For those who are interested in the works of Sir Walter Scott, this set is a real find. The poetical works of Scott are more important than those of many authors because poetry is how he began his career and he never really stopped telling stories in verse. His fascination with his own country's native poetry led him to compile and publish his first work, The Minstrelsy of the Southern Border. After this he began to write full length books in verse such as The Lay of the Last Minstrel and The Lady of the Lake. Scott was a true scholar of literature as well as poetry and these twelve volumes contain all of his notes and introductions along with various readings and the editor's notes. There is much information and pleasure to be found in this set. The books are bound in half-leather over marbled boards. They are 12mo in size. The endpapers are also marbled. there is some normal shelfwear to the books that has occurred over the years. The spines are very nicely decorated in gilt and each separate volume has a frontispiece as well as a pictorial title page. In four of the volumes the tissue guard (small piece of tissue paper between the frontispiece and the title page) is not present. Most volumes show some shelfwear such as a bit of wear to the top and bottom of the spines and extremities. Volume eight shows particular wear to the spine. All of the bindings are very tight and the textblocks are clean with no foxing. All edges are nicely marbled and within the texts there is also printed the musical scores to the rhymes which had been set to melody thus being historical folk songs so to speak. This is a wonderful set that will be enjoyed for generations as it indeed has already been enjoyed by previous generations. We are pleased to send pictures on request.