GEORGE WADDINGTON: The present condition and prospects of the Greek or Oriental Church with some letters written from the convent of the Strophades. London 1829 First edition. In 8vo 22 x 13 cm, contemporary light blue hard covers, spine sunned. Text clean. Complete: 207 p. Manuscript ownership inscription of William St Clair, leading Hellenist, on the first page. Overall in very good condition and with fine provenance. George Waddington (1793–1869), an English priest and traveler, spent much time in the 1820s in the Ionian Islands and lived for months among the Greek monks at the Strophades. The book is divided into three chapters: the first provides an analytical presentation of the contemporary condition of the Greek Church (ceremonies, spiritual leadership of the Greek people, etc.); the second covers the recent history of the Church during the first three decades of the 19th century; and the third (titled The Strophades) offers a unique, lengthy dissertation on the famous monastery on the Strophades Island in the Ionian Sea, a Byzantine foundation still functioning in the late 1820s and the life on the island. This extensive account of the Strophades is a unique testimony for an island very rarely visited and almost never described. Very rare, absent from all major collections for the Levant.