
AMERICANA
AFTER 1820
A-Ba Bb-Bz
Bibles1 Bibles2 Ca-Ch
Ci-Cz D E F G H I-J K-Le
Lf-Lz Ma-Mc
Md-Mz N-Pd Pe-Q
R-Sg Sh-Sz T U-Wd We-Z
Science Balanced Out with
Angelic Photographs
Mellin's Food Company. The home modification of cow's milk. Boston: Mellin's Food Co., 1908. 8vo. 60, [2] pp.; illus.
$45.00
Click the images for enlargements.
Early edition: Instructions on how to adapt cow's milk for the use of human infants, focusing on the benefits of the Mellin's Food additive. The text, of which much is dedicated to chemical analysis, is illustrated with numerous photographic portraits of babies and children nurtured on Mellin's Food–enhanced milk, labelled with the children's names — and also with artistic evocations of the joys of farm life, bearing poetic captions.
Publisher's tan cloth, front cover with title and Art Nouveau decorative design (unsigned) stamped in brown and dark blue; spine and front cover with a trio of tiny spots and edges significantly darkened, the discoloration just touching outer edges of title stamping. Pages still clean; children's pictures
still adorable. (29815)
Memorial
biographies of the New England Historic Genealogical Society.
Boston: Pub. by the Society, 1880. 8vo (24.5 cm, 9.6"). 533 pp.
$100.00
First edition of the first volume in a series compiled and published by the oldest genealogical society in the United States. Among the biographies present are entries on Harrison Gray Otis, Albert Gallatin, William Ingalls, and Daniel Webster.
Publisher’s cloth, spine with printed paper label; spine and back cover scuffed, spine label darkened and chipped. Front pastedown with institutional stamp. Many signatures unopened. Pages slightly age-toned, else clean; paper embrittled, with a few short edge tears.
Culinary Economy
Metropolitan Life Insurance Company. The Metropolitan Life cook book. New York: Metropolitan Life Insurance Co., 1924. 8vo. 64 pp.
$25.00

Early edition of a popular Metropolitan Life give-away. This promotional pamphlet emphasizes thrifty food purchasing and preparation for the average housewife; it contains, for the most part, fairly straightforward and regionally neutral recipes like pot roast, potato croquettes, and tapioca pudding, mixed with a few exotics such as chop suey.
Click the image for an enlargement.
Brown, Culinary Americana, 2819g (for 1922 first ed.). Publisher's printed paper wrappers; spine and edges mildly sunned, otherwise clean and all but unworn. Light offsetting to four pages from laid-in recipe clippings. Nice. (29158)
Opening
the Port of
Matamoros
Mexico.
Laws, statues, etc. 16 July 1836. Broadside. Begins, “Durante
la guerra con los sublevados de Tejas, se permitará la introducción
de viveres del extrangero por el puerto de Matamoros.” México:
no publisher/printer, 1836. Folio (30.5 cm; 12"). [1] p.
$875.00
Decree of the Congreso General, approved by José Justo Corro, president ad interim, 16 July 1836, and promulgated the same day by Juan de la Fuente, opening the port of Matamoros to the importation of provisions during the war with Texas, assigning those provisions to the expeditionary force, and exempting from seizure mules and wagons carrying supplies to that army
from within the country.
This is a states' edition, promulgated by José Gómez de la Cortina, Governor of the Federal District.
Streeter, Texas, 880. Very good condition. Lacking the integral blank leaf. (24618)
California, New Mexico, & Galveston
Mexico. Secretaría de Hacienda (authored by José Ignacio Esteva). Memoria sobre el estado de la hacienda publica, leida en la Camara de diputados el 13 de enero y en la de Senadores el 16 del mismo, por el ministro respectivo. Mexico: Imprenta del Supremo Gobierno, 1826. Folio (29 cm; 11.25"). [1] f., 82 pp., [2] f., 93 tables (some fold.), [4] tables, p. 83.
$450.00
Click the images for enlargements.
This account of the income and monies received as loans in support of the government of Mexico includes, on pp. 26–27, information on California and its then current situation. The tables contain significant data on mining and transportation; scattered paragraphs on Galveston and New Mexico.
Not in Howes despite the previous year's report being listed. Stitched as issued, lacking the original plain paper wrappers, dust-soiling and some age-toning; title-leaf torn at inner margin and a partial repair sometime done with document tape; corners bumped and last leaf chipped at edges. Good copy. (29969)

Miller's Second Novel
Miller,
Henry. Black spring. Paris: The Obelisk Press, 1945. 8vo (19.2
cm, 7.56"). 269, [3] pp.
$150.00
Click the image for an enlargement.
First post-war edition, the third edition printed by Obelisk, and the fourth overall,
of Miller's second published novel.According to Miller's bibliographers, the 1945 printing uses the same plates as the 1938
edition, explaining why the copyright reads “Reprinted October 1938,” confusing this with the
second Obelisk printing. “The actual date of publication is 1945 and is documented in a letter
Miller wrote to Ben Abramson in August of that year” (Shifreen & Jackson). Like the copy seen
by Shifreen and Jackson, the present copy's leaves vary in size, so that many are shorter than
others.
Jack Kahane founded the Obelisk Press at Paris in 1929 to publish illicit English-language books like this free from legal censure.
Shifreen & Jackson A12e.
Publisher's steel gray wrappers with white boxes lettered in black; faded and
shelf-worn, paper on the lower spine cracked to reveal quires beneath. Age-toning resulting from
poor paper quality, as usual for this edition; sewing brittle. Far from pristine; definitely showing
evidence of its readership. (30196)

The
Book That Defined
Miller's Career
Miller,
Henry. Tropic of Cancer.
Paris: The Obelisk Press, January 1939. 8vo (19.3 cm, 7.6"). [1-6], 7-[318],
[2] pp.
$225.00
Click the image for an enlargement.
Fifth Obelisk printing of the book that “afforded [Miller] his literary voice”
(Shifreen & Jackson).“I start tomorrow on the Paris book: first person, uncensored, formless — fuck
everything!” So wrote Miller to Emil Schnellock in 1931. Three years later, after some financial
difficulty, Jack Kahane published Tropic of Cancer at Obelisk in Paris with money Anaïs Nin
borrowed from a psychoanalyst. It is the story of Miller's first year in Paris, living hand-to-mouth
as a struggling writer.
This edition is the same as the fourth edition in all but wrappers (and the
same as the third in pagination, except for necessary variations on the copyright
page: “Fifth printing” and “Reprinted January 1939"); our
copy's
binding
is blue and white, lettered in black, not the light green wrappers
lettered in darker green called for by Shifreen & Jackson.
Jack Kahane founded the Obelisk Press at Paris in 1929 to publish illicit English-language books like this free from legal censure.
Shifreen & Jackson A9h.
Binding as above; wrappers faded and creased along the spine, upper joints
cracking. A copy that clearly was read more than a few times.
(30191)

TWO
Very Early
Missionaries to
HAWAII
Miller, Samuel. A sermon, delivered in the Middle Church, New Haven, Con. [sic] Sept. 12, 1822, at the ordination of the Rev. Messrs. William Goodell, William Richards, and Artemas Bishop, as evangelists and missionaries to the heathen. Boston: Crocker & Brewster, 1822. 8vo. 48 pp.
$250.00
William Richards (1793–1847) and Artemas Bishop 1795–1872) were sent to Hawaii, while William Goodel (1792–1867) headed for the Holy Land and adjacent regions. Pages [47]–48 contain a “Brief view of the missions under the direction of the American Board of Commissioners for Foreign Missions, compiled October, 1822.”
Shoemaker 9489. Not in Hill. Removed from a nonce volume. Light age-toning. “No.7” in ink (early 19th-century hand) at top of title-page. (27260)
Miller's “Evidence”
Millerite Foundations
Miller, William.
Evidence from scripture and history of the second coming of Christ
about the year 1843; exhibited in a course of lectures. Troy: Kemble & Hooper,
1836. 12mo. 223, [1 (blank)] pp.
$850.00

First expanded edition of a foundation work of an American religious movement. Miller first issued this work as a 64-page pamphet in 1833. A second edition appeared in 1835, and this much larger and fully developed work appeared in 1836. Miller (17821849) sparked the beginning of the Seventh Day Adventists and is revered for his writings and preaching. “Millerites” were a significant and powerful force in America as an alternative established and traditional religions.
Publisher's purple cloth, spine faded to brown; bottom of spine pulled with small loss of cloth; top of spine with brown paper tape repair. Ex-library: call number on spine; bookplates; five-digit number stamped in two blank areas; blind pressure-stamp on title-page; charge pocket removed from rear pastedown. Foxing of the sort to be expected, no other soiling. (21276)

Technically an Amateur Production, But
Nicely Executed
Milliken, K.L., & H.H. Cummings. Manuscript on paper, in English. “The lookout. May 1886.” [1886]. 4to (25.5 cm, 10"). [30] pp.
$300.00
Click the images for enlargements.
Whoever Milliken and Cummings were, they were
serious about their efforts at a literary periodical. The present issue has an impressively ornate hand-inked front cover featuring a decorative title and stag vignette and a back cover with a likewise hand-drawn, unsuspecting gentleman about to have his derrière savaged by a charging hound (above the caption “Look out!!”), these enclosing otherwise unpublished short pieces (including “An Emotional Old Man,” attributed to Max Tuttle) and “splinters” of local interest items, all recorded in a casual but legible hand. Jennie Crowbie's class essay “Awkward Boys” is added at the back.
Although whatever title-page may have been present is now lost and the first piece's beginning likewise, what is present here is a fascinating labor of love and lively-mindedness.
Hand-inked covers as above; edges darkened, one bright orange tie surviving and one lost. Leaves separating, first leaf lacking. (30247)
ALL
These Businessmen Want Is What
They're
“Entitled”
To
Mississippi river
convention. St. Paul, Minnesota, 1877. A memorial
to congress to secure an adequate appropriation for a prompt and thorough improvemenof
the Mississippi River with an appendix by Sylvester Waterhouse. St. Louis: John
J. Daly & Co., 1877. 8vo. [1] ff., 39 pp.
$100.00
The River Improvement Convention of 1877, made up of "practical business men" of the Mississippi Valley, resolved to petition Congress to "provide adequate means for the deepening of the channel of the Mississippi" and for "the removal of every obstruction to navigation from St. Paul to Balize." This pamphlet consists of their "memorial" and its supplementary appendix by Sylvester Waterhouse, which together set forth specific demands along with statistics and economic analysis supporting them. River shipment of grain, lumber, meat, and other commodities is discussed in detail, often offering comparisons with rail shipment; Valley industry, present and potential immigration, and foreign trade (with citation of foreign "examples" of such subsidies as are sought) are all canvassed. The petitioners believe that the Valley is "entitled" to "better facilities for the transaction of its enormous business," and want appropriation to be "speedy."
Although a scholar in Greek and Latin at Washington University, Waterhouse according to the DAB had "interests [that] carried him far from the classical subjects he enthusiastically expounded in the classroom." He is noted as a "firm believer in the future of the Middle West [and] an ardent advocate of improving the Mississippi River."
On Waterhouse, see: Dictionary of American Biography, XIX, 533. Original flexible fabrikoid, splitting along spine.

American Romance with
Mystic Oriental Overtones — In a Signed Binding
Mitchell, John Ames. Amos Judd. New York: Charles Scribner's Sons, 1901. 8vo. [4], 152 pp.; 8 col. plts.
$65.00
Click the image for an enlargement.
Early, illustrated edition of a popular novel originally published in 1895 and later made into a movie titled “The Young Rajah,” starring Rudolph Valentino as a young, psychic Indian prince spirited away and adopted by a New England farming family. The romantic tale is decorated with a color-printed title-page vignette and seven other color-printed plates, from paintings by Arthur J. Keller.
Signed binding: Publisher's brick-colored cloth, front cover and spine with decorative gilt-stamped title and twining vine and flower motifs, front cover with “AR” monogram of designer Amy Richards (fl. 1896–1918).
Binding as above, slightly cocked and with corners a little bumped, spine very gently darkened and back cover with small spots, front cover with a few pinprick-type holes not detracting overly from overall appearance of design. Top edges gilt. A few page margins with faint smudges, otherwise clean. (29769)

Before There Were Crock-Pots
Mitchell, Margaret J. The fireless cook book. A manual of the construction and use of appliances for cooking by retained heat. New York: Doubleday, Page & Co., 1920. 8vo. xii, 315, [1] pp.; illus.
$75.00
Click the image for an enlargement.
Written by a teacher of domestic science and former dietitian of Manhattan State Hospital (not the novelist of Gone with the Wind fame), this how-to book offers both “economy of fuel” and “a mind free from all care of the meal that is cooking” (p. 7). The work describes techniques for building and assembling portable insulating pails, refrigerating boxes, insulated ovens, and hay-boxes, followed by
250 recipes making use of slow cooking. The instructions are illustrated with in-text engravings; at the back of the volume is a series of experiments designed to demonstrate the insulating powers of different materials, the effects of food density upon the temperature maintained, detection of poisonous metals that may be dissolved from the cooker utensils, etc. This is the third edition, following the first of 1909.
Bitting 326 (for 1909 & 1911 eds.); Brown, Culinary Americana, 2637 (first ed. only). Not in Cagle & Stafford. Publisher's dark green cloth, front cover and spine stamped in black with title and images of fireless cookers; mild rubbing to extremities, very faint scratches to back cover. Front hinge (inside) with small area of insect damage near head. A clean, solid copy. (30292)
A
“Philadelphianum”
(Published in Boston)
Mitchell,
Silas Weir. The hill of stones
and other poems. Boston: Houghton, Mifflin & Co., 1883. 16mo. iv,
98 pp.
$75.00
Click the image for an enlargement.
First edition: Romantic poems, including one Arthurian piece, written
by a neurologist born in Philadelphia and known for his work on nerve injuries
and erythromelalgia (“Weir Mitchell’s disease”).
An early hand inked neat responses to a few lines in “The
Quaker Graveyard.”
Publisher's cloth, front cover black- and gilt-stamped, spine simply gilt-stamped, binding gently worn with minor spotting to spine and lower edge of front cover. Ownership inscription to front free endpaper. A nice copy. (2901)

Daily Business Life — International! New Orleans 1831
Moctezuma, A.M. Autograph Letter Signed, to Francisco Pizarro Martínez. In Spanish, on paper. New Orleans: 22 October 1831. Small 4to (25 cm x 10"). [1] p. with integral address leaf; and [2] p. translation into English, ca. 1837.
$100.00



“Early American” for THIS Sort of
Chess Book
Monroe, J. Science and art of chess. New York: Charles Scribner; London: Sampson Low, Son & Co., 1859. 12mo (19 cm; 7.5"). 281 pp., illus.
$450.00
Click the images for enlargements.
First edition, not a modern reprint. Designed for the beginner and novice, this was published during the early days of interest in the U.S. in chess as a social event. The first American chess congress was held in New York in 1857 and that certainly helped expand interest in the game. (Oddly, the founding of the first chess club in America did not come until 1877.)
Provenance: Ex-German Society of Pennsylvania Library, a German-American social organization.
Publisher's green cloth stamped in blind on covers and in gilt on spine (with a knight, bishop, and castle in addition to author and title); a little cocked and bottom edges worn. Front free endpaper separated and rear one chipped. Ex–social club library: call number on endpaper, rubber-stamp on title- and two other pages, no other markings. Clearly a book that was often read and consulted with some soiling and staining resultant; text not chipped though printed on inexpensive paper. (26923)

A Very Autobiographical Comedy
Moore, George. The coming of Gabrielle a comedy. New York: Boni & Liveright, 1921. 8vo (21 cm; 8.25"). 132, [1] pp.
$50.00
Click the images for enlargement.
First U.S. edition of this comedy about literary identity and the attentions paid to a successful author, based on a real-life incident in which a European baroness began to write to Moore following the appearance of his Evelyn Innes. This was a limited edition of 895 numbered copies, of which the present example is no. 351.
Publisher's quarter cream parchment paper and blue paper sides, front cover and spine with gilt-stamped leather title-labels, in original blue-gray paper dust jacket with black-stamped title and edition information; binding in beautiful condition, jacket with small edge chips and spine head splitting. Pages clean. A nice copy. (29707)

One
of the
Great
Charitable Endeavors
of the U.S.
CIVIL WAR
Moore, James. History of the Cooper Shop Volunteer Refreshment Saloon. Philadelphia: Jas. B. Rodgers, 1866. 12mo (19.3 cm, 7.55"). Frontis., 212 pp.
$225.00
Click the images for enlargements.
First
edition:
Well-documented contemporary account of a relief effort for the Union soldiers
who passed through Philadelphia, “the great highway of travel between
the East and the seat of rebellion” (p. 22). At William M. Cooper's storefront
on Otsego Street, the ladies of the city provided food and coffee (at one point
100 gallons were being made per hour), nursed the sick and wounded, washed and
mended clothes, and offered the comforts of home to any soldier who presented
himself. The saloon operated from 26 May 1861 through 28 August 1865; details
of the numbers of soldiers who passed through, what they received, and which
volunteers organized what are provided here.
The volume opens with a
wood-engraved
illustration of the saloon, done by Philadelphia artist Charles
H. Reed. Author James was a medical officer in the Union army and also published
Two Years in the Service, or, the Personal Recollections of a Medical Officer
and A Complete History of the Great Rebellion; or, the Civil War in the
United States.
Binding: Publisher's textured
green cloth, front cover with gilt-stamped vignette of the shop and a very
large American flag, taken from the frontispiece; back cover with same vignette
in blind. Spine with a bit of gilt embellishment at top and bottom, gilt-stamped
title.
Provenance: Front free endpaper
with inked inscription: “Compliments of Mrs. A. Horner Phila. July 4th
1876"; also with rubber-stamp of Samuel Hoffman, a Philadelphia collector
and dealer of presidential and political material; and finally with inked
inscription: “To the LIbrarian U. of Chattanooga Sept. 13, 1957 from
John C. Daub,” a Pittsburgh rare book dealer.
Sabin 50402. Bound as above, corners and spine extremities rubbed. Front free endpaper with inscriptions and stamp as above. A clean, solid copy. (29560)

Irish Songs American Striped Cloth Binding
Moore, Thomas. Irish melodies and sacred songs. Boston: Re-printed by Munroe & Francis, 1849. 12mo (18.5 cm, 7.3"). [4], [ix]–xxxi, [5], 184 pp.
$250.00
Click the images for enlargements.
Later American edition of these celebrated Hibernian-themed lyrics from the author of “Lalla Rookh.” The front free endpaper bears a rather sweet early inked inscription: “For thee, A.E.” (with a small, difficult-to-decipher signature).
Signed binding: Publisher's striped cloth, predominantly seen in the 1840s and never common: Brown ripple-textured cloth thinly striped in light blue, covers each with blind-stamped frame and gilt-stamped harp and shamrock vignette, spine with gilt-stamped title and strapwork; front free endpaper with pressure-stamp of the Benjamin Bradley company. All edges gilt.
On binding cloth: Krupp, Bookcloth in England and America, 1823–50, Rip3. Binding as above, cocked, corners rubbed, spine extremities chipped, tiny spot
of insect damage in front joint; overall more attractive than this list might suggest. Front hinge (inside) tender. Pages gently age-toned; a few leaves of preface with light staining along inner margins. A very popular work, here in an unusual and distinctive binding. (30344)
His
“Travels”
Here Are through
Time
& Texts
Moore, Thomas. Travels of an Irish gentleman in search of a religion. Philadelphia: Carey, Lea & Blanchard, 1833. 12mo (17.7 cm, 7"). viii, [13]–328 pp.
$225.00
First U.S. edition, following the London first of the same year, of a controversial defense of Catholicism from the author of the enduringly popular Lalla Rookh and other poems. This eclectic theological treatise is arranged as a chronological examination of the history of Christianity, conducted by the titular Irishman who tries (rather, “tries”) but fails to find a convincing reason to convert from the Roman Catholic to the Protestant Church.
American Imprints (1833) 20211; NSTC 2M35483. Publisher's brown cloth, spine with printed paper label; cloth faded and discolored, spine label rubbed. Front free endpaper with faint pencilled ownership inscription dated 1856. Light to moderate foxing throughout. (20642)
“Abounding
in Beauty, Grace, &
Pathos”
According
to the Translator
Müller, Max.
Memories. A story of German love.... Chicago: A.C. McClurg & Co., 1905.
4to. 134, [3] pp.; 8 plts.
[SOLD]
A mournfully romantic prose-poem written by a celebrated philosopher, Orientalist, and Oxford professor. Translated from the German by George P. Upton, the work appears here illustrated with
eight plates and various page embellishments all done by artist and designer Blanche Ostertag. This is an early edition thus, following the first printing with Ostertag's illustrations in 1902.
Binding: Publisher's rosy beige cloth, front cover with vase of roses design stamped in cream and dark green and with gilt-stamped title and crown decoration, spine with cartouche-style title stamped in cream and dark green. Endpapers with printed mountain scenes.
Binding as above, virtually unworn. Two faint small smudges to title-page, pages otherwise clean. A lovely copy. (28605)
Munn, B.T. La petite belle; or the life of an adventurer. Skaneateles, NY: [Truair, Smith, & Bruce], 1877. 8vo (19.6 cm, 7.75"). Frontis., 368 pp.
$125.00
The last page of this unfinished work announces that the present book is Vol. I, but no more was ever published — rather ironically, as the title-page proclaims “A life is not fully rounded out till its close.” The author, a Spiritualist who lectured on that topic, set the novel in the small New York town where it was published.
Wright, III, 3879. Publisher’s green cloth, spine with gilt-stamped title; cloth showing minor wear overall. Frontispiece with outer edge waterstained; four leaves with some offsetting from laid-in scrap of cloth. Pages with a few scattered small spots, mostly clean.
Produced
under the Supervision of
Bruce
Rogers
Murdock, Harold. Earl Percy's dinner-table. Boston: Houghton Mifflin &
Co., 1907. 8vo (26 cm, 10.25"). Frontis., [6], 77, [1] pp.
$105.00
Printed at the Riverside Press under the direction of Bruce Rogers, this
is number 202 out of 550 in this limited edition. Murdock's pleasant, readable
fantasia on historical events near the beginning of the Revolution presents
an immediate and personal perspective from the British side.
Publisher's red cloth, spine with paper label, in excellent
condition save for slight discolorations to spine label. With laid-in prospectus.
Pages mildly cockled; scattered, pinpoint spots of something(?) that got into
the slurry during the paper-making.
A handsome, clean copy.

Cookery by a Famous
Epicure & Cuisinier
Murrey, Thomas Jefferson. Valuable cooking receipts. New York: White, Stokes, & Allen, 1886. 12mo. 128 pp.
$135.00
Click the images for enlargement.
Home cookery, written by the famed “Terrapin Tom,” a caterer and one-time manager of the restaurant that served the House of Representatives. Murrey here provides a comprehensive survey of good but not excessively fussy, classic 19th-century cuisine, as well as a few more unusual items such as hop sprout salad, canned quinces, chili sauce (mild American-style), and Reed-Birds a la Lindenthorpe (cooked inside large potatoes). He mentions in several places the utility of various “weeds” as good salad greens, and offers brief remarks on etiquette and dinner menus (including the ideal bill of fare to be wholly supplied by the state of Maryland, and the author's version of a Dickensian “Christmas Carol” meal). This is an early edition, following the first of 1880.
Binding: Publisher's brown cloth, front cover with black-stamped title and gilt-stamped vignette of an 18th-century mob-capped lady tasting from a steaming cauldron.
Bitting 337 (for first ed.); Brown, Culinary Americana, 2452 (likewise). Not in Cagle & Stafford. Binding as above, minimal rubbing to extremities. Back pastedown with 19th-century Brentano ticket. Pages faintly age-toned, otherwise clean. A very nice copy. (30093)
PLACE
AN ORDER |
E-MAIL US |
PRB&M HOME
SEARCH OUR DATABASE