[Burne-Jones, Edward]--Catterson-Smith, Robert ILLUSTRATIVE MATERIAL RELATING TO THE BEGINNING OF THE WORLD, COMPRISING: 1-25) COMPLETE SET of twenty-five illustrations, ink and gouache, mostly 95 by 135mm. (average), all laid down to cards, the borders and reverse with occasional additional details or notes; 26) page 17 illustration, proof printing, some spotting and water-damage; 27-48) twenty-two proof printings, occasional spotting--49) Burne-Jones, E. The Beginning of the World. Longman’s Green and Co., 1902, original cloth-backed boards, some browning to endpapers, binding worn with loss to spine The Beginning of the World, with twenty-five illustrations by Burne-Jones, was first published in 1902. Georgiana Burne-Jones provided a foreword: "...The designs in this book were made for an illustrated edition of Mr. Mackail's "Biblia Innocentium," which was to have been produced by the Kelmscott Press and to have contained upwards of two hundred pictures. Many of these were begun, but none quite finished. The twenty-five designs here given were so far carried out that, with the help of Mr. Catterson Smith, it has been possible to complete and reproduce them. It was he who, under my husband's own eye, translated almost all the designs for the Kelmscott Chaucer from pencil into ink before they were engraved, and in so doing he learnt most intimately the manner and meaning of the artist. Accordingly, the conventions agreed upon for certain parts of the Chaucer drawings - as in sky, trees, and flowers - have been used here, and the colour tradition of black and white then taught has been followed. Where the pictures were finished, they have been exactly reproduced, and where, as in some parts, little more than a suggestion was given, the skill and sympathy of the pupil have understood it and made it visible to others. Any resulting incompletion of form and detail has been accepted as inevitable, but the spirit of the whole is rendered with extraordinary fidelity..." Here are Catterson-Smith's complete set of illustrations, as presumably sent for engraving. In addition there is a near-contemporary proof printing on laid paper (of the illustration on page 17) and twenty-two proofs on coated wove paper (lacking the illustration on page 6, the first illustration on page 11, and the illustration on page 19). This last group is, presumably, a more modern proof set.