MELVILLE, HERMAN Moby-Dick or The Whale. New York: Harper and Brothers Publishers, 1851.8vo, publisher's drab brown cloth with an arabesque design in blind, gilt-lettered spine, yellow endpapers. Thomas Melville copy, with stamped ex-libris to f.f.e.p. and transferred to front pastedown. First American edition, following the English edition by a month and containing some thirty-five passages not present in the English edition (deemed "profane"). Many unsold copies of the first edition were destroyed. With 6 pp. pbs' ads. Wear to boards, expertly repaired at spine, edges, corners and a few points and upper and lower board; evenly toned at preliminaries with intermittent light brown staining throughout.