The Art of Crime

1931. First edition. 254pp. The author of the book was the Rev. Arthur Robert Lee Gardner (1889-1961) an Anglican clergyman associated with Lincoln College, OxfordHe writes in his foreword: "In this book it has been my aim to assemble for the convenience of its readers a collection of instances of everyday crooked enterprise, and to present them with a picture of crime from the standpoint of its practitioners. Chapters include: Introducing the Crook Proper, Suppliers of Illicit Desires and Blackmailers, The Art of the Forger and the Coiner, The Art of Jenny Diver, and Robbery with and without Violence. The book is bound in the original green cloth covered boards with gold titling on the spine. The case of the book is in very good condition with shelf wear and some soiling to the boards and bumping to the spine ends. The spine is noticeably faded and there is light fading with some damp spotting along the top 1" and part of the fore edge of the front board. The contents are tight and clean with foxing to the first and last few pages, including the title-page. The fore edge of the text block is fiarly heavily foxed and on some pages this has seeped a little way into the fore margin. The front free endpaper has been inscribed by the author thus: "To DCS from ARLG with all good wishes".…