•  Publisher's blue cloth, stamped in black and gold; with a full-color illustration on-lay on front cover. Spine rubbed and with a tiny bit of cloth loss at both ends. Rubber stamp of St. John's Episcopal Church, Glenwood, Iowa and pencilled inscription on front pastedown. Small chip out of one corner of pp. 7-8. Frontispiece loose. In mylar covering. Binding sound, overall good +. (4670)

•  Original wrappers, covers detached and slightly chipped; most of spine chipped away. Pages clean and free of chips or tears. Not teethed on. (13111)

•  Shaw & Shoemaker 23576. Removed from a nonce volume; respined with archival tissue.

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Some of the science is now of questionable authority (and may have been even at the time of this publication), as in the answer to “What is supposed to be the proximate cause of sleep?” — “An impeded motion of the nervous fluid to the brain, produced by a mechanical compression or collapse of the nerves” (p. 176).

Provenance: Front and back pastedowns rubber-stamped by the Railroad Mens' Reading Room of Sayre, Pennsylvania (“Contributed by Henry C. Davis”); bookseller's label of a firm in Glasgow. Faint oval rubber-stamp on fly-leaf of Richard Hutchinson(?), New Brunswick (probably in England), with pencilled date, 1858.

•  NSTC 2P15178.   Publisher's green moiré cloth, front cover with gilt-stamped candle vignette surrounded by blind-stamped title and arabesques, spine with gilt-stamped title and back cover blind-stamped; binding lightly rubbed, with spine somewhat sunned and covers with streaks of discoloration. Front hinge (inside) tender; paper across back hinge cracked. Pastedowns and fly-leaf markings as above and two text pages rubber-stamped by the Railroad Men; two leaves of publisher's advertising affixed at front.  (23715)

•  NSTC 2P24752.   Removed from a nonce volume. Title-page cropped close to the border along the top edge and the spine; second leaf with outer edge chipped. (16771)

education

•  NSTC 2P27024. On Prinsep, see: DNB. Removed from a nonce volume. Lightly age-toned. Traces of soiling and small inked numeral on title-page. A few instances of pencilled sidelining.

Binding/Provenance: Prize binding of contemporary vellum, covers framed and panelled in gilt rolls with gilt-stamped corner fleurons and gilt central vignette with the crest of the city of Amsterdam, spine with gilt-ruled raised bands and gilt-stamped decorations in compartments. The partially printed, partially inscribed, bound-in prize certificate reads “Ingenuo magnaeque spei adolescenti, Henrico Gerteler propter insignes in artibus humanioribus progessus, in classe tertia . . . Quod testor R. v. Ommeren [/] Gymnasii publici Amstelaedamensis Rector,” dated 1791.

•  Brunet, IV, 905; Dibdin, I, 385–86; Graesse, V, 460; Sandys, II, 455; Schweiger, II, 831. Binding as above, vellum slightly darkened, lacking ties; spine with gilt dimmed and traces of a now-absent label and inked call number at foot of spine. Lower edges with institutional rubber-stamp; title-page with shadow of a pencilled numeral. Front free endpaper with paper adhesions from a now-absent bookplate; back pastedown with rubber-stamp and small adhesion. Pages clean save for offsetting to upper margins of a few, from a laid-in slip.

•  Publisher's green paper boards. Light wear to edges, small paper loss to head of spine and back cover. Light wear to edges; bits of paper loss to spine, and dime-sized loss at back cover. Pages clean and crisp, binding tight. (5867)

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for an enlargement.

•  Written in a clear notarial hand, but with bleed-through in the inventory, making reading slightly challenging — not, impossible. Very good condition.

•  In original printed and wrappers, illustrated on both covers. Front cover bears an illustration of a squirrel. Covers soiled, pages lightly foxed. Front wrapper torn and separated at the spine, and chipped or folded at outer corners; back wrapper chipped in one corner. (4859)

Phinney began the first press in Cooperstown in the very year this book was printed! Prior to this work, he had printed only a sermon and a few issues of a newspaper, making this the first book printed there. In 1795 Cooperstown was still essentially a frontier settlement, making this production all the more remarkable!

Clearly Phinney had ambition and the firm, with the help of the Erie Canal and the settlement of western New York, was able to see that ambition fulfilled. But at this early stage, a bit of learning was still required: Planning text to fit on the paper allocated was still troublesome for Phinney, for beginning on p. 147 he had to change to a smaller point size. (One wonders if this would have been necessary had he not devoted the entire last leaf to a self-promoting advertisement?)

The promise of “copperplate engravings” was another wrinkle not worked out, or a case of something's not going as planned, for all copies are barren of illustrative plates.

•  ESTC W27586; Evans 29414; Rosenbach, Children’s, 199; Welch, American Children’s Books, 1102.3 .   Contemporary mottled sheep, round spine, single gilt rules forming spine “compartments,” red leather title-label reading “Clarissa Harlowe.” Small piece of leather missing from rear cover at joint; rear joint starting at bottom and extending up about three inches, but binding sound. Stray occasional stains but overall a very, very good copy of a scarce early American children's book that is also an early-for-what-it-is imprint.  (24337)

•  NSTC 2R11677; Lowndes 2099; Hugo, The Bewick Collector, 434.   Contemporary half dark green morocco with red marbled paper sides, spine with gilt-stamped title; some rubbing and with a bit of green discoloration to paper of front cover. Minor offsetting to frontispiece and title-page; mild to moderate foxing in first third of volume and to last few pages.  (21934)

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•  Shoemaker 40547. Not in Rosenbach, Early American Children's Books.   Publisher's printed yellow paper wrappers, front wrapper lacking, back wrapper stained with edges nicked, spine overstitched at a later date. Moderate spotting and staining to pages; corners bumped. Slightly tattered: first few leaves with short tear from outer margin, not touching text; title-page and subsequent two leaves with short tear from inner margin, extending into text without loss.  (24545)

•  Publisher's quarter cloth and printed paper–covered boards, spine with gilt-stamped title; covers effectively detached, sides darkened and worn, cloth split along joints and chipped at spine head. Ex-library: spine with shelving label, front pastedown with private collector's bookplate and institutional rubber-stamp.  (23677)

José-Ignacio Roquette (1801–70), a Franciscan friar and professor at the patriarchal seminary in Lisbon, also wrote a History of the Discovery of America and works on natural history and philology. First published in 1844, this is the fifth edition of this rare work: We were unable to trace any copies via NUC Pre-1956, OCLC, or RLIN.

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•  Contemporary mottled calf, spine handsomely gilt with floral devices and with a gilt-lettered red leather label; scratched and abraded with some loss on edges and corners. Marbled endpapers, a little rubbed. Light foxing and some spots of light soiling; a few tears in margins of pages and plates. A book apparently used by members of its intended audience, though not put through truly gruesome maltreatment.

•  Sewn; in original printed wrappers. Front cover illustrated with scenes of children playing. Publisher's advertisement on back cover. Foxed. Numerous chips and short tears, limited to margins; one long tear (1.5") to pp.15 and 16, intruding upon text and engraving. One corner of back cover chipped. A child has colored most of the engravings. A somewhat worn copy. (4845)