Note 48 to Chapter 5 of the author's Pegasus in Harness: Victorian Publishing and W. M. Thackeray, which University Press of Virginia published in 1992. It has been included in the Victorian Web with the kind permission of the author, who of course retains copyright.
The one copy of the book-form issue composed partially of sheets printed from type is the presentation copy to Peter Rackham in the Berg Collection, NYPL. Of the four sets of parts with some sheets printed from plates, two are in the British Library; one in the Cooper Library, University of South Carolina; and the fourth is in my own collection.
Many copies of Pendennis bound in two volumes without wrappers or advertisements were originally issued in parts and are distinguished front the book issue by the three stab holes in the gutter margins where the parts were sewn. Apparently this is not generally known: three of the seven copies of Pendennis in the Berg Collection, NYPL, described as "in book form" are actually bound sets of parts.
Last modified: 4 April 2001