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WOMEN
Popular Philosophical Dialogues 
Helps, Arthur, Sir. Friends in council: A series of
readings and discourse thereon. Boston & Cambridge: James Munroe & Co. (pr. by Allen &
Farnham), 1853. 8vo (18.5 cm, 7.25"2 vols. I: [2 (adv.)], viii, [2], 291, [1] pp. II: vi, [2], 271, [1]
pp.
Click the images for enlargements. Present here is an early U.S. edition of the first series; two series were published, the first in 1847–49 and the second in 1859. 
Much of the second volume of this series is dedicated to the question of slavery.
• Allibone 818. On Helps, see: Dictionary of National Biography online. Publisher's blind-stamped brown cloth, spines with gilt-stamped title; moderate rubbing most noticeable at vol. I spine head, and vol. II with strip of dark cloth tape at head of spine extending onto sides. Ex–social club library: front pastedowns with 19th-century bookplate and call-number sticker, front free endpapers lacking, title-pages pressure-stamped, no other markings. Pages age-toned, with intermittent spots of staining and light pencilled bracketing. (26412)
Mrs. Hening on
African Missions Hening, Mrs. E.F. History of the African mission of the Protestant Episcopal Church in the United States, with memoirs of deceased missionaries, and notices of native customs. New York: Stanford & Swords, 1850. 12mo. xii, [13]-300 pp.; 1 fold. map.
Click the images for enlargements. • Library Company, Afro-Americana, 4726. Publisher's blind-stamped cloth, spine with gilt-stamped title; spine and board edges sunned, cloth torn (repaired) and chipped at spine, spine with call number label. Front pastedown with institutional bookplate, title-page and map each with rubber-stamp, back free endpaper with circulation slip. Map and a few other leaves lightly foxed. (19500)
The
Mining Revival &
The Father of
Mexican
Independence
Hidalgo,
Miguel de, Father of Mexican
Independence. Document Signed (Br. Hidalgo), on paper, in Spanish.
No place [mining region of Real de Bolaños or Aguas Calientes], no date
[1780]. Folio, 1 p., bound in a dossier of documents relating to the execution
of the provisions of the will of 
Augustina
Velázquez.
Approximately
350 ff.
This
is a fine, extremely early example of Father Hidalgo's signature.
The woman who provided the money for the above mentioned masses was the wife
of Antonio de Vivano (also spelled Bibano) Gutiérrez and mother of
Antonio Guadalupe de Vivano, the first two Condes de Vivanco. Cambridge scholar
David Brading credits Antonio de Vivanco with restoring the mining region
of Bolaños to prosperity in the early 1770s, following the region's
sharp decline in silver ore production during the first two-thirds of the
18th century — whereby he became very wealthy.
In addition to payment for masses for her soul, Doña Augustina's will provides for large sums of money to be spent on construction work on the chapel of Our Lady of Guadalupe in the bishopric of Guadalajara. The paperwork, including receipts, associated with the distribution of her largesse is weighty and detailed.
Among
the collateral documents in this offering are copies of the last wills and
testaments of Antonio de Vivanco Gutiérrez (1796), Augustina Velázquez
(1780), and Antonio Guadalupe de Vivanco (1800); the inventory of the younger
Vivanco's massive estate (1801); and a marvelouscalligraphic
manuscript in which the bishop of Guadalajara grants
a special privilege to Vivanco the elder. All are notarially certified copies
of the originals.
• All documents in very good condition, sewn, in contemporary vellum bindings.
A
Well-Meaning butNot
Very High-Rising MUSEHill, Elizabeth Chase. Gleanings: Girlhood and womanhood. Concord, NH: Republican Press Association, 1887. 4to (19.2 cm, 7.5"). Frontis., [2], 76, [2] pp.
privately
printed as a holiday gift for friends of the author; the
poems and short pieces display intelligence, but not much by way of polished
craft — unsurprising given that most of them were written during Hill’s
adolescence. One unfinished poem ends abruptly with “. . . my Muse would
plume her wing, / And higher as she rises sweeter sing — ”; the
note beneath humorously reads “Muse did n’t get any further up that
trip” (p. 25).
Provenance: Front pastedown with bookplate of Burton W.F. Trafton, Jr.’s library at Old Fields in South Berwick, ME; pastedown also with binder’s ticket from Crawford & Stockbridge of Concord, NH. Front fly-leaf with inked gift inscription dated Christmas, 1887.
• Publisher’s brown cloth, front cover with gilt-stamped title and dark brown–stamped decorative bands, bottom band labelled “Christmas 1887"; corners and spine extremities rubbed, binding showing very little wear otherwise. First two signatures with sewing loosening; pages very slightly age-toned but otherwise clean.
“Services
Rendered” — 1835,
'36(Hofmaster,
Mary). Dakal, G.M. Two Autograph Notes Signed. No
places, 19 September 1835 and 29 June 1836. One sheet 8vo, one 4to with integral
address leaf. 
• Both long folded, the bill apparently into an "envelope" (with direction to Mrs. Hofmaster); receipt with some tears and tatters not affecting text.
An Englishwoman's Translation of
This German Landmark Humboldt, Alexander von. Cosmos: A sketch of a physical description of the universe. London: Henry G. Bohn, 1849–58. 8vo (18.8 cm, 7.4"). 5 vols. I: Frontis., xvii, [1], ix, [1], 369, [3], 18, 40 (adv.) pp. II: xxi, 370–742, 16 pp. III: [6], 289, [1], 8, 32 (adv.)
pp. IV: xv, [1], 291–601, [1], 7, [1], 32 (adv.) pp. V: viii, 500 pp.
Click the interior image for an enlargement. Elise C. Otté (with assistance from Benjamin Horatio Paul and William Sweetland Dallas for vols. 4 and 5, respectively) and first published in 1845 through 1848, with this edition being part of the “Bohn's Scientific
Library” series. The work was written by German naturalist, explorer, and diplomat Friedrich Wilhelm Heinrich Alexander Freiherr von Humboldt, famed for his scientific observations of Latin America as well as for the present, groundbreaking overview of natural science. Humboldt's exploits and writings served as an inspiration for countless other scientists (including Charles Darwin), and his encyclopedic approach to describing our world as a whole, in terms of all of its natural phenomena, helped launch science's ongoing search for the unifying principles of the universe.
This translation caused a bit of controversy: Tipped in at the front of vol. I is a printed rebuttal by Bohn of accusations made by the publisher of a rival translation by Mrs. Sabine, regarding the accuracy of Otté's work — which Bohn defends, of course.
• NSTC 2H36378; Sparrow, Milestones of Science, 106 (first ed.). Publisher's embossed red cloth, spine with gilt-stamped title and series identification; spines sunned with heads and feet pulled (in one instance chipped), corners bumped, cloth with spots of minor discoloration; vol. V with binding darkened overall and cloth starting at heads of joints. Married set: Vols. I–IV each with institutional bookplate on front pastedown; vol. V from another set, with a different bookplate. Vols. I–IV institutionally rubber-stamped on front free endpapers and title-pages. Many signatures unopened in vols. I–IV; sewing starting to loosen in vol. V. (23913)
For more SETS, click here. For a little more SCIENCE, click here. For NATURAL HISTORY, click here. For more TRANSLATIONS, click here.
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Part VIII . . . |