The Cockpit Book

First edition, first impression.  150pp, illustrated with line drawings and page decorations throughout.  Cream cloth binding, with metallic blue lettering front and spine.  Illustrated endpapers.  8vo.  Cloth a little bruised at spine tips.  Upper text block edge dust spotted.  There's a small, old price label on the front free endpaper else internally neat, clean and tight.  In its original dust wrapper, dull and a little shelf worn, sunned over spine. The Cockpit book is a collection of nautical anecdotes, stories and sketches collected by the author over a period of 35 years at sea, originally intended as a 'desk diary', which became an autograph book, on a succession of yachts, to be read and enjoyed in the cockpit, with a drink in hand of course.  But the book's appeal goes beyond the yachting world: contents include a nautical pot pourri of superstitions, rhymes, recollections and food and drink recipes especially suitable for on board preparation and consumption.