Undescribed by Thoms.
Another edition of 1728, presumably the second, rather than the preceding. The type is entirely reset in the body of the work, although the same founts are used. On the title-page it is larger and of a heavier face than in the preceding edition, and the ornament is different. The "U" in "Dunciad" is not symmetrical, as in the other edition, but has a straight right and a curved left side. The Owl frontispiece has been re-engraved (variety No. 2).
The first page of the Preface, A2 (A3 in the other edition), has a large, heavy capital "I" for "It," whereas the other begins with an "I" in a woodcut border.
"Who," the last word of the first line of the other edition, is the first word of the second line here,—the distinguishing mark of this edition. The type of the final page of advertisement is of much lighter face than in the other edition.
It does not contain the additional notes on pages 5, 7, and 22, and the spelling of "Interludes" in the note on page 5 is preserved; therefore it was probably set up from a copy of "B" rather than "C," although the misprint "spirits," page 23, line 159, is corrected.
Lieut.-Col. Francis Grant's copy.
Collation: Title with square printer's ornament, A1 (verso blank). "The Publisher to the Reader," A2-A4. Pages i-viii. Text, A5-E6 (verso advertisement of "The Progress of Dulness"), in sixes. Pages 1-51, 36 misprinted 56.
POPE, Alexander.—The Dunciad, variorvm. With the Prolegomena of Scriblerus [vignette of Ass] London. Printed for A. Dod. 1729. 4to, red levant morocco, gilt back and sides, gilt top, uncut edges, by Rivière.
First complete, and author's first avowed edition. "F" of Thoms's list.
Four varieties of the Ass frontispiece are found in different editions. No. 1 as in the present edition, No. 2 in the first variorum 8vo edition, No. 3 in the reprint of the variorum 4to (page x), and No. 4 in the Collected Works, folio, 1735.