[Adam and Eve]
By: drawn by Richard Hawes, October the 28th, 1784
Published: 1784
Language: eng
Subjects: Children's writings; Early works to 1800; Pictorial works; Toy and movable books; Specimens; English Manuscripts
Other titles: Sands, Benjamin. Metamorphosis, or, A transformation of pictures with poetical explanations for the amusement of young persons.
Notes: Ms. throughout.

"These 'metamorphoses' were extremely popular and children made colored manuscript copies of them ... manuscript copies appeared in America during the later part of the eighteenth and early nineteenth centuries"--Cf. Welch, D.A.  Bibl. of American children's books, 1972, p. 389.  See full entry, under Sands, Benjamin (1163), for a full description of printed metamorphoses books.

This ms. metamorphoses book, also called a harlequinade, predates the first printed American edition recorded in Welch, ca. 1787, and it is made in part with British newsprint, indicating it was probably created in Britain.

Each of five panels is folded inward at the top and bottom to create two illustrations: one when the flaps are closed, another when the flaps are open.  Illustrations: Adam and Eve, Cain and Abel, the lion and the griffin, Lazarus and the rich man, and a man and skeleton.  The text is in verse.