LITERATURE

“Medieval Romance” from aNotable (later)Woman of Letters

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•  Scarce sole edition, first book only (of two) of a historical romance set in the 14th century. Several sources identify the author as Marie-Caroline de Murray, a.k.a. Caroline Murray, known as “la Muse Belgique,” amanuensis to the Prince de Ligne. OCLC locates only one U.S. institutional holding of this novel.

•  Manne, Nouveau dictionnaire des ouvrages anonymes, 162; Le Mayeur, Les Belges, 340.   Contemporary plain paper-covered boards, spine with hand-inked volume label; binding stained, spine rubbed with small insect hole. Vol. I only. Inner margin of title-page repaired with loss of first letter of publisher's information line. Faint spotting and staining; trimmed closely, often shaving pagination and signatures. As interesting to see how this was produced, as it is frustrating to be unable to finish the story!  (26937)

Classically Inspired Exploits & aSigned Crimson Binding

Macaulay, Thomas Babington. 

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•  First edition: An introductory survey of Roman history and literature precedes these 19th-century hits — retellings of heroic episodes of classical times done by the 1st Baron Macaulay, a politician, historian, and essayist. Present here are “Horatius,” “Battle of the Lake Regillus,” “Virginia,” and “The Prophecy of Capys.”

Binding:  Late 19th- or early 20th-century full crimson calf, covers framed in triple gilt fillets with gilt-stamped corner fleurons, spine with gilt-dotted raised bands, gilt-stamped title and author labels, and gilt-stamped compartment decorations. Top edge gilt. The publisher's original brown cloth spine and blind-stamped covers arebound in at the back of the volume. Signed: Front free endpaper stamped “Root & Son.”

•  Hayward 258; Tinker 1509; NSTC 2M1220.   Binding as above, carefully refurbished; edges and extremities mildly rubbed, sides with unobtrusive scuffs and a few small smudges. Previous owner's small ticket on back pastedown, slightly scraped. Two leaves with offsetting from now-absent laid-in slip. Last few leaves with pinhole worming in lower margins, not touching text; worming to back fly-leaves and endpapers neatly repaired. Endpapers foxed; pages age-toned with occasional faint spots or smudges, generally clean. Solid and very attractive.  (29456)

Illustrated Theatre Edition

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•  The earliest and best-known of all the tales of rural Scottish life published by “Ian Maclaren,” pseudonym of the popular author and preacher John Watson. This special illustrated theatre edition of the Rev. Watson's beloved work (originally published in 1894) features a photographic frontispiece of James H. Stoddart in the role of Lachlan Campbell, as well as five other scenes both comic and tragic. The final section of the volume is “A Doctor of the Old School,” a loving portrayal of stalwart practitioner Dr. William MacLure.

Binding:  Publisher's tan cloth, front cover with double iris design stamped in green, white, and violet.

•  Binding as above, minimal rubbing only. Pages and plates clean. A beautiful copy.  (28613)

Scottish Philosophy w/Celtic Knotwork Gracing the Binding

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•  First edition: Warmly human observations on various character types, including musings on the boundless energy of the American, the argumentativeness of the Scot, and the essential boyishness of the young boy. Ian Maclaren was the oft-used pseudonym of the Rev. John Watson, a popular Scottish author and preacher; several of the pieces here include commentary on Scottish religious practices.

Signed binding:  Publisher's green cloth, front cover and spine with gilt-stamped title; Celtic knotwork-inspired medallion decoration stamped on cover and spine in gray and maroon. Front cover with “F” monogram (Charles Buckles Falls?).

•  Binding as above, minimal wear only to extremities, head of spine with very minor spot of darkening. Front free endpaper with gift inscription dated Christmas, 1904. One leaf with short tear from lower margin, not touching text. A few signatures opened slightly unevenly; pages clean.  (28593)

CAN a Southern Belle Find Love with aDay-Laborer?

•  Originally written for the Ladies' Home Journal and first published in book form in 1899, this novel tells the tale of a progressive Virginia lass, ill at ease with the stodgy traditionalism of her aristocratic family, who falls in love with a workman who may not be what he seems. Much discussion of class differences ensues.

The volume is illustrated with afrontispiece and 10 plates by painter Henry S. Hubbell.

Signed binding: Publisher's tan-with-green-tint cloth, front cover with title and Art Nouveau iris design stamped in pink and green surrounding a color-printed portrait of the heroine; spine with green-stamped title. Binding with the distinctive monogram of prolific book designer Amy M. Sacker (1873–1965).

•  Not in Wright.   Binding as above, clean and fresh; endpapers with areas of offsetting. One leaf with lower outer corner torn away; half-title with pencillings. A very attractive copy.  (28587)

The LEC Gets Stoic

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•  Limited Editions Club production of the philosophical thoughts of the last of the Five Good Emperors: Méric Casaubon's 17th-century translation, illustrated withclassically inspired wood engravings by Hans Alexander Mueller, the illustrations printed in blue and black. The book was designed and printed by Peter Beilenson in Waverley type on Basingwerk Parchment paper, and bound by Russell-Rutter in half black morocco bearing a column design, with gray marbled paper–covered boards.

This example is numbered copy 972 of 1500 printed, signed at the colophon by the illustrator; the appropriate LEC newsletter is laid in.

•  Bibliography of the Fine Books Published by the Limited Editions Club, 269.   Binding as above, in publisher's original slipcase; spine leather dried and chipping, slipcase with small scratches and mild shelfwear. Quite sound, and internally very clean and crisp; in fact, depending on taste, the look of the spine can suggest survivorship of a sort that Marcus Aurelius would have appreciated!  (30121)

Presentation Copy of the“Greatest Poem EVER Written
on the Immortal Martyr . . . ”

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•  Broadside poem honoring Abraham Lincoln. “This is the prize poem on Lincoln; for in 1922, when the American Government had completed the Lincoln Memorial Building at Washington, D.C., the President appointed Chief Justice Taft and a committee to arrange for the dedication. They called in all the poems that have been written on Lincoln . . . [and] decided unanimously on this Markhamic poem.”

Author's presentation copy:  Signed by Markham, with an inscription “with my friendly greetings” to a theological seminary, dated 1933.

•  Mounted on cardboard. Age-toned, edges darkened; clean and unchipped.  (26119)

Interesting Pathetic Moral COMPLICATED!

•  English-language version of "La bergere des Alpes" by Jean François Marmontel: A count and countess on their way through the Savoy mountains come across a virtuous and beautiful shepherdess named Adelaide. Convinced she is living a life below her station, they try in vain to persuade her to come with them to Turin. Their son Fonrose becomes obsessed with the idea of the mysterious shepherdess, leaves home and, disguising himself as a shepherd, tries to win Adelaide's hand. She finally confesses that though from a wealthy family, she has embraced her lowly life as a reward for her sins. Against her parents' wishes, she secretly married an army officer. She is still in mourning for her husband, who killed himself after she caused him to miss a crucial battle. All ends more or less well when Adelaide, after much persuasion, agrees to marry Fonrose on condition he accepts that her heart still belongs to another. Title-page with woodcut vignette of a man in a boat on a lake with a castle in the background and a basket and anchor on the shore in the foreground, and "[No.] 97" printed at the foot. The top edge of the chapbook is closely cropped, else very good.

•  NSTC 2S18901. Removed from a nonce volume. (16764)

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Continental Blind-Embossed Binding

•  First edition.

Binding:  Full green calf, covers elaborately blind-embossed using the same plaque for both covers. Round spine with gilt ruling, gilt title, and gilt center devices in compartments; all edges marbled.

•  Palau 156283.   Binding as above, a little rubbed, some loss of gilt; front free endpaper with a patch of abrasion. Signature on verso of title-page. The usual scattered foxing.  (28726)

A Universalist Women's Literary Annual: 1843

•  First edition: The “fourth blossom of our cherished Rose,” an annual collection of writings by Universalists. Among the contents are “The Dweller Apart” by Mrs. J.H. Scott, “The Minstrel and His Bride” by Caroline M. Sawyer, and several pieces by the editor. Also present is an article on the Actual vs. the Ideal, which opens with a critique of L.E.L. (the poet Letitia Elizabeth Landon) for indulging in flights of romantic fantasy rather than depicting the “glory of love in its power to beautify the affections of the mother, the wife, the sister, and the friend” (p. 219). Click the images for enlargements.

The volume is illustrated with an added engraved title-page and three steel-engraved plates, done by O. Pelton after designs by T.B. Read and Beaume, and by Charles Phillips after Sir Joshua Reynolds.

Signed binding: Hunter green embossed morocco, covers with cherub vignette in foliate frame; the embossed panel was designed by Francis N. Mitchell and engraved by Alex C. Morin, and the binding was done by Benjamin Bradley, with all three names stamped in panel. All edges gilt.

•  Faxon 713. On binding, see: Wolf, From Gothic Windows to Peacocks, 178; Spawn & Kinsella, American Signed Bindings, 53.   Binding as above, extremities with very minor rubbing; frontispiece lacking. Offsetting from plates, two pages with offsetting from now-absent laid-in item, scattered light spotting elsewhere. A gorgeous example of the binding, with interesting reading inside.  (26737)

“Shout, Shout, America!”

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•  Three volumes of flag-waving verses commemorating a variety of inspiring American moments: maritime events including Commodore Perry's victory on Lake Erie and the battle between the frigates Constitution and Guerriere, military events including the Battle of Bunker Hill and Braddock's defeat, and general love of country, freedom, peace, etc. The lyrics were collected by McCarty; a few pieces of music are included, and in some other cases the tunes meant to be used are indicated.

Provenance:  Front free endpaper of vol. I with inked inscription: “Presented to the 'German Society Library of the State of Pennsylvania' by the Compiler,” signed “Wm. M'Carty.”; same to vol. III. Vol. II from a second 19th-century Philadelphia subscription library!

•  American Imprints 42-3093; Sabin 42997.   A married set. Vols. I & III: Publisher's brown cloth, covers framed in blind, spines with gilt-stamped title and two different vignettes; corners and spine extremities chipped (foot of vol. I revealing printed music beneath the cloth). Ex–social club library with remnants of shelving labels on spine heads, 19th-century bookplates and call number on endpapers, pressure-stamp on title-pages. Vol. II (Naval) sometime rebound in navy leather over blue cloth, leather edges blind-tooled, spine with gilt-stamped leather title label; spine sunned, rubber-stamp of a different 19th-century library on title-page and a number of other pages, small repair to dedication leaf of vol. II. All volumes with occasional short marginal edge tears or corners chipped away; some pages lightly age-toned. All meaty, all sound for use, all evocative; despite “mixed” nature, a very pleasant set.  (3283)

Christian “Pearls” Set in Blue & Silver

•  Early printing of this “galaxy of thought from four hundred writers of wide repute”: Inspiring excerpts from Christian literature, gathered by the Rev. McClure.

•  Publisher's dark blue cloth, front cover and spine stamped in silver; corners and spine extremities slightly rubbed. Front hinge (inside) cracked and back hinge tender; endpapers partially adhered to pastedowns.  (22222)

Lord Save Us — An AttractiveSMALL Broadside

(Medical Prayer).

•  This prayer, in poetic form, is against an unspecified epidemic and is printed on wove paper within an ornamental border, in double-column format with the columns separated by double lines of entwined opening and closing parentheses. An extremely rare ephemerum, it was probably sold outside churches, to theworried devout.

•  Slightly irregular margins, as issued. Handsome.

Racism & Insanity on the High Seas — The NonesuchBenito Cereno

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•  First edition thus: Based on events recounted in Delano's 1817 Narrative of Voyages and Travels, in the Northern and Southern Hemispheres, this much-debated, enigmatic novella tells the story of a black slave revolt at sea. Illustrated by American artist Edward McKnight Kauffer (noted for his influential poster designs) with a frontispiece and six plates in hand-stencilled color, the text was reproduced from the 1856 first edition of The Piazza Tales.

This is numbered copy 932 of 1650 printed on grey Van Gelder paper at the Curwen Press.

Provenance: Front pastedown with bookplate of prominent New Yorker E. Coster Wilmerding.

•  BAL 13726; McKitterick/Rendall/Dreyfus 36.   Publisher's red cloth, spine with gilt-stamped title, in black-printed dust-wrapper; spine slightly sunned with extremities rubbed, dust-wrapper split and significantly chipped with most of spine paper lost. Provenance as above, and the volume clean.  (28230)

Victorian ArabicaNicely Presented

•  The centenary edition of Meredith's Arabian-inspired fantasy, with an introduction by Sir Francis Meredith Meynell and illustrations by Honore Guilbeau, who signed the colophon. The printing here is handsome, with accents and chapter indications in blue throughout and with touches of other colors — leaf green and curry. This is copy number 288 of 1500 printed.

•  Bibliography of the Fine Books Published by the Limited Editions Club 260.   Publisher's quarter leather over printed paper-covered sides; spine extremities slightly rubbed, in slipcase showing a bit of scraping and refurbished at top fore-edge. Very nice.  (13276)

One of 50 Copies withthe Extra Suite of Illustrations
The Cortlandt Bishop Copy

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•  Bibliophile's treasure: One of only 50 copies “de grand luxe sur Japon ancien” and with a suite of proofs of the wood engravings, which are by Daniel Vierge. Total edition was 300 copies.

Provenance:  Cortlandt F. Bishop, with his elegant red leather bookplate.

Binding:  Signed binding by M. Lortic: red morocco, gilt extra with accents of black; original wrappers bound in. Board edges with gilt double fillet; wide turn-ins with richly gilt; marbled endpapers. All edges gilt.

The prospectus is bound at the rear.

•  Binding as above, joints unobtrusively repaired, very faint traces of shelfwear to lower edges. Pages gently age-toned. A beautiful volume.  (3390)

Signed byArthur Miller & Leonard Baskin

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•  This Limited Editions Club copy (no. 880 of 1500 printed) is signed by both the playwright and the illustrator at the colophon.

The binding is full rusty-brown Nigerian goat, stamped in gold on the spine. The etchings are by Leonard Baskin, a series of five portraits tracing the downward spiral of Willy Loman — a powerful complement to Miller's portrait of a salesman at the end of his career and at the end of his rope! The plates, printed by Bruce Chandler, are each protected by a brown paper tissue guard. The book is designed by Benjamin Schiff, who chose a Bulmer font for the text.

This offering includes the monthly newsletter but not the mailing notice.

•  Limited Editions Club, Bibliography of the Fine Books Published by The Limited Editions Club, 1929–1985, 540.   Binding as above. One of the tissue guards is loose but otherwise undamaged. Fine, in the original slipcase. A handsome production of one of the most performed plays in the world!  (21754)

Miller's Second Novel

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•  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

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•  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'sbinding 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)

Technically an Amateur Production, But
Nicely Executed

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•  Whoever Milliken and Cummings were, they wereserious 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)

MILTON inBright & Shining Guise

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•  Illustrated, beautifully bound edition of Milton: “Carefully revised, from the text of Thomas Newton,” with eight wood-engraved plates done by Dalziel after William Harvey. This copy is decorated with a fore-edge painting.

Fore-edge: A simply but strongly executed architectural view identified by a previous owner as being of St. James's Palace, with soldiers marching in the foreground.

Binding:  Contemporary crimson morocco, covers framed in wide stylized thistle and leaf gilt roll with gilt-tooled corner fleurons, spine compartments with similar gilt motifs, turn-ins with gilt roll. All edges gilt. Volume housed in recent red cloth-covered slipcase.

Provenance:  Front pastedown with armorial bookplate of collector John Train and with small ticket of Rastall & Son Booksellers, back pastedown with ticket of Leighton Son, & Hodge of London. Front free endpaper with inked inscription: “To Minnie on her marriage,” from A.B., dated Oct. 1858.

•  NSTC 2M29671.   Binding as above, minor rubbing to extremities, spine leather very slightly darkened and showing thin faint cracks. Front hinge (inside) cracked but holding. Small newspaper clipping regarding Milton and a slim silk ribbon marker (possibly once attached to binding) laid in. Plates with moderate spotting confined to upper margins only, not touching images; pages clean. An attractive and very Victorian rendition of Milton.  (30150)

First Peformed at Ludlow Castle 1634 — Comus with the Music

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•  John Milton was commissioned to write this masque by his good friend, Henry Lawes, for John, Earl of Bridgewater, on the occasion of his becoming President of Wales. It was first performed by Lawes himself and the Earl's children at Ludlow Castle in 1634. The masque's five songs were set to music composed by Henry Lawes, and this music is printed in two parts (for treble and bass clefs) on 12 pages immediately following the text. The prefatory materials to this edition, which is limited to 1500 copies, include an introduction to the play proper by Mark van Doren and an explanation of the music by Hubert Foss.

The illustrations consist of six full-page watercolors by Edmund Dulac. The LEC bibliography says they were “printed in process offset,” but this is in error: The mailing notice (not present with this offering) asserts they were “reproduced in six printings by the Sun Engraving Company,” and a member of the family that owned that enterprise observes to us that it did not in fact have offset presses — while it was noted for its color letterpress productions, including the original (1940) Szyk Haggadah. The design is by John Dreyfus, who chose a monotype Bembo font printed by the University of Cambridge Press; the engraving of the music was done by G.T. Friend.

The binding is quarter gold-stamped vellum with marbled paper sides; top edges are gilt.

•  Limited Editions Club, Bibliography of the Fine Books Published by The Limited Editions Club, 1929–1985, 250.   Binding with a light, small stain on back cover. Clean inside; bookseller's small label on rear pastedown. Original slipcase, with light scuff marks and minor paper loss at head and foot of mouth. A fine book, in a very good slipcase.  (23002)

American Romance withMystic Oriental Overtones — In a Signed Binding

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•  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)

A “Philadelphianum” (Published in Boston)

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•  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)

Euphony Cacophony Versification & CompLit

•  Mitford (1744–1827), a historian of ancient Greece, sometime member of Parliament, and principally a gentleman of means, here presents the second edition of his study of versification in English — including Anglo-Saxon and Middle-English, and with comparisons to Classical Latin and Greek, French, Italian, and Spanish. There is even a chapter on Oriental and Celtic versification! First published anonymously in 1774 as An essay upon the harmony of language, intended principally to illustrate that of the English language, the work in this edition boasts “ improvement and large addition.” Click the interior image for an enlargement.

•  Recent quarter calf, round spine; raised bands accented with gilt beading, gilt center devices in spine compartments, and two green spine labels. Combed-pattern marbled paper sides. Lacks the half-title, only; occasional light foxing. A very good copy of an interesting and now uncommon book.  (22228)

Words for an Important Irish Poet
from anImportant Irish Press

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•  First edition: One of 1000 copies printed of this Dolmen Editions homage to the Irish poet Austin Clarke. Contributing authors include Thomas Kinsella, Hugh MacDiarmuid, Padraic Colum, Ted Hughes, Anthony Kerrigan, Liam Miller, and others; a checklist of Clarke's works is provided.

•  Publisher's printed paper wrappers; spine and edges gently sunned, edges with minor shelfwear. Half-title with pencilled (relevant) annotations; pages crisp and clean.  (29718)

Gascon Tales & Anecdotes

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•  Compilation of wit and humor from the southwest of France, a region universally acclaimed for its douceur de vivre. This is one of two editions of 1708 (the first year of the work's appearance), the other issued in Paris; the collection was also issued under the title Gasconiana.

•  Barbier, Dictionnaire des ouvrages anonymes et pseudonymes, 915.   Contemporary speckled sheep, spine gilt extra; overall rubbed, front cover with small nick to upper edge and short tear from joint now repaired, spine leather cracked with gilt rubbed yet stillvery nice to look at. Front pastedown with printed paper label (owner's name in blackletter) affixed, front free endpaper excised. Intermittent light spotting and staining, some pages browned.  (26907)

OXONIANMusings Illustrated

Montgomery, Robert. 

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•  Second edition of this poetic look at Oxford University, by the author of the highly successful “Omnipresence of the Deity.” The poem is here illustrated with12 copper-engraved views in and around Oxford, drawn by A.G. Vickers and engraved by various hands including J.H. Kernot, J. Skelton, W.R. Smith, and J.W. Cooke; the title-page vignette depicts the “New Clarendon Printing Office.”

•  NSTC 2M34090.   Contemporary calf framed in blind triple fillets with blind-tooled corner fleurons and panelled within with gilt double fillets with gilt-tooled corner fleurons; spine gilt-extra with gilt now attractively faded and recent period-style gilt-stamped morocco label, all edges gilt. Plates including engraved title lightly to moderately foxed with offsetting to surrounding pages. A good solid copy with substantial presence.  (30110)

A Very Autobiographical Comedy

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•  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)

Joseph & JesusBefore & After the Crucifixion — Illustrated

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•  Attractive edition of a controversial reimagining of the lives of Joseph of Arimathea and Jesus of Nazareth, in which Jesus survives the crucifixion. The volume is illustrated with a total of12 copper engravings (nine plates and three smaller vignettes) by Stephen Gooden; this is numbered copy 96 of 375 printed on deckled-edge, hand-made paper using hand-set type, with the limitation statement signed by both author and artist.

•  Publisher's cream vellum, spine with gilt-stamped title; gilt faded, not-awful patch of staining on back cover, front joint rubbed at head (only). Binding solid and overall cleaner-appearing than those points suggest. Pages clean and crisp.  (29952)

Irish Songs — American Striped Cloth Binding

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•  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)

Lalla Rookh, the Irish Melodies, & More

•  First edition of this Parisian single-volume compilation of Moore's verse, with an engraved portrait of the author done by J.T. Wedgwood after Sieurac, and a biographical and critical sketch of Thomas Moore written by J.W. Lake. The volume opens, of course, with the beloved Lalla Rookh; and, though the publishers here were the Galignanis, it is noted on the back of the half-title that “Jules Didot, Senior,” was the actual printer. Click the interior image for an enlargement.

Binding: Contemporary straight-grain black morocco, covers framed and panelled in gilt and blind, spine with gilt-stamped title and gilt-framed compartments, spine compartments blind-tooled in foliate designs, turn-ins with gilt double fillets. All edges gilt.

•  NCBEL, III, 264.   Bound as above, edges and extremities with minor rubbing, bottom spine compartment with small crack, leather (only) starting at front joint (joint itself strong). Front pastedown with early inked ownership inscription. Moderate foxing, more pronounced to first and last few leaves; two pages with offsetting from dried plant matter laid in. A lovely volume.  (24906)

An Attractive American Set in Seven Volumes

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•  “Complete in seven volumes.” Each volume has an added engraved title-page, with vignette, and the first one offersa frontispiece portrait from the painting by Opie.

A newspaper clipping of a portrait of Hannah More taken from an engraving after the painting by H. W. Pickersgill, lies loose inside first volume.

•  Contemporary half red sheep in imitation of morocco over marbled cloth-covered boards, spines with gilt-accented raised bands, gilt lettering on spines. All edges marbled. Leather rubbed and scraped with some chips on spine, joints, and edges; pp. 421–34 of vol. VI have some shallow tears and chips from being bumped, fore-edge of one leaf folded back, without affecting text. Front joint of vol. VII starting from top edge. Some foxing throughout. Clean and complete.  (21439)

Local Spiritualism? — “All Published”

•  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.

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He Wrote Beautiful Latin & He Found Protection in the Vatican

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•  First edition of Muret's classical commentaries to include the Hymni. The Variae, first published complete in 15 books in 1580, include excerpts from and explanations of both Greek and Latin texts, especially Cicero. A separate title-page introduces the Hymni (verses recited on specific holy days), followed by poems about illustrious contemporaries of Muret's — e.g., Raphael — and an index to the previous 15 books.

The French humanist Muret (1526–85) has long been recognized as the best Latin prose stylist of the Renaissance, and his works were used as a model for students. Greatly admired for his excellent understanding and interpretation of classical texts, he was dubbed “le meilleur orateur du temps” in Italy and France by Montaigne, whom he tutored; and Scaliger mused that Muret “satirised the Ciceronians and at the same time expressed himself in a thoroughly Ciceronian style.” LIke most of Muret's published work, these Variae are based on his academic lectures; however the scholar Lambinus accused Muret of plagiarism, and indeed it seems Muret “borrowed” bits from his work without permission. (In retaliation, Lambinus published their personal correspondence.)

Muret's personal life was fraught with tribulation stemming from multiple accusations of homosexuality in various cities where he resided. From 1559 till his death, however, he lived in Rome under the protection of at least one cardinal and a pope.

The text is in Latin and Greek, printed in roman and italic, with decorative headpieces and floriated initials. A letterpress diagram on p. 547 shows the Greek alphabet corresponding to numerals.

Provenance:  John Saltar (19th-century adolescent's signature, front pastedown); Henry Johns Gibbons, Rittenhouse (Philadelphia), 1923 (signature, front fly-leaf verso).

•  Adams M1971. On Muret, see: Sandys, History of Classical Scholarship, II, pp. 148–52.   Contemporary vellum with evidence of four ties and trace of oval stamp to front cover center, ink title to spine and bottom edge; soiled, with worm to spine/ pastedowns, hinges (inside) cracked, textblock starting to loosen. Paper age-toned and foxed, with small holes from natural flaws on two leaves (and two others partially uncut); Hymni dampstained in lower inner portions (not horribly). A few early ink annotations present.  (30146)

Cookery by a FamousEpicure & Cuisinier

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•  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)

“A Second Edition ofMy Mutilated Poems”

•  Second, expanded edition, following the first of the previous year, of the author’s second published book. In addition to the title piece, the volume includes “Goldau: Or the Maniac Harper,” along with a few shorter works. Neal, who went on to become a prominent voice in 19th-century American literature, describes in the preface here his distress over the first edition, which he calls “crowded and disfigured with innumerable errors — chiefly typographical, however; though in some cases, whole lines were left out . . .” Alas, this edition also required an errata leaf.

•  BAL 14856; Shaw & Shoemaker 48824; Wegelin 1066. On Neal, see: Dictionary of American Biography, XIII, 398–99. Period-style quarter tan cloth over light blue paper–covered boards, spine with printed paper label. Dedication page and a few others (not including title) stamped by a now-defunct institution. Waterstaining to upper margins and some inner page parts, with final leaves darkened and a few spotted with foxing. Some upper edges chipped; final leaf with inner margin repaired.

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Saving the Souls of the Rich viaCHARITY

•  First edition: Nelson, a philanthropist and popular religious writer, reminds the wealthy and well bred of their charitable obligations as Christians. After exhorting the rich to consider their salvation, Nelson solicits their support for such endeavors as building churches, funding the Society for the Propagation of the Gospel, maintaining poor clergy and their families, founding seminaries and schools, relieving prisoners, and establishing houses for the improvement of ladies (both proper and fallen). The appendix provides texts of various proposals as well as statistics on numbers of residents in hospitals and schools. Click the images for enlargements.

The frontispiece portrait of Nelson was engraved by George Vertue after a painting by Sir Godfrey Kneller. The volume also includes all publisher's advertisements as well as the rather uncommon Poem in Memory of Robert Nelson Esquire.

This was produced to be a handsome work, printed in large type on good paper with wide margins — the better to appeal to a “quality” audience?

•  ESTC T85360; Goldsmiths’-Kress 5249. Poem: ESTC T25431; Foxon P538.   Contemporary speckled calf, framed and panelled in blind with blind-tooled corner fleurons; rebacked with speckled calf, spine with gilt-stamped leather title-label, raised bands, and blind-tooled foliate compartment decorations. Original leather abraded, front cover with small chip to outer edge and area of faint discoloration from a now-absent label; title-page institutionally rubber-stamped (no other markings). Some signatures browned and foxed, most pages clean.  (25999)

Lovely Christian Gift Book — BEAUTIFUL Hand Coloring

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•  Third annual volume: The year's issues of the Christian Family Magazine, gathered into a collection of improving essays, short stories, poems, songs (with music), and meditations, edited and published by the Rev. Daniel Newell. The volume is illustrated with an engraved title-page and24 steel-engraved plates, including 11 hand-colored images of flowers and birds.

•  Faxon 126.   Contemporary half navy morocco and marbled paper–covered sides, spine gilt extra; lightly/moderately rubbed. Front free endpaper with early pencilled ownership inscription. Early leaves and plates with waterstaining along inner/lower portions and later leaves with scattered light spotting, regrettable but not devastating.  (27103)

Bibliophilic High Spots

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•  First edition, limited to 500 copies, of which this is numbered copy 226. The work is illustrated with examples of some of the most significant illustrations and colophons found in the LEC oeuvre; the colophon here is signed by Mortimer J. Adler, who provided the preface.

•  Publisher's blue-grey cloth, front cover with gilt-stamped title and LEC compass device, spine with gilt-stamped title. Slipcase lacking. Clean and fresh.  (30010)

Dime Novel: Secret Service

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•  Technically a nickel weekly but really a classic “detective hero” dime novel, this is no. 804 (19 June 1914) of the long-running serial thriller “Secret Service: Old and Young King Brady, Detectives.” The Bradys were a spin-off from Tousey's popular “New York Detective Library” series; early Old King Brady stories were written by Francis Worcester Doughty, with subsequent tales supplied by various in-house writers. The present issue features thecomplete title story along with chapters VII and VIII of “Drawer 99 or A detective's Six-Year Search” by Percy B. St. John, chapters IX and X of “Ventriloquist Val or The Mystery of the Dark Room” by Tom Fox, thecomplete story “The Witch in the Well,” and an assortment of jokes and odd news clips. (The ads present are their own enhancement.)

•  Publisher's color-printed paper wrappers, spine chewed and overall with soiling; back cover with tear from upper edge into text without impairment to reading. Paper age-toned; some text pages ragged at edges, again, without harm to reading.  (26935)

Dime Novel:  A Yachting Yarn

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•  Technically a nickel weekly but really a classic “detective hero” dime novel, this is no. 796 (24 April 1914) of the long-running serial thriller “Secret Service: Old and Young King Brady, Detectives.”  The Bradys were a spin-off from Tousey's popular “New York Detective Library” series; early Old King Brady stories were written by Francis Worcester Doughty, with subsequent tales supplied by various in-house writers. The present issue features thecomplete title story along with the prologue of “Drawer 99 or A detective's Six-Year Search” by Percy B. St. John, chapter III of “Ventriloquist Val or The Mystery of the Dark Room” by Tom Fox, thecomplete story “The Traitor's Doom” by Alexander Armstrong, and an assortment of jokes and odd news clips. (The ads present are their own enhancement.)

•  Publisher's color-printed paper wrappers; spine and edges chewed with overall light soiling. Paper age-toned and actually rather good/strong, of its sort.  (26936)

NOT an Ordinary Widow

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•  First edition of a lighthearted mystery-romance featuring a madcap young widow of questionable provenance and a bit of WWI espionage revolving around her ivory fan. Nicholson was an Indiana-born diplomat as well as a highly successful author, known for his bestsellers House of a Thousand Candles, The Port of Missing Men, and A Hoosier Chronicle.

Signed binding: Publisher's quarter blue cloth and light blue paper–covered sides, front cover with black-stamped title and larkspur decoration, spine with gilt-stamped title and larkspur. The design is signed “C.S.” (unidentified, but not the square letters of C.H. Simonds).

•  Binding as above, paper split at corners; spine extremities slightly rubbed. Pages faintly age-toned with occasional tiny spots of light foxing, mostly quite clean.  (28589)

ROMANTICStyle & Story — Illustration Suites in Two States

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The coloring here is VERY delicate though at the same time rich —
our photos really do not do them justice.

•  Beautiful and scarce. This is signedno. 1 of an edition of 150 on Japan paper (there were also 10 on “papier vélin” re-imposed in 4s) color printed and with watercoloring after the original by Henri Caruchet, the coloring executed under his direction by artists at the atelier of A. Charpentier et Fils. The title-page is printed in red and black, with Soeur Béatrix's face in a central medallion of blue, grey, and white.

This volume for connoisseurs offers two distinct parts: first, the text printed and all the illustrations present as fully colored, delicately washed in shades of pink, blue, purple, grey, white, and earth tones; and second, a set of the illustrations in proofs uncolored and without text. Most of the illustrations in both suites areinitialed by Caruchet.

Jean Emmanuel Charles Nodier (1780–1844) was a French author and librarian, appointed to the Bibliothèque de l'Arsenal in 1824. His literary stylemuch influenced the Romantics, including Victor Hugo and Alfred de Musset. This legend, first published in La Revue de Paris (1838), is representative of his fantastical oeuvre. It was later adapted into a French opera (Béatrice, 1914) and a film (1923).

Signed Binding: Crushed half milk chocolate morocco over marbled paper boards signed “V. Champs,” gilt author, title, and date to spine; patterned marbled endpapers (different from the covers). Original gilt and hand-colored stiff cream wrappers bound in, showing Béatrix full-figure on the front, her hands extended outward beneath the gilt title.

Provenance:  An initialed ink inscription beneath the Justification du tirage states this copy was “Offert à Madame Conquet” — who must have been related toM.L. Conquet, “the great Paris publisher of works of the romantic school,” whose publications were famous for being very limited editions and for the “high artistic quality of their illustrations” (“Books and Authors,” The New York Times, 26 March 1898).

•  Carteret, V, 141; Vicaire, VI, 179.   Binding as above. One small nick on the front leather near the spine, and board extremities (paper and leather) lightly rubbed. The publisher's authentication embossed stamp below the limitation statement. Text clean, unblemished. Simply, excellent.  (30135)

The FIRST Press in Guatemala Memorializesuna Gran Fiesta

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•  On 14 August 1670 Pope Clement X confirmed the canonization of Mercedarian Pedro Pascual de Valencia (1227–1300) and a papal bull to the effect was issued. Its arrival in Guatemala was cause for the Mercedarians to plan and carry out a multi-day celebration that included the writing of poetry, the composing and singing of at least one villancico, the writing and performance of a short play, and other literary and religious events including sermons and special masses. All are described or transcribed here.

Guatemala was the fourth Latin American city to have a printing press (after Mexico, Lima, and Puebla de los Angeles); the press was brought at the instigation of the bishop of Guatemala, Payo Enríquez de Ribera, who wished to have a work of his own published. In reply to the bishop's appeal for a printer, it wasJosé Pineda Ibarra who arrived at Antigua in 1660. He had worked as an assistant to several printers in Mexico, but according to Medina did not have his own press; when Payo de Ribera's representative found him, he had moved to Puebla but was apparently not doing well there. (Medina does not list him as a printer in Puebla — presumably he was again working for others.) The bishop apparently paid for the press that was taken to Guatemala, and Pineda Ibarra later purchased it from him. Torre Revello (quoted in Furlong) remarks that despite the dearth of materials available to him in his new place of settlement, Pineda Ibarra managed to print exceedingly well: “Ningún tipógrafo de los que le sucedieron, durante el periodo colonial, logró superar la pulchritud y elegancia de sus trabajos.”

The various religious orders in Guatemala had promised to make it worth the while of a printer to come, by giving him commissions. Judging from the list of over 30 works Pineda Ibarra printed before 1674 — eulogies, sermons, constitutions, regulations, descriptions of religious festivities — the orders fulfilled their promise; his major productions, however, were Bishop de Ribera's Explicatio apologetica nonnullarum propositionum . . . , 1663, and Diego Saenz Ovecuri's La Thomasiada, 1667. Also a bookseller and binder, Pineda Ibarra died in 1679 and was succeeded in 1681 by his son, Antonio de Pineda Ibarra, under whom the press operated until 1721.

All 17th-century imprints from Guatemala are extremely rare: Searches of WorldCat, NUC Pre-1956, Catálogo Colectivo del Patrimonio Bibliográfico, COPAC, and MetaBase fail to locate any copies of this one anywhere. We do know, however, of one copy in the Guatemalan national library itself.

Provenance: Marca de fuego on the upper edges of the text block of a Mercedarian convent. The marca does not matches those known to have been used in Mexico, leading one to believe this copy belonged to the Mercedarian convent in Guatemala.

•  Medina, Guatemala, 38. Contemporary limp vellum with remnants of ties; without the final blank leaf (only). A very nice copy of a very scarce early Guatemalan book.  (29425)

Venetian History — Unique Medieval Revival Binding

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•  First published in 1887, this evocative study of medieval and Renaissance Venetian history comes from a Scottish-born novelist and historical writer who also published similarly titled works on Florence, Rome, and Jerusalem. Here it appears in a remarkable hand-painted, medieval-inspired binding with raised and gilt details.

Binding:  Striking medieval-style vellum, front cover with inset chromolithographic illustration in jewel tones in raised, stamped and gilt frame; hand-painted foliate decorations in pink, green, blue, and yellow with stamped and gilt “studs” laid on, artfully scattered. Calligraphic title incorporating onlaid raised decorative capitals; spine with painted foliate decoration; back cover with fully-filling reverse-painted griffin in blue-green and gilt. Studs and other raised elements appear to be clay or ceramic; upper edges gilt and gauffered.

•  Binding as above, moderately dust-soiled and darkened, ties now lacking; gilt elements, front cover inset, and some paint a bit rubbed, with a few studs chipped and three absent — none of this much diminishing the effect. Frontispiece recto with early inked gift inscription. Pages age-toned with a very few light smudges; almost, entirely clean. A pretty and remarkable binding, very appropriate for this romantic history.  (30306)

Die Religion desZoroaster

•  Contains the Persian text of Daulat Shah Alai Samarkandi and the translation of the texts as edited by Justus Olshausen and Julius Mohl. An important text on the lasting influence of Zoroaster and with the life of the great poet Ferdusi (i.e., f Abu-'l Kasim Mansur). Click either image for an enlargement.

•  19th-century German boards covered with black mottled paper; abraded. Paper author/title label on spine, call number label on front cover. Ex-library with bookplate on front pastedown and call number in pencil on verso of title-page. No other markings. (19137)

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The ANCIENT ART ofFISHING

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•  Oppian (fl. ca. A.D. 225) lived in Cilicia, in southeast Asia Minor. He wrote this work in five books on fishing in Greek hexameter, and another work, on hunting, is sometimes also attributed to him. William Diaper (d. 1717) prepared this translation, in English verse, and it was taken to the publisher by John Jones, who dedicated it to the Marquis of Carnarvon. The press's engraved vignette depicting the Sheldonian Theatre appears on the title-page in a nice example; the “Catalogue of Fishes Mention'd in Oppian” is present; a list of subscribers, with a fair representation of the Oxford colleges, is appended.

•  ESTC T139002; Schweiger, Handbuch der classischen Bibliographie, I, 217; not in Dibdin. On Oppian, see: Oxford Companion to Classical Literature, 395.   Recent quarter calf over marbled paper; spine gilt with a red leather title label. A brittle copy and some pages and gatherings now pulled loose. A little soiling in some top margins, and a few occasions of spotting. A few spots of very shallow chipping. Rubber-stamps from a now-defunct library, including one on title-page. All edges speckled red.  (3011)

Poëmata Embellished withLovely Engravings

•  Sole edition of these neo-Latin poems, written by the brother of noted classical scholar Jacques Philippe d'Orville. The volume is illustrated with a mythic-themed, copper-engraved added title-page and head- and tailpiece vignettes done by A. vander Laan. All the engravings are gorgeous, and some extend almost to a half page in size. The main title-page is printed in black and red.

Most of the poetry here is “occasional” — there are several epithalamia as well as elegies and odes honoring various “noble youths” and such figures as Pieter Burmann, Hadrian Reland, and the author's brother Jacque Philippe. Some works celebrate (and are in the styles of) the great ancient Latin poets; at least one, and the longest, is explicitly (Christian) religious; two are in Greek.

Uncommon.  OCLC and NUC Pre-1956 find only four U.S. holdings.

•  Brunet 13064.   Contemporary vellum, covers framed and panelled in blind with blind-tooled central lozenge, spine with hand-inked title; front cover slightly warped, binding dust-soiled. Front pastedown institutionally rubber-stamped. Scattered spots of light to moderate foxing. Errata (final page) lined through in ink.  (24490)

Young Ezra Saves the Day — Based on a True Story

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•  Second edition, following the first of 1895: A 14-year-old boy heroically protects his murdered master's four-year-old daughter from marauding Indians in this tale from Otis's “Stories of American History” series. The volume is illustrated with a frontispiece, eight steel-engraved plates, and additional in-text vignettes by Lewis Jesse Bridgman.

Binding:  Publisher's light green cloth, front cover stamped with wreath and star design in dark green, red, and gilt, spine with green-stamped title.

•  Sternick, Children's Series Books, 920.   Binding as above, spine and board edges sunned. Front fly-leaf with inked inscription: “Bought with money Sarah sent me Christmas 1898.” Sewing starting to loosen in some signatures. Page edges slightly age-toned, otherwise clean.  (28920)

Well-Edited & Well-Produced

•  Edited by Montague Summers. Limited to 1340 sets, this one of 1250 on machine-made paper.

•  McKitterick/Rendall/Dreyfus 38. Quarter light brown publisher's buckram with cream Ingres paper sides. Cream paper label at top of spine. All edges untrimmed. Light dustsoiling. Bookplate on front pastedown of each volume. A rather nice set.

For an unillustrated PDF list of 200+ separately published
18TH- & 19TH-CENTURY BRITISH PLAYS,
more OTWAY included — click here.

Ovid's “Art of Love” in GERMAN — Limited Edition with Slevogt's Embellishments

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•  Attractive edition of the Ars Amatoria translated into German by Ernst Hohenemser. The title-page and the charming, individual, and in a few cases mildly erotic head- and tail-pieces were lithographed by Max Slevogt, a notable member of the Berlin Secession. Publisher Cassirer was an art dealer and editor who actively promoted and supported artists of the Secession and the French Impressionist School.

This is numbered copy 201 of 320 printed, of the eighteenth work to come from Cassirer's Pan-Presse. The Lehrbuch is not widely institutionally held in the U.S.; WorldCat findsonly three American locations.

•  Publisher's half cream pigskin and light grey/tan cloth, rich eggplant endpapers, front cover with gilt-stamped vignette and spine with gilt-stamped title; binding showing only very minor wear overall, upper edge of front cover with area of faint staining. A clean and attractive copy.  (28154)

Conducting aClassical Love Affair

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•  Ovid's famous Ars Amatoria, here translated by B.P. Moore and illustrated in Roman-inspired fashion by Eric Fraser with 10 full-page and numerous in-text pen-and-ink drawings (which do feature fetching maidens and muscular males but are generally fairly innocuous). The volume was designed by Robert L. Dothard, printed by A. Colish in Poliphilus and Blado italics on mould-made Arches paper, and bound by Tapley-Rutter in full vellum with a gilt-stamped cherub vignette.

This is numbered copy 972 of 1500 printed.

•  Bibliography of the Fine Books Published by the Limited Editions Club, 440.   Binding as above, in publisher's glassine dust jacket and original metallic slipcase; volume all but pristine, jacket with a few tiny nicks but an unusually nice example of these impermanent wrappers, case with corners very slightly rubbed. A clean, fresh copy; frankly, one wants to dare say, “could not be better.”  (30130)

“Nothing ButINDEPENDENCE . . . Can Keep the Peace of the Continent”

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•  Uncut copy with original stitching of what was “the most incendiary and popular pamphlet of the entire revolutionary era” (Gordon Wood, American Revolution, p. 55). Popularity of the work can roughly be gauged by the fact that at least 25 editions were printed in the first year

Two editions were printed at Norwich, Connecticut, by Spooner and Green: one extending to 56 pp. and the other, offered here, to 64 pp. This edition is by far the scarcer: It wasunknown to Evans and only seven U.S. libraries report owning a copy.

Provenance:  Contemporary ownership signature at top of title-page: “J. Store's [book].”

•  Not in Evans. Bristol 4313; Shipton & Mooney 43119; Trumbull, Connecticut, 1214; Johnson, New London, 1047; Adams, American Independence, 222r; Grolier, American One Hundred, 14 (for first edition). This edition not in Sabin or Howes.   Uncut and stitched as issued. Title-page age-toned, lightly soiled and lightly abraded. Lower margin of pp. 29–30 torn with loss of three words on 29 and four on 30; supplied for reading sense. Housed in quarter red morocco clamshell case, spine nicely gilt, with an inner paper chemise protecting the pamphlet.  (29365)

Third Lessons in ReadingALOUD, Illustrated

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•  Revised edition of this reader: Short pieces to be read aloud, with notes regarding proper pronunciation, accents, and expression — the whole providing a nice overview of contemporary literature considered appropriate for juveniles, emphasizing PERFORMANCE.

The poems, stories, and Christian meditations are illustrated with a number of in-text wood engravings, including an image of Marion's Men and one of the two Native American “Children in Exile” of J.T. Fields's poem; the front cover scene of a young boy declaiming to his mother and sister was engraved by John Karst after George White.

Provenance:  Front free endpaper with ownership inscription of a Miss Brewer inked twice, once faintly as Harriet and once a little more darkly as Hattie (dated 1870); title-page same name in upper margin (very faint) and front cover with very very faint fourth signature.

•  Publisher's quarter sheep and printed paper–covered sides, spine with gilt-stamped title and embossed stars within circles, all edges marbled (now faded); spine head chipped, corners bumped, general rubbing and paper darkened. Ownership indicia as above; early hand-coloring to title, probably Hattie's. Intermittent mild to moderate foxing.  (28421)

The Provincial Letters

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•  Pascal's pseudonymously published Provinciales, an elegantly composed, widely read defense of Antoine Arnauld and of Jansenism against Jesuit opponents. First printed in 1657, the work appears here along with the notes by Guillaume Wendrock (a.k.a. Pierre Nicole), translated from Latin into French.

The first three volumes were printed in Amsterdam in 1734, and each opens with an engraved frontispiece; the fourth volume was printed in Cologne in 1739. All four volumes have title-pages printed in red and black, with the fourth specifying that Nicole's notes were translated by Mademoiselle de Joncourt.

Provenance:  All four title-pages with small early inked ownership inscription in upper outer corner of “A. Thorpe, York.”

•  Period-style quarter mottled calf and marbled paper–covered sides, spines with gilt-stamped leather title and volume labels and gilt-stamped compartment decorations. Vols. I and II with frontispiece rectos institutionally rubber-stamped, with bleed-through into images; ownership inscriptions as above. Pages clean.  (27243)

Dulac Illustrations

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•  Pater's retelling of the tale from Apuleius's Golden Ass, printed in the Trajanus type designed by Warren Chappell and here set by hand, illustrated with Edmund Dulac's watercolors, in a binding done by Frank Fortney. The appropriate “Sandglass” Heritage Club newsletter is laid in.

•  Publisher's red buckram, front cover and spine with gilt-stamped title, in publisher's metallic paper–covered slipcase; volume clean and fresh, slipcase showing shelfwear. An attractive copy.  (29938)

Marrying for MoneyNEVER Ends Well

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•  Greed destroys the lives and dreams of a cast of young members of  “the best families,” the nouveau riche, and the would-be rich; part of the action is set at the Yale Promenade. This is an early printing of the first edition, illustrated with a total of six plates: a color-printed frontispiece from a painting by Hazel Martyn Trudeau and five black-and-white illustrations from paintings by Walter Dean Goldbeck.

Binding:  Publisher's blue cloth, front cover pictorially stamped in cream, black, and gilt, spine stamped in cream and black.

•  Binding as above, minor rubbing to extremities, a few spine letters with tiny spots of rubbing. One leaf with lower outer corner torn away. Clean and fresh.  (28606)

Romance in the Wilds ofKentucky

•  First edition of this best-selling novel set on the Kentucky frontier. Among the characters are an uprooted Virginia family and their slaves, a lone Native American hunter, a would-be newspaperman, and a young man susceptible to madness. Click the images for enlargements.

Part of the “Harper's library of select novels” series, the work appears here with vol. I in the second printing (vol. II had only one printing); the binding is BAL's state A, with the front cover of vol. II incorrectly marked “No. XXV.”

•  American Imprints 14120; Wright, I, 2024; BAL 15715.   Publisher's green cloth, covers and spines stamped in black; corners bumped, spots of discoloration, spines sunned (and a little bubbled) with extremities rubbed. Ex–social club library: 19th-century bookplate and call number on endpapers, title-pages pressure-stamped. No other markings; endpapers foxed and pages with intermittent moderate spotting.  (26533)

“Corrected” & AnnotatedPEPYS

Pepys, Samuel.

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•  Pepys’s perennially fascinating shorthand journal in its first longhand transcription, done by John A. Smith, later the rector of Baldock but an undergraduate student at St. John’s College at the time of the work. This appears to be the first Philadelphia printing of the diaries, here in an abridged form edited for decency, although there were earlier American editions and a limited deluxe edition was printed in Philadelphia in the same year. The four-volume work is illustrated with two portraits, one of the author and one of his wife, engraved by J.W. Steel.

•  NCBEL, II, 1583 (for the 1854 ed. on which the present ed. was based). Publisher’s textured cloth, worn, covers framed in decorative blind-stamping, spines ruled in blind and simply gilt-stamped with titles and volume numbers; spines faded, slightly discolored, all pulled with cloth lost above page level and one with additional chip out of cloth near head. Front pastedowns with tickets from a Nashville bookseller. Many pages with light offsetting (darker following frontispieces) and foxing such as the paper is prone to; front free endpaper of vol. IV with pencilled ownership inscription and back fly-leaf of vol. II with pencilled annotations. (4737)

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    “General Reading” & Inexpensive,  click here.

Covers with Embossed,Chromolithographic Paper Onlays
An Added Engraved Title-PagePrinted Partly in Purple

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•  Eighth in the popular “Garland” series of American gift books. Although Faxon claims that the plates were omitted from this retitled version of 1854's “Amaranth,” the present copy is decorated with a frontispiece and four plates, engraved by W. Drummond after W. Warner, O. Pelton after E.C. Wood, E. Finden after W. Maddox, Sartain after Guet, and McRae. It also has an extra engraved title-page that is printed all in purple except for the charming vignette, which is in black.

Binding:  Publisher's red leather, covers embossed in blind and stamped in gilt, each cover with a different embossed and chromolithographed floral illustration affixed (bouquet to front and wreath to back; spine gilt extra. All edges gilt.

•  Faxon 259.   Binding as above, spine slightly darkened with small repaired tear to cloth and volume refurbished; joints skillfully and unobtrusively repaired with toned tissue, spine lining and endbands readhered to text block, leather consolidated and carefully toned. Front free endpaper with owner's inscription dated 1869. A few spots of foxing, mostly in proximity to plates. A lovely and entertaining gift book bound in particularly splendid (and somewhat unusual) fashion.  (12931)

Mystic or Pragmatic Wife?

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•  First edition: Acclaimed play from a prominent Spanish realist author, addressing issues of class, materialism, and feminism.

•  Palau 220783.   Contemporary quarter maroon sheep and red pebbled paper–covered sides, spine with gilt-stamped title and compartment decorations; spine attractively darkened, edges and extremities rubbed, sides with spots of discoloration. Front free endpaper with private shelf-code sticker; title-page with private collector's rubber-stamp. Pages age-toned, with some scattered small smudges or spots of light staining.  (29936)

Four ClassicSpanish Novelas Neatly Bound

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•  First edition of this collection of four works by a prominent Spanish realist author.

•  Palau 220773.   Contemporary mottled calf with gilt-stamped red leather title-label; minor wear to edges and extremities. Half-title rubber-stamped, no other markings. Pages age-toned with a few scattered instances of faint spotting or smudging.  (29867)

A Historical Novel ofGrand Sweep

•  “Nueva Impression, corregida. de muchas faltas y erratas” of this classic late 16th-century historical novel, originally published (1595) under the title Historia de los vandos de los zegries y abencerrages. The Oxford Companion to Spanish Literature says of it that it is “a remarkable work of fiction on a basis of history but interspersed with frontier and Moorish ballads already circulating out of context.” A second part that was published more than two decades later (1619) is universally characterized as a disappointment; this edition prints the favored part I only, i.e., from the origins of the kingdom through the entrance of the Catholic Kings into the city.

The marginal notes here are printed in French!

•  Palau 221179; Peeters-Fontainas 1056; Gallardo 3449; Oxford Companion to Spanish Literature 457. 19th-century calf, old style. Scuffed and abraded. Front free endpapers starting to loosen and with a few tears in margins. Text clean and tight.

This also appears in the HISPANIC
                      MISCELLANY — click here.

Tributes to Lope de Vega by“Those Who Mattered”

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•  First edition of a tribute volume created on the occasion of the death of Lope de Vega with contributions frommore than 150 of his contemporary writers, both male and female. Sonnets, epigrams, extended poems, decimas, elegies in Spanish are joined by a sprinkling of pieces in Latin and Italian. Pérez de Montalván was a disciple of Lope's and knew just about everyone who was anyone in the Spanish literary circles of the first third of the 17th century, meaning the writers here are to be reckoned with. There is even a sonnet by Antonio Enríquez Gómez , the Sepharic crypto-Jew.

This is Pérez de Montalván's last publication: He suffered a mental breakdown just about when the book was published and died in 1638.

Provenance:  Bookplate of the eminent 19th-century collector Antonio Canovas del Castillo.

•  Palau 221664; Grease, IV, 582.   Late 19th-century quarter black morocco, round spine, raised bands, gilt tooling on spine; green textured paper over boards, marbled endpapers. Paper age-toned, some old water- and inkstains, some foxing. Underlining in sections in pencil (recent) and ink (old); occasional marginalia (including pointing fingers and old “brackets of emphasis”). A nice, satisfying old book.  (28540)

Sleeping Beauty & a Bear to Boot

•  Title woodcut vignette of a girl holding a bird in a cage out of reach of a cat, & a tail-piece. A version of Perrault's "La belle au bois dormant". The story is followed by"The Moral" in verse and by the story of "Paddy and the Bear", pp. 21-24. Very scarce edition. We were unable to locate another copy. No. "52" at foot of title.

•  Very good. Original self wrappers (unbound; removed). (17581)

The Father ofRenaissance Humanism

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•  Famous as he is for his sonnets and influence on the development of the Italian language, to understand best why Petrarch (1304–74) is often labelled the father of Renaissance humanism, one must read and know his correspondence, his epistolarum. In this edition they are, as stated on the title-page, “Opus non paucis mendis repurgatum & multis epistolis auctum ex vetusto codice bibliotecae I. Chalasii I. C. quae ut à caeteris dignosci possint ex Epistola ad lectorem praefixa intelligetur.”

The reference to “multis epistolis auctum ex vetusto codice bibliotecae I. Chalasii I. C.” refers to the 65 letters found in the library of Johannes Chalasius, of Nîmes, andpublished here for the first time.

The volume is in roman type and has the Crispinus printer's device on the title-page, woodcut initials, and headpieces. This is one of several issues of an edition differing only in the imprint and in slight variations of paging.

•  Horti 364–5; Catalogue of the Petrarch Collection in the Cornell University Library 34; Graesse, V, 236 (“C'est l'édition la plus complète des Epitres de Petrarca.; il y a 65 lettres de plus que dans la prem. édition”).   18th-century half “white” calf, gilt spine, raised bands; boards covered with red and white combed paper. Edges rubbed; two spine compartments lighter than others. Old institutional bookplate (no other markings); 19th-century pencilling and pen notes on front free endpaper. A clean and nice copy.  (24431)

SATYRICON with Loads of Commentary

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•  One of the most famous satires of all time, here in the expanded revision of Pieter Burman’s edition, with the much-debated corrections by Johann Jacob Reiske — with which the editor’s son, Caspar Burman, was most displeased. Brunet calls the 1743 edition “beaucoup plus complète que la précédente [of 1709], et celle qu'on recherche le plus;” Dibdin confirms that this second edition is preferred by collectors and “the curious” over the first. The neoclassical frontispiece was engraved by J.C. Philips.

•  Brunet, IV, 575; Dibdin, II, 276–77; Schweiger, II, 725. 19th-century quarter sheep in imitation of morocco, with marbled paper–covered sides, spines with gilt-stamped titles; spines, edges, and extremities rubbed, vol. I with spot of discoloration to spine. Main title-page with shadows of pencilled numerals. Pages clean.

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INSCRIBED

•  First edition of a projected two volume work, of which volume two never appeared. This volume is dedicated to Mexican poets.

Inscribed copy from the author to the president of the Societe Americaine de France (the predecessor to the International Congress of the Americanists), and dated Mexico, Feb. 1888.

•  Uncut, unopened copy in later wrappers (which are tattered). Text block split in two: requires binding. Edges dog-eared, some dust-soiling.  (21470)

PhiladelphiaPoets, Playwrights, & Publishers BEWARE

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•  A well-done poetic skewering of prominent literary Philadelphians (poets, playwrights, journalists, periodical editors and publishers) of the mid–19th century as well as fulmination on some practices and events. Uncommon, as one would expect, asprivately printed.

•  Sabin 62915.   Publisher's plain dark gray boards, front cover with “Parnass” etched in an early hand; rubbed overall with front joint carefully repaired, spine and edges subtly restored with toned repair tissue. Ex-library, spine with remnants of paper shelving label, front pastedown with faint traces of now-absent bookplate, pencilled annotation along inner margin of first text page. Front pastedown with early pencilled note regarding contents. Light foxing, a bit of soiling.  (24837)

“Pindaric” Satire . . .

•  Wolcot lets George III in for it, first taking a moment to decry his own reputation for devilish unkindness—totally undeserved, according to him, as witnessed by the subsequent four laughably saccharine imitations of contemporary verse. Having gotten that out of the way, he recounts humorous tales of the monarch's poor judgment, dim sensibilities, and parsimony, before directing a final blow at a hypocritical parson.

This second edition was printed in the same year as the first; although the title-page mentions "an engraving by an eminent artist," no illustration is present in this copy.

•  ESTC T7920; NCBEL, II, 695. Recently rebound in marbled paper–covered boards, spine with gilt-stamped title label. Lacking engraving. A half-title (possibly not that belonging to this piece) has, at some point in the past, been cut in thirds and used to back/repair the title-page (to good effect, actually), leaf 45–46, and leaf 47–48 (text on p. 48, a list of "Pindar's" productions partially obscured by repair; the work itself, fine). One page (not the title) has been stamped by a now-defunct library; several leaves with tears, some repaired.

For ENGLISH POLITICS,  click here.

Coveted Editio Romana ofPindar's Epinician Odes

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•  The Editio Romana of Pindar’s famous praises of victorious Panhellenic athletes, beingthe first edition of the text with the scholia and the first Greek book printed at Rome. Three of the four odes are considered more accurate in this edition than in the Aldine editio princeps (1513, based on a different family of manuscripts).

This was printed by the talented Greek expatriate Zacharias Kallierges, who had earned his reputation as one of the best printers of Greek at Venice in the incunable period, at the palace press of Sienese banker Agostino Chigi (1466–1520), whose financial ties to the papacy made him the wealthiest manolv in Rome and a prominent patron of the arts. In this great endeavor — there is evidence the edition comprised approximately 1,000 copies, existing in multiple permutations since part of the text wasreset, probably twice! (see Fogelmark) — he was assisted by his sometime partner and backer Cornelius Benignus, a humanist and Chigi's secretary. The nicely laid out title-page bearsthe devices of both Benignus and Kallierges, whose mark appears again on the verso of the final leaf.

Save just one instance of Latin, the “Impressi” printed in roman on the title-page, the entire volume is in Greek elegantly printed in black with some red, including on one leaf several capitals floating in the margin just outside the justified text. A few large floriated initials — two red, introducing the Olympia and the Pythia — and a handful of interesting small ornaments decorate the headings of major sections. The copious scholia, also printed in Greek, engulf the text, typically filling at least seventy-five percent of each page with notes on the subject, syntax, and even scansion of Pindar's poetry.

Chigi's good friend the Pope granted the right to print this work exclusively to Kallierges for five years.

Provenance:  Willm. Markham (his bookplate, front pastedown, covering another); Ed. Jameson (inscription above title).

Marks of readership: A partially legible early ink scrawl in Italian below the title and a one-line note faded to illegibility on another leaf; one missigned leaf corrected in manuscript; sparse underlining and annotations in brown and red ink; and, on eight leaves ruled for notes bound in at end, entries (one or several) in an early hand to most columns.

•  Adams P1221; Brunet, IV, 658; Dibdin, II, 286 (“scarcer and dearer than the preceding [edition]”); Graesse, V, 293–94; Sandys, II, 80 & [107]; Schweiger, I, 234; S. Fogelmark, “The 1515 Kallierges Pindar: A First Report” in [Greek title]. Studies in Honour of Jan Fredrik Kindstrand. Acta Universitatis Upsaliensis. Studia Graeca Upsaliensia 21, VIII, pp. 37–48, and his forthcoming monograph.   18th-century brown calf, covers bordered with gilt triple fillets and an interior roll alternating a flower and a dotted arch; marbled endpapers and all edges red. Board extremities bumped/scuffed and volume rebacked with gilt morocco spine labels (original leather discolored where laid over the new material); hinges (inside) subtly repaired with similar marbled paper. Intermittent foxing and generally light old waterstaining, the latter chiefly to lower margins or across corners but occasionally ranging upwards or across text; fore-edges of ff. 231 affected, with final leaf significantly stained and extensively repaired/reinforced without loss to text or to printer's device on the verso. A masterpiece of Renaissance printing, on thick paper.  (29671)

Pindar ON THE OLYMPICSin English

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•  First edition: Pindar's famous tributes to the classical Panhellenic festivals, of which at the time of this work's appearance “not one fourth . . . have ever appeared in English” (according to the title-page). The Rev. Francis Lee, chaplain in ordinary to the Prince of Wales, here takes on the avowedly challenging task of rendering the entire body of the victory odes into English; his efforts are accompanied by West's dissertation on the history and nature of the Olympic Games, first published in 1749, and West's previous translations of some of the odes. The volume opens with an engraving of a classical bust of the poet,and is additionally illustrated with a plan of Olympia in Elis, both from drawings by Lee himself.

Provenance:  Front pastedown with armorial bookplate of Edward Everett, renowned American statesman and orator, Governor of Massachusetts (1836–39), President of Harvard University (1846–49), and Secretary of State under Millard Fillmore.

•  Lowndes 1869; NSTC L976; Schweiger, I, 238. Not in Dibdin.   Mid-20th-century half brown morocco and light green cloth, spine with gilt-stamped title, compartments with gilt-stamped floral and foliate decorations; spine gently sunned, extremities slightly rubbed. Top edge gilt. Front pastedown with bookplate as above, front free endpaper with inked inscription of Douglas F. Bauer, dated 1970. Front hinge (inside) unobtrusively reinforced with long-fiber tissue. Text with scattered light foxing, frontispiece and map affected more heavily; a few other spots only. Handsome and interesting.  (29763)

FirstEnglish-Printed Edition of Pindar's Works — “Beautiful & Celebrated”

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•  First edition printed in England of Pindar's famed epinician odes praising athletes victorious in Panhellenic contests and other illustrious men, being a handsomeOxford folio offering parallel columns of Greek and Latin with paraphrasis, notes, and extensive scholia often occupying half a page below. Editors Richard West (1671–1716) and Robert Welsted (1671–1735), both fellows at Magdalen College, combined the text and Latin translation of Erasmus Schmid (Wittenberg, 1616), commentary by Jean Benoit (Saumur ed., 1620) and Sudorium (Nicolas Le Sueur, ca. 1545–94), andthe text of five manuscripts in the Bodleian Library, with an argumentum opening each ode (accented by a handful of large block initials), a Life of Pindar following the preface, and intriguing dedications and obits for the Bourbons appearing at the back before the errata.

The quoted matter in our caption is from Dibdin, who further says, “The editors of this magnificent work have taken infinite pains to bring together every thing which could illustrate and improve the reading of the poet; and . . . their edition will long remain a splendid monument of classical research and typographical beauty.”

The frontispiece and title-page here producea “spread” of Oxford’s most pompously engaging sort, the former bearing an engraved portrait of Pindar flanked by Mercury and Apollo with a winged herald bouncing by on a cloud overhead, signed M. Burghers, and the title-page featuring one of the largest and most elaborate of the press’s self-referring allegorical vignettes, a helmed Minerva surrounded by her insignia with an extensive architectural panorama of the city behind her, signed MB

Provenance:  Douglas F. Bauer (his signature, Easter 1968, on the front flyleaf, and gilt initials on the lower spine); early ink owner's mark above the imprimatur on f. [a]2v.

•  Brunet, IV, 659; Dibdin, II, 289; ESTC R20960; Graesse, V, 295; Schweiger, I, 236; Wing (rev. ed.) P2245; Brüggemann, A View of the English Editions, I, 78–79.   Modern brown cloth over boards with a gilt leather title piece and gilt lower spine (as above). Moderate foxing, age-toning, and/or soiling, variously; later quires and indices notably browned, a couple of corners torn away and one tiny interlinear hole, a very short and slim track of minor wormwork in one section, and a few natural paper flaws. A substantial, satisfying volume.  (29710)

Portable Pindar from the Glasgow Editions of the Greek Classics

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•  One of Foulis's Editiones minimae, this being a dainty miniature printing of selected odes from Pindar's famous tributes to the classical Panhellenic festivals: Olympia, Pythia, Isthmia, and Nemea.

Provenance:  Each front fly-leaf with early inked inscription of Henry Moore, Worcester College, Oxford; front pastedowns with bookplate of H.M., presumably also Moore.

Binding:  Publisher's mottled crimson calf, covers framed in gilt beaded roll, spines with gilt-stamped title and compartment decorations, board edges with gilt roll.

•  ESTC T134377; Brunet, IV, 660; Dibden, II, 290; Gaskell 274; Schweiger, I, 236.   Bindings as above, edges and extremities rubbed, spine leather darkened and showing small cracks. Vol. I with occasional instances of early inked marginalia in Greek. Vol. II with paper flaw to one leaf that has torn slightly, affecting about three letters. Pages gently age-toned with a very few scattered light spots, otherwise clean. A nicely printed text in a pleasing small format.  (30208)

FIRST English Translation ofPlato's Complete Works

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•  First edition of Plato's complete works in English, partially translated by Floyer Sydenham (1710–87), revised and completed by Thomas Taylor (1758–1835), who published the impressive five-volume set at the expense of Charles Howard, Duke of Norfolk, dedicating the work to him. This isthe set that informed the Romantics of Platonism.  In America, Taylor's translation was studied by Ralph Waldo Emerson and the Transcendentalists, including Thomas Wentworth Higginson, who through it probablyintroduced Emily Dickinson to Platonism.

Elegantly printed with wide margins, this is dotted with references to the original works in Greek, which Taylor studied with the aid of ancient commentaries; thorough footnotes clarify foggy passages and explain editorial decisions, often referring to ancient sources. A helpful “Explanation of Certain Platonic Terms” (in English, next to the original Greek) follows the general introduction in vol. I, before the translated Life of Plato by Olympiodorus.

Provenance:  Front pastedowns with one of the 19th-century bookplates of the German Society in Philadelphia.

Evidence of readership: On two pages in vol. IV, ink annotations supply the original Greek and correct the translation.

•  Schweiger, I, 250; Lowndes 1877; Brunet, IV, 698; Graesse, V, 322–23; On Taylor, see: Oxford Dictionary of National Biography online.   Recent period-style quarter speckled calf over red marbled boards, spines gilt-ruled and with gilt title and volume numbers on red and black morocco labels; place and date gilt-stamped collector-style at spine bases, red speckled edges. Early library markings in ink on front fly-leaves. Offsetting from original binding to endpapers in all volumes and in vol. I from plate onto contents. All volumes with occasional thumbsoiling, sparse mild mildew stains, a few tiny spots from chemical reactions in the paper affecting a handful of words, and occasional ink smudges; there are a natural flaw or two, a couple of marginal tears, light dust stains, and faint browning. Despite its handful of typical blemishes, this five-volume set is handsome and magisterial.  (30052)

Dramatic Romance & Comic Opera — With Hot Air Balloons

Each:   $450.00

Bifolia. [2] ff.
Each:   $1000.00

•  Featured plays include Romeo and Juliet, Douglas, The West Indian, and "a new comic opera" called Robin Hood; or, Sherwood Forest. Secondary attractions range from dances to minor dramatic works to pantomimes, with sheets for consecutive evenings showing how a main attraction might be paired with a comedy one night and a musical entertainment the next.

Charming 19th-century playbills are not, even today, terribly hard to come by. But 18th-century playbills ARE very uncommon on today's market — and unseparated bifolia are even more so.

To view the PLAYBILLS,  click here.

He’s Back! — Occasional Poetry “del pueblo”
 An Ephemerum of 1814

•  An anonymous patriotic poem/song (without music), printed in double-column format, celebrating the return of Ferdinand VII to the throne of Spain. An interesting and rare example of this sort of Spanish poetry. 

Not in NUC Pre-1956, WorldCat, or Catálogo Colectivo del Patrimonio Bibliográfico Español.

•  Not in Palau. Modern marbled boards with cordovan-colored gilt morocco title-label on front cover. A very good copy.

ALoving & Respectful Production

•  Time in its course has not been kind to Pollok’s reputation, but among his contemporaries his name enjoyed a triple fame due to his sublime preaching, best-selling poetry, and untimely, tragic death from consumption. Inspired by its author's reading of Byron’s "Darkness," the Course of Time examines in ten books the destiny of mankind, and in the words of the Dictionary of National Biography, "tends to prolixity and discursiveness, but is relieved by passages of sustained brilliancy."

The present volume is a late edition among numerous English, Scottish, and American printings of the poem but apparently the first of this restored and annotated text, although someone has provided misleading copyright information—both Stevens of Cincinnati and Andrus & Son of Hartford are on record as claiming to have copyrighted the text in 1846.

Binding: Contemporary brown morocco bordered in triple gilt fillets, with gilt foliate and arabesque motifs to covers; spine gilt extra with title, author, and floral motifs. Beautiful gilt inner dentelles.

•  On Pollok, see: Dictionary of National Biography, XLVI, 69–70. Binding as above, corners and joints rubbed with light edge wear; spine leather and irregular areas of covers faded. Gilt bright. Original green silk bookmark separated but laid in. Pages pleasingly white save for a very few spots and one area where a poetry clipping was laid in. Neatly pencilled ownership inscriptions dated 1848 to front pastedown and title-page. Lovely, if somewhat worn, copy of this once-beloved poem.

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FirstU.S. Edition, First Issue

•  First U.S. edition, first issue of a classic account of the clash of empires in Peru and the destruction of that of the Inca. Prescott’s follow-up to his well received History of the Conquest of Mexico appears here in BAL’s state B, without printer’s imprint on verso of title-leaf of vol. I (with no precedence established).

•  BAL 16346; Gardner P-7; Sabin 65272. Publisher’s blind-stamped cloth, spines with gilt-stamped titles; sunned and with small spots of discoloration, spines each showing traces of a now-absent shelving label. Front pastedowns each with private collector’s bookplate, institutional rubber-stamp, and speckled show-through of binder’s glue. Light to moderate foxing throughout.

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THACKERAY Admired These “Most Charmingly Humorous
of English Lyrical Poems” —
   Some Fellow-ADMIRER HadTHIS Set Bound

•  Witty, amorous, sardonic works by the English poet-diplomat, edited by Evans and first thus. The DNB notes that among posthumous editions of Prior's works, "that of Evans . . . long enjoyed the reputation of being the best."

The "Story of the Country-Mouse and the City-Mouse," Prior's satiric and politically motivated response to Dryden's "Hind and Panther," is not included, but the long pieces "Solomon on the Vanity of the World" and "Alma" are present. The "Life of Mat. Prior" in the first volume commences beneath a small engraved portrait.

Binding:  Later sprinkled calf, covers gilt-ruled with gilt inner dentelles, spines gilt extra with gilt-stamped leather title and volume labels. All edges saffron.

Provenance:  Both volumes with armorial bookplates of Sir Robert D'Arcy Hildyard.

•  On Prior, see: Dictionary of National Biography, 397–401. Leather cracking over joints with hinges tender; spine tips a little dry and pulled; upper and outer edges of all covers somewhat darkened; light wear to extremities. Light foxing to some pages. In fact a very handsome pair.

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               BINDINGS,  click here .

Adelaide — Introduced by Charles

•  Later American printing, illustrated with a frontispiece portrait of Procter and an engraved plate, of the works of one of the most important and successful women poets of the 19th century. Dickens, for whom Procter wrote a number of pieces under the pseudonym Mary Berwick, provided the introduction.

•  Publisher's red cloth, front cover and spine stamped in black, spine with gilt-stamped title label (gilt just showing in our photograph); cloth very slightly rubbed over corners and spine extremities, with a small smudge to front cover near head of spine and spine stamping a bit dimmed. Reverse of frontispiece with inked gift inscription dated [18]87. One leaf with short tear from outer margin, not quite touching text. (14353)

For more of WOMEN's interest,  click here.

Illustrations by Dulac

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•  This eccentric Russian fairy-tale is retold here in prose by Edmund Dulac, the noted children's book illustrator, from the poem by Alexander Pushkin. Dulac, in the foreword, asserts that the meaning of the tale is not easily understood, seeing it as belonging to a “class of folk tales that start as clear and simple myths and . . . have other myths or incidents, often irrelevant, added to them from generation to generation in order to make them more entertaining.” However, it has usually been interpreted as a kind of political satire.

Edmund Dulac created the book's enchanting illustrations, consisting of 10 full-page and six in-text watercolors, a two-color decorative title-page, and decorative head- and tailpieces, and initials, also in two colors. Ernest Ingham designed the book using a monotype Poliphilus font.

The binding is full Russian-red cloth with apolished brass design of a cockerel set in the front cover and a gilt-lettered title on the spine. (The cloth is brighter than we seem to be able to make it appear, here.) This edition is limited to 1500 copies and this offering includes the monthly mailing notice.

•  Limited Editions Club, Bibliography of the Fine Books Published by The Limited Editions Club, 1929–1985, 205.   Binding as above. In a glassine wrapper with shallow edge tears and chips, contained within a chemise covered with Russian-red paper with gilt cockerel design with gilt-lettered spine; spine sunned and paper chipped. The whole in an unevenly sunned slipcase, with slight loss of paper to top edge at mouth and spine. A fine book, in a good+ slipcase.  (22314)

TO Part VI

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