The Big Six by Arthur Ransome, First Australian Edition with Dust Jacket

Arthur [Mitchell] Ransome (1884 to 1967)—English author and journalist, born in Leeds and best known for writing the Swallows and Amazons series of children's books (Swallows and Amazons, Swallowdale, Peter Duck, Winter Holiday, Coot Club, Pigeon Post, We Didn't Mean To Go To Sea, Secret Water, The Big Six, Missee Lee, The Picts And The Martyrs: or Not Welcome At All and Great Northern?). He was also the author of forty or so other titles including other children's books, fishing books, sailing books and books on politics

Jonathan Cape Limited—(Founded in 1919) British publisher founded in 1919 by Herbert Jonathan Cape (1879-1960), the son of a builder who started as an apprentice in the book trade. The company was initially named Jonathan Page and Company (Page was his mother's maiden name) and this changed to Jonathan Cape in 1921. Its most books and authors are probably: T. E. Lawrence, Arthur Ransome, the later Roald Dahl books, Malcolm Lowry's Under the Volcano, Fitzroy Maclean's Eastern Approaches, the James Bond series by Ian Fleming and more recently Anita Brookner, Margaret Atwood, Julian Barnes, Salman Rushdie. It is currently an imprint of Random House.

Swallows and Amazons—A series of 12 (Swallows and Amazons, Swallowdale, Peter Duck, Winter Holiday, Coot Club, Pigeon Post, We Didn't Mean To Go To Sea, Secret Water, The Big Six, Missee Lee, The Picts And The Martyrs: or Not Welcome At All and Great Northern?) children's books by English author Arthur Ransome, named after the title of the first book in the series. They involve the outdoor adventures of children, most notably John, Susan, Titty, and Roger Walker, Nancy and Peggy Blackett and Dick and Dorothea Callum. They portray an idyllic, yet also realistic, depiction of childhood adventure set in the 1930s. The series contains 12 books. The first book was originally published in 1930 and the last book was originally published in 1947. Titles in the series are: 1—'Swallows and Amazons', 2—'Swallowdale', 3—'Peter Duck', 4—'Winter Holiday', 5—'Coot Club', 6—'Pigeon Post', 7—'We Didn't Mean to Go to Sea', 8—'Secret Water', 9—'The Big Six', 10—'Missee Lee', 11—'The Picts and the Martyrs: Or Not Welcome at All', 12—'Great Northern?' and 13—'Coots in the North (Unfinished)'

The Coot Club becomes Scotland Yard to track down the person who is casting off boats and trying to lay the blame on the Coot Club ….

There are thirty two chapters: 1—'Out of the Dentist's Window', 2—'First Sign of Trouble', 3—'Eel Sett at Night', 4—'Misleading Appearances', 5—'Darkening Clouds', 6—'Tow Out of Trouble', 7—'The World's Whopper', 8—'At the Roaring Donkey', 9—'Breakfast at DR Dudgeon's', 10—''we Got to Emigrate'', 11—'Worse and Worse', 12—'Two Ways of Looking at the Same Thing', 13—'The First Clue', 14—'Rival Detectives', 15—'Spreading the Net', 16—'News From the Outposts', 17—'A Scrap of Flannel', 18—'Unwanted Gift', 19—'Dunlop Tyres', 20—'Morning Visitors', 21—'Another Coat of Paint', 22—'The Villain Leaves His Mark', 23—'Things Look Black', 24—'The Last Chance', 25—'A Kid for the Tiger', 26—'Setting the Trap', 27—'Blinding Flash', 28—'Siege of the 'Death and Glory'', 29—''All the Evidence We Got'', 30—'In the Dark Room', 31—'The Legal Mind' and 32—'What Happened to the Fish'.

Full page illustrations include : 'At the Staithe', 'The Death and Glory Inside and Out', 'The Dentists', 'Lifting the Pod', 'Another One to Put Back', 'Map', 'The Big Fish', 'Funeral Procession', 'Saving Sir Garnet', 'Escape From the Staithe', 'Sailing on Ranworth', ''It's a Different Tyre'', 'Dick's Drawing of the Tyre - Tracks', 'Scotland Yard', 'Detectives on Their Way', 'Someone Was Patting the Chimney', 'Painting the Chimney', 'Inside the Cabin', 'Five Finger Print', ''It's the Cachalot'', 'The Flashlight and the Shield', 'The Moment' and 'Developing'.