisfied with the results, he rejected these designs in February 1895 and turned instead to Burne-Jones, who produced the four illustra- tions engraved, as usual, by Hooper. The first, serving as the frontispiece, bears the legend "Help is to hand in the wood per- ilous," and shows Ralph rescuing a damsel from her two captors, one of whom lies dead at his feet. 1. May Morris, ed., The Collected Works of William Morris, vol. 18 (London, 1913), p. xix. 2. See Arthur and Georgie Gaskin (exh. cat., Birmingham: Birmingham Museums and Art Gallery, 1981).