Beatrix Potter

First edition of Beatrix Potter's story of what happens when an over-confident squirrel tries the patience of an owl.

• Beatrix Potter (English).
• London and New York: Frederick Warne and Co., 1903.
• 86 pages.
• Illustrated in color throughout. 
• Original dark grey paper boards with color pictorial center panel and white lettering, color decorative endpapers of other Beatrix Potter characters.

"This is a Tale about a tail – a tail that belonged to a little red squirrel, and his name was Nutkin."

Set in the scenic Lake District, where "the Potter family had spent a number of their summer holidays," The Tale of Squirrel Nutkin is the classic Beatrix Potter mix of realistic and fantastic animal exploits (Taylor et al., 111). The sailing squirrels and the antics of Nutkin (and his eventual comeuppance) were an immediate hit with Potter's young readers, who wrote her letters about how much they enjoyed the "lovely" "Scell nuskin"; "I shall always have a strong preference for cheap books myself," Potter wrote to Norman Warne, "all my little friends happen to be shilling people" (Linder, 142).