AMERICANA AFTER 1820

For a U.S. Navy Shipyard — LithographedFOLDING Frontispiece

•  Technological innovation in the design, building, and maintenance of drydock facilities is proposed here. The volume includes the proposal itself, lists of companies and agencies in New York doing business with the Navy, testimonials concerning the proposed dry dock, and "Dry dock—New York Harbor. Report of the Secretary of the Navy, relative to the construction of a dry dock in New-York harbor . . . House document, 28th Congress, 1st session, no. 146 (pp. [32]–44)"—plus bibliographical references. The handsome frontispiece folding plate showing the proposed facility (lithographed by "Miller's Lith.") is intact.

•  Original printed wrappers; dusty. Number stamped in upper outside corner of the front wrapper.

Theatrical! Divorce Case
   in a Couple of Senses

•  Title on spine: Forrest Divorce Case. The divorce trial of Catherine N. Forrest vs.Edwin Forrest in the New York Superior Court, lasting from 16 December 1851 to 26 January 1852, received considerable public attention. Mrs. Forrest brought her suit for divorce, which was counter-sued by her husband, a famousPhiladelphia actor. The case was argued by the able attorneys Charles O'Conor, counsel for the defendant, and John van Buren. It was finally decided in favor of Mrs. Forrest who was awarded an annual alimony payment of $3,000 by the jury. Illustrated with engraved portraits of the couple on pages 96 and 97.

Provenance:  Bookplate of Dr. J. Chalmers DaCosta (1833–1963) on front pastedown. In 1885, he graduated from Jefferson Medical College in Philadelphia and became a surgeon. He wrote the standard textbook on surgery, which passed through ten editions. From 1907 to 1933, he headed Jefferson's department of surgery, following in the footsteps of such eminent surgeons as William W. Keen, Samuel Dr. Gross, and Thomas Dent Mutter.

•  Sabin 25110.   Rebound in full black cloth, gilt-stamped title on spine. Pages waterstained, some browning, spots of foxing, and a bit of bug-spotting. Lacks title-page, and pp. 181–87; lots, lots, LOTS! of scandal (and real pain and sadness) yet left.  (7337)

AnILLUSTRATED Travel Classic

•  Second edition, printed in the year following the first, of a popular travelogue describing the author’s adventures in Mexico, particularly through the Yucatan interior. Norman, an author and bookseller, was noted for his humanitarian efforts during the yellow fever epidemic in New Orleans in 1841; he was one of the first U.S. authors to publish an account of the ruins at Chichen Itza, racing against John Lloyd Stephens for that distinction. Click the interior image for an enlargement.

In addition to what Sabin calls “a valuable ethnological disquisition,” the volume includes a “Maya vocabulary” and grammar, along with a map of the region and 24 lithographic plates done from designs by the author, many being important images of Mayan architecture.

•  Sabin 55494; Catalogue of the Avery Architectural Library 721; Smith, American Travellers Abroad, N27. Publisher’s cloth, blind-stamped with strapwork, front cover with central gilt-stamped pictorial vignette, spine with gilt-stamped title and different vignette; spine and edges sunned, spine with short tear in cloth beneath title and small area of light discoloration at foot, cloth spotted along joints. Front pastedown with institutional bookplate. Scattered small spots of foxing; some signatures darkened.

Newspaper Recipes — TWO Can Dine
for thePrice of ONE

•  Very uncommon pamphlet.  Recipes from the Sunday North American newspaper, which employed Marion Harland as its expert on domestic life. One section is by Mrs. Anna B. Scott of Philadelphia, “one of the leading cooking teachers and domestic economists in the East.”

•  Not in Brown, Culinary Americana. Stapled in publisher's printed paper wrappers, with sewn hanging loop; wrappers faintly soiled, with light wear over spine and edges. Pages age-toned. A scarce item. (13769)

Famous Debate

•  First edition of this account of the famous and important debate between the social reformer, atheist, and idealist Robert Owen (founder of New Llanark, etc.) and preacher, Christian, and educator Alexander Campbell (founder of Bethany College), that occurred in in Cincinnati in April, 1839. Includes an “appendix, written by the parties.”
Click the image at right for an enlargement.

•  Shoemaker 39945; Goldsmiths', Robert Owen, 1771-1858: Catalogue of an exhibition of printed books held in the Library of the University of London, 79a. Uncut copy, in original quarter cloth, with paper spine label. Binding worn, covers detached (such bindings are notoriously delicate), and with the usual amount of foxing to pages. Housed in a cloth clamshell box. A good copy.

Whenthe “North-West” Was INDIANA

•  Important address to the citizens of Indiana.

•  Fragile condition. Some pages loose, lacks back wrapper, fore-edges chipped.

Published in Exile in “New-York”

Click the image above for an enlargement.

•  In this address to his fellow Venezuelans, Paéz (1790–1873), the exiled general and former president—who would serve as president yet again in the early 1860s—denies any part in revolutionary conspiracies against the regime of General José Gregorio Monagas (1798–1858), then ruling Venezuela. Páez probably drew upon the pen of D. Antonio José de Irisarri (1786–1868) for the composition of this publication.

Handsomely printed on a single sheet, in two columns.

Rare: We fail to trace this piece of exile writing via OCLC, RLIN, NUC Pre-1956, or Palau.

•  In good/very good condition, save for short tears to margins. Good Venezuelan item.

Constitutional Law — SECESSION?

•  1st edition. Author was Royall Professor of Law at Harvard. Preliminary thoughts on the effect of secession on debts, and other initial thoughts caused by the events of 1861.

•  Removed from a nonce volume. (180)



 

“Now the Sun Shone . . .”

•  First edition: The third portion of Parkman’s “France and England in North America” historical narrative series, also published under the title LaSalle and the Discovery of the Great West. Focusing on the exploration and settlement of the Mississippi, the work provides much information on LaSalle’s exploits, as well as on the Native Americans of the region.

•  Publisher’s cloth, spine with gilt-stamped title; spine with small area of light discoloration, binding otherwise clean and intact with only very minor signs of wear to corners and spine extremities. Front pastedown with 19th-century collector’s bookplate and with institutional stamp (no other markings). Page edges slightly brittle, with two short edge tears not extending into text.

Parry’s First Voyage — Plates, Maps, Stories

Click any image above for an enlargement.

•  First edition of Parry's classic account of his first and most successful voyage of Arctic exploration (1819–20), which resulted in the mapping of extensive stretches of coastline. The volume is illustrated with 14 plates and six maps, four of which are oversized and folding; the appendix includes tables of navigational and chronometer data, lunar observations, and a report on the state of health and disease among the men.

The copper-engraved, oversized frontispiece map shows Baffin's Bay, Barrow's Straits, Prince Regent's Inlet, and the North Georgian Islands, as well as the bay named after Parry's two ships.

•  Arctic Bibliography 13145; Hill (2nd ed.) 1311; Sabin 58860. Recent quarter calf over marbled paper–covered sides, spine with gilt-stamped leather title and author labels, and gilt-stamped anchor decorations in compartments. Title-page and a few others, plus reverse of 1 map, lightly stamped by a now-defunct institution. Pages gently age-toned, with occasional offsetting from engraving and the odd spot or smudge. One map with small portion of inner margin reinforced; final two leaves with inner margins reinforced; one plate with tears into image and mounted. Final advertisement leaf bound in before final text leaf. All edges marbled.

Seeking the Northwest Passage, 1824–25

•  First U.S. edition. Sir William Edward Parry (1790–1855) made a successful naval career and earned a knighthood exploring the Arctic. This was his third voyage, and his second in command of the expedition. He gives a detailed description of his travels in the Arctic Sea north of Canada, adding much to the knowledge of that area, while still not finding a navigable route. His subsequent voyage in 1827 had the aim of attaining the north pole; it was not successful in that aim but set a record for reaching the highest latitude that remained unbroken until 1876.

The Journal was first published in London in 1826 and shortly followed by this first American edition. It includes a foldout map showing Parry's route.

•  Shoemaker 25670; Sabin 58867. On Parry, see: The Dictionary of National Biography, XLIII, 392–93. Quarter cloth over paper with paper spine label, antique style. Map tattered on the edges, affecting ruled border, and with two closed tears. Lightly cockled with bumped corners; foxing and old damp-staining. A leaf of advertisements has been bound in at front—see our second illustration, here.  Ownership inscription on title-page.

For more books of CANADIAN interest,  click here.
For more VOYAGES, TRAVELS, & books on
"EXOTIC" PLACES,  click here.

TO Part XVIII . . .

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