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With additional illustrated title page/dedication leaf and 48 hand-colored aquatint plates. Interleaved with descriptive text. (4to) 32.5x25.3 cm (12¾x10"), modern three-quarter calf & cloth, spine tooled in gilt, raised bands, morocco lettering piece, all edges gilt, slipcase. First Edition.

One of a series of seven titles on costumes of the world published by William Miller at the start of the 19th century. The plates are dated between 1797 and 1804, with several different imprints. The added pictorial title, which in this copy is bound after the four-page list of subscribers, bears the dedication "Inscribed to the Earl of Macartney, K.B. Embassador from the King of Great Britain to the Emperor of China. A.D. M.DCC.XC.II. By W. Alexander F.S.A. Draftsman top the Embassy."

In the preface of another of the series the publisher describes them thus: "By presenting to the eye a series of judiciously selected and well executed pictorial representations, forming striking portraits of single subjects, accurately finished in the colours of the original, and aided by short descriptive essays, they give more pleasing and definite ideas of the external character, style of dress, and peculiarity of occupation, than can be acquired by any other method, except actual personal observations."