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BLACKWELL’S RARE BOOKS
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Item 2 48-51 Broad Street, Oxford, OX1 3BQ, UK Tel: +44 (0)1865 333555 : Fax: +44 (0)1865 794143 Email: rarebooks@blackwell.co.uk : Twitter: @blackwellrare www.blackwell.co.uk/rarebooks
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1. (Old School Press.) BOULLOSA (Carmen) Alchemy of the Planets. Images by Philip Hughes with Amy Petra Woodward. Poems by Carmen Boullosa. Translation by Psiche Hughes. Cliff Edge, Beer Hill, Seaton: Old School Press, 2018, 14/60 COPIES, introductory booklet signed by the author, artist, translator, studio manager and publisher, 32 Epson 3800 eight-colour prints on Somerset Enhanced Velvet, mounted on Vélin Arches Noir paper, distributed through 12 concertina-folded books, each representing a planet or moon (Venus, Mercury, Mars, Ceres, Jupiter, Europa, Saturn, Enceladus, Rhea, Uranus, Neptune, Pluto), parallel verse in English and Spanish, pp. 8; 14; 6; 12; 6; 6; 6; 6; 6; 6; 6; 6; 8, 32 x 36.5 cm, booklet title with blue printed device on cover, concertina-folded books with translucent paper jackets, all contained in aluminium/polypropylene case with magnetic catch, lid repeating blue screen-printed device, fine £1,900 Inspired by the images from recent space missions, detailed here in the introductory booklet, particularly the close-up views of Pluto, Mars and Saturn, Hughes has created a sequence of striking and widely varied prints from paintings, pastels and digital collages: luminous polychrome-striped planetary rings, granular monochrome and gradient map images, fractured and marbled effects, precisely rendered spheres against black grounds etc. Boullosa’s poetry is a direct response to the images and draws on planetary mythology and worship rituals. 2. (Russell.) BAXTER (John) An Archive of Ken Russell material formed by his biographer, comprising: - the author’s own copy of the biography, ‘An Appalling Talent/Ken Russell’ (Michael Joseph, 1973 [but 1974]) - two typescripts of the same, both with corrections, one by the author only but the other heavily corrected by both the author and the subject (also the galley proofs, with a few corrections) - research material for the book, including an interview with Huw Wheldon annotated by the subject, various notes by Baxter and a quantity of papers relating to Russell’s work - 4pp. of typed notes by Ken Russell submitting corrections and clarifications for the book, 7pp. of manuscript notes by the same relating to hs work - more than 90 pieces of correspondence relating to the book, including circa 20 from Russell to Baxter, 30 relating to the threat of a lawsuit from Harry
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Saltzman, letters from the publisher to Baxter and letters relating to his research - a selection of books on Russell and his work, a few inscribed – including an inscribed copy of H.S. Ede’s Savage Messiah (second impression) - 4 typescript screenplays, 3 of these filmed by Russell (Valentino, French Dressing, The Boy Friend) and 1 unrealised project (a screenplay by Russell of Adrian Mitchell’s Man Friday) - an 8pp. treatment for the unproduced Rusell project ‘Music Music Music’ - the ‘key book’ for French Dressing, 120 mounted photographs of production shots, stills, costume tests, etc., and circa 500 photographs from Russell's films as well as work from his early career as a photo-journalist - The 'Press Books' for various projects: Tommy, The Music Lovers, Billion Dollar Brain, Clouds of Glory, The Boy Friend, Mahler, Altered States, The Devils, Women in Love - many in more than one version, some with original inserts - a quantity of other advertising material (posters, etc.) for these and other films, as well as a handful of magazines with articles on Russell [More detailed listing available on request.] various, circa 1960- 1980, various sizes and formats, well stored and in good condition overall £8,000
Ken Russell's incendiary status, his radical vision and controversial behaviour, were of an enduring nature even whilst the quality of his output waned in later years. This archive - formed by his first biographer John Baxter before, during, and after his 1974 book on the director - captures him in his combustible prime. The difficulty and delight of the subject and project is encapsulated in the central document of this archive: a carbon typescript of the biography, heavily edited and annotated by the director in amongst Baxter’s own amendments,
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with numerous inserted sheets and continuations to verso. The extent of his work on it - correspondence between the two shows that he kept it for much longer than was originally intended, and it is cited as a dilatory factor in communication from the publisher – prompted Russell to suggest an equal share of royalties from the book, but Baxter stood his ground (the carbon copy of his letter pleading his case, largely on a financial basis, though one can observe how Russell's intervention considerably enlarged the scale of the biographer's task, is present here) and the director quite quickly withdrew his claim, whilst continuing to state how disproportionate the reward was in relation to the work – ‘I’d be the last person on earth to see you emaciated & starving’, but ‘for every 10 days on the book I spend I am a thousand quid down’ because of its effect on other, more remunerative activities. The incident is somewhat typical of Russell’s flair for controversy, which was also behind the other major delay to the book’s publication: a legal tussle with producer Harry Saltzman, whose attention had been drawn to an extract from the book published in The Observer whilst he happened to be in the UK, which gave a damning and potentially libellous account of his personality and ability in relation to his work with Russell on Billion Dollar Brain, and resulted in some changes to the text being necessary at a point where it had already been printed (leading to a cancel leaf). The saga is documented here from its very origin – a letter to Baxter from his agent, Pat Kavanagh, announces with pleasure that the extract has been placed with the newspaper, the latter receiving Saltzman's objections via his lawyer within a month of publication – and includes input, in the form of correspondence, from all sides, showing how endangering to the book's existence the episode had been. Whilst it is on the one hand a working archive that relates directly to the production of the biography, it is also a collection of material relating to the director's work that testifies to Baxter being what a surprise telephone-call recounted at the opening of An Appalling Talent calls him: ‘England’s leading expert on the work of Ken Russell’. This is an archive that provides a record of Baxter as a collector as well as a biographer. We have here an abundance, perhaps unrivalled, at least as far as it goes in respect of Russell's career (just touching Altered States but largely concentrated on his earlier work), of photographic and printed material documenting the director's emergence into and his impact upon the British film world: his early career as a photojournalist, his work for the BBC under Huw Wheldon, and his varied but consistently controversial directorial career, from biopics of various composers, sculptor Gaudier-Brzeska, Rudolph Valentino, Coleridge and Wordsworth, to commercial success with Tommy and outright scandal with The Devils; the archive also includes an insight into unrealised film projects in various stages of development - the treatment for the ambitious 'Music Music Music', some preliminary research on Thomas De Quincey, an unfilmed screenplay of Adrian Mitchell's 'Man Friday'.
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But it is the biography where the fire blazes strongest, and which attracts the most compelling material - in the form of manuscript input by Russell, both on the draft of the work itself and in the correspondence around it, where he is by turns expansive, charming, dismissive, or acerbic, without ever being predictable.
With proof copy of vol. I 3. Churchill (Winston S.) Collected Works. Centenary Limited Edition with additional uncorrected subscribers’ proof copy of vol. I, [39 vols.] Library of Imperial History, 1973-76, 300/3,000 SETS, numerous maps, charts and illustrations, 8vo, original vellum, gilt ruled borders on upper covers with gilt arms just above centre, gilt ruled compartments on spine, lettered in gilt direct, gilt edges, vellum of 8 volumes of a slightly darker tone, rifle green slip cases (7 in a lighter shade), fine £4,500 Complete with the four additional volumes of collected essays published later. The subscriber for this set was Dr. J.J. Drever, geochemist and George Watson’s College, Edinburgh alumnus.
4. Bodimeade (John) [Storyboards for:] Alfred the Great. [2 Albums.] 1969, 182 storyboard strips, mounted on card pages, gouache, pencil and penand-ink renderings, the majority reproduced photographically or carboncopied, but several original, numerous annotations in the second album, elucidating the scene depicted, possibly by the film’s director, Clive Donner, occasional spots, pp. 29; 36, A4, photograph albums £750
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The key compositions and camera set-ups for the major action sequences of the film - the coronation, the Battle of Ethandun, etc. - are included here in highly atmospheric detail. Aside from the bird’s-eye views of army formations, the character close-ups, the technical considerations of hand-to-hand fighting, Bodimeade’s depiction of light and movement is particularly striking - several scenes reminiscent of Kamakura battle scrolls. The film itself, shot in Galway, with a cast including David Hemmings, Michael York, Ian McKellen, Sinead Cusack, 1500 extras, and a 3/4-size replica of the Uffington White Horse (see Viking Summer - The Filming of MGM’s ‘Alfred the Great’ in Galway in 1968, Mary J. Murphy, 2008), though not a box office success at the time, has since gained near-cult status. John Bodimeade, the uncredited storyboard artist, also provided the same service for ‘Those Magnificent Men in their Flying Machines’, 1965.
5. Attenborough (David) Zoo Quest To Guiana; Zoo Quest For A Dragon; Zoo Quest in Paraguay; Quest in Paradise; Zoo Quest To Madagascar; Quest Under Capricorn. [6 Vols.] Lutterworth Press, 1956- 1963, FIRST EDITIONS, photographic illustrations throughout with some colour plates, maps, one or two faint spots (very seldom), pp. 185, [1]; 174; 168; 224; 160; 162, crown 8vo, original boards, backstrips lettered in gilt, final volume with a
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strip of tape residue to front pastedown concealed by dustjacket flap, dustjackets bright, a little rubbing to extremities, the odd nick or very short closed tear, but in general a very good set £1,500
‘Love in Japanese’, and other languages Beckett (Samuel) Collection of translations, inscribed to Barbara Bray. 6. [15 Vols.] 1959- 1989, the majority first editions (or first editions thus) in their respective languages, many bi- and trilingual editions including the French and English texts, various sizes and formats, original cloth, boards, or wrappers, dustjackets where called for, very good condition £4,500 - Gedichte [Translated from the English by Eva Hesse and from the French by Elmar Tophoven]. Wiesbaden: Limes, 1959 - inscribed, ‘For Barbara, with love Sam, Paris June 1959’ - Robert Pinget, La manivelle. Pièce radiophonique. Texte anglais de Samuel Beckett. Les Éditions de minuit, 1960 (Federman & Fletcher 502) - inscribed at the head of the English text ‘For Barbara, from Sam, Paris Mai[?] 1960’, and with the card referring to the BBC performance (’Mise en ondes de Barbara Bray’) laid in as issued - Warten auf Godot. [Translated by Elmar Tophoven.] Frankfurt am Main: Suhrkamp, 1960 - inscribed ‘For Barbara, with love from Sam, Paris Aug ‘74’ - Endspiel - Fin de Partie. Deutsch und Französisch [Translated by Elmar Tophoven.] Frankfurt am Main: Suhrkamp, 1960 - inscribed ‘For Barbara, with love from Sam, Paris Aug ‘67’ - Auswahl in einem Band. Deutsch von Erika und Elmar Tophoven. Frankfurt am Main: Suhrkamp, 1967 - inscribed ‘For Barbara, with love from Sam, Paris Nov. ‘67’
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- Primo amore, seguito da Novelle e Testi per nulla. Traduzioni di Franco Quadri e Carlo Cignetti. Turin: Einaudi, 1967 - inscribed ‘For Barbara, with love from Sam, Paris 1972’ - Murphy. Roman. Hamburg: Rowohlt, 1969 - inscribed, ‘for Barbara, with love from Sam, Paris Oct. 1970’ - Watt. Deutsch von Elmar Tophoven. Frankfurt am Main: Suhrkamp, 1970 inscribed ‘For Barbara, with love from Sam, Oct. 1970’ - Das letzte Band [Opera adaptation of ‘Krapp’s Last Tape’]. Regiebuch de Berliner Inszenierung. [Translated by Elmar Tophoven.] Frankfurt am Main: Suhrkamp, 1970 - inscribed on fly-title, ‘For Barbara, with love from Sam, Paris June 1970’ - Warten auf Godot / En attendant Godot / Waiting for Godot. Frankfurt am Main: Suhrkamp, 1971 - inscribed ‘For Barbara, with love from Sam, Berlin, February 1975’, clipping from Irish Times regarding Jack MacGowran’s performance of a ‘Beckett Anthology’ in ‘71 loosely inserted - Words and Music, Play, Eh Joe / Paroles et Musique, Comédie, Dis Joe. Introduction de Jean-Jacques Mayoux. Traduction de Samuel Beckett. Paris: Aubier Flammarion, 1972 - inscribed ‘For Barbara, with love from Sam, Paris March 1972’ - Sin, seguido de El Despoblador. Traducción de Félix de Azúa. BArcelona: Tusquets Editor, 1972 - inscribed ‘For Barbara, with love from Sam, Paris 19.5.73’ - Gesellschaft. Eine Fabel. Englische Originalfassung. Deutsche Übertragung von Elmar Tophoven. Französische Übertragung von Samuel Beckett. Frankfurt am Main: Suhrkamp, 1981 - inscribed ‘For Barbara, with love from Sam, September 1981 - Czekając na Godota [Translated by Antoni Libera]. Warsaw: Państwowy Instytut Wydawniczy, 1985 - signed by Beckett on the flyleaf - Beketto gikyoku zenshu 3. [Translated into Japanese by Yasunari Takahashi.] Tokyo: Hakusuisha, 1986 - inscribed on the flyleaf (at rear), ‘For Barbara, with love in Japanese, from Sam, 18.2.89’, with Bray’s manuscript table of contents in English A set of presentation copies that speak of the author’s personal affections and global appeal, being editions of his work in various languages and the copies of his close friend and fellow translator Barbara Bray. Beckett met Bray in 1956, during the production of his radio play ‘All That Fall’ for the BBC (where Bray worked as a script editor) - the attraction, intellectual and otherwise, was more or less immediate and continued for over thirty years, up until his death in 1989. The beginning of this affair was contemporaneous with Beckett’s marriage, with which it ran a parallel course and perhaps surpassed in terms of its impact upon his praxis. A translator herself, of Marguerite Duras, Jean Genet, Jean-Paul Sartre, et al., Bray was one of the few people with whom Beckett would discuss his own translation work. The present collection encapsulates that bond. Though the inscriptions are characteristically terse, they convey within the details (principally,
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‘love...Sam’) the more than usual warmth upon which their relationship was founded. [With:] Six further volumes, comprising German, Italian, or Japanese translations of Beckett’s work - with the same provenance, but without signature or inscription.
On Wittgenstein, etc. 7. Malcolm (Norman) Manuscript philosophy notebook. 1953, ink on ruled paper, the odd pencil note, pp. [125], 4to, original quarter blue cloth notebook, black boards, a little wear and fading, good condition £5,000 The first entry in this notebook is dated September 1953 at the head: Malcolm was then in the early years of his long association with Cornell University, at the Sage School of Philosophy there, having studied at Nebraska, Harvard, and Cambridge - at the latter he met G.E. Moore and Ludwig Wittgenstein, whose ideas were an important influence on his own work. The final third of this notebook consists of a commentary on the latter’s ‘Tractatus’, the entries
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numbered to correspond to the statements of Wittgenstein’s magnum opus; there are scattered references to that work elsewhere in the present document, as well as to Wittgenstein’s ‘Philosophical Investigations’ (upon which Malcolm published an important essay in 1954). Also of interest is Malcolm’s engagement throughout with other followers of Wittgenstein - Yorick Smythies, Rush Rhees, G.E.M. Anscombe (’Elizabeth’) - as well as to other contemporary British philosophers such as Geach, Strawson, and Ryle. The notebook is a compelling document of an important moment in twentiethcentury philosophy, written in Malcolm’s clear and precise style - it bears clear relation to the philosopher’s published work, but the material here is unpublished (though ripe for that purpose) and of considerable scholarly import.
8. Thomas (R.S.) An Acre of Land. Newtown: Montgomeryshire Printing Co. Ltd, 1952, FIRST EDITION, pp. [vi], 38, crown 8vo, original sewn paper wrappers with blue dustjacket, a few spots and a little sunned around the spine, very good £700 Signed twice by the author, on the flyleaf and title-page. Thomas’ second collection received a sales boost from having been praised on BBC radio by Alan Pryce-Jones, which led to its first edition selling out quickly after - it remains perhaps a scarcer proposition than his first collection on account of this spike.
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9. Borges (Jorge Luis) Otras Inquisiciones, (1937-1952) [Other Inquisitions.] Buenos Aires: Sur, [1952,] FIRST EDITION, title-page printed in red and black, pages browned throughout, pp. 226, crown 8vo, original wrappers with French flaps, a little rubbing to extremities, the backstrip faded and some gentle dustsoiling, very good £700 From the library of the author’s translator and friend Norman Thomas di Giovanni, but without mark of ownership. Borges senior’s only novel, his daughter’s copy 10. Borges (Jose [Guillermo]) El Caudillo. [Palma de Mallorca: Imprenta Mallorquina de Juan Guasp Reinés,] [1921,] FIRST EDITION, some faint foxing to first few leaves, pp. 3-195, crown 8vo, in a crude binding by Norah Borges (the author’s daughter) of limp grey morocco with corners of tan calf, rather worn, the title-page and final text-page used as pastedowns, the covers held by a single strap (no backstrip otherwise), hand lettering to front with tile and author information, and at the foot of same ‘Norah’ in small letters, sound £800 A family copy of this notable rarity. The British Library only on WorldCat, though the Borges collection at the University of Virginia also records copies. This copy has superb provenance, originating in the collection of the artist Norah (Leonor Fanny) Borges – daughter of the author, and sister to Jorge Luis Borges. It later passed into the collection of Borges’ translator Norman Thomas di Giovanni.
With a Salonikan snake 11. (World War One. Salonika Campaign.) McDONALD (John) A small archive relating to his education, military service, and career. 19041947, a long autograph letter to his sister (15pp., dated 16th March 1917) and a couple of wartime postcards to the same, photographs in military uniform and his wartime ‘Certificate of Employment’, various documents relating to his education, then his career as a schoolmaster, his 1947 obituary in The Ayrshire Times, a stuffed snakeskin from Salonika, a little tape repair to its tail, various sizes and formats, in contemporary suitcase, good condition overall £1,000 John McDonald was born in Lochfoot, Dumfries in 1890; he attended Dumfries Academy and then Glasgow University, where he graduated as M.A. The
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present archive includes a record of his education at various stages, from schooldays through to university, and a folder of certificates and testimonials related to his teacher training, up to and after the War, which provided an interruption to his steady progress. He served with the Army Service Corps during the Great War, fighting in the Salonika campaign and attaining the rank of Sergeant. The long letter to his sister here is written from Struma Valley, Macedonia on pages from his Army notebook, and recounts ‘uncensored’ the events of the last five months, including his unforgettable ‘first glimpse of war’: ‘the enemy guns were pouring out shells, and the noise rolled like thunder among the hills [...] There was a short truce to bury the dead and gather in the wounded’; flashes of energetic bombardment and fire, and rumours of ‘a big push’; horse-riding on dangerous terrain, his exposure to shell-fire, including ‘one moment’ where he was ‘prepared to leave this world [...] but I did not get as much as a souvenir’ of the shell-shrapnel; the local landscape and weather (‘now we are having beautiful sunny days – like a Scotch summer’); a civilian casualty; the threat of malaria, fever and dysentery – injury possible but illness inevitable, the ‘skeletons of men and animals killed in the last Balkan war [...] still lying bleaching in the sun’ making it ‘no wonder that this country is full of disease’. Overall, the experience is considered a formative one: ‘My life here has been better guided for me than I could have planned it myself, and out of the past I get confidence for the future, but should the final sacrifice be required, I shall not shrink from it’. Following the war he was appointed Headmaster at Kirkmichael School, before taking on the same role at Tarbolton – his obituary records his interests as gardening and bee-keeping, both of which he employed in the educational setting dear to him.
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With a signed card 12. Ambler (Eric) A Coffin for Dimitrios. New York: Alfred A. Knopf, 1939, FIRST AMERICAN EDITION, pp. [xii], 281, [1], crown 8vo, original grey cloth, backstrip and upper board lettered and decorated in purple, publisher’s device in same to lower board, top edge purple, fore-edge roughtrimmed, bookseller ticket to rear pastedown,dustjacket price-clipped and a little rubbed and chipped with a small stain to margin of rear panel, a little tape repair, good £600 With a card signed by the author laid down to the flyleaf. Published in England as ‘The Mask of Dimitrios’. 13. Čapek (Karel) Ett Ǻr med min Trädgård [Zahradníkův rok/The Gardener’s Year]. Med Teckningar av Josef Čapek. Bemynd Övers. från Tjeckiskan av Erik Frisk. Stockholm: Hugo Gebers, 1934, FIRST SWEDISH EDITION, line drawings to the text, pp. 159, foolscap 8vo, contemporary quarter crimson morocco with marbled boards, the original front wrapper bound in, backstrip lettered in gilt between five raised bands, a trifle rubbed at extremities, minor knock to top edge of boards, bookplate of Folke Wennerberg to front pastedown, very good £400 Inscribed by the author on the half-title, ‘À Mme Wennerberg, un petit souvenir de Karel Čapek, 22. XII.34’. The recipient was Dagmar Wennerberg (née Schlasberg), wife of the Swedish diplomat Folke Wennerberg, whose bookplate adorns the pastedown – the couple married in the year of publication. Both have added their initials at the close of the text to record successive dates of completion in the first months of 1935. Čapek’s travels around Scandinavia in the mid 1930s were recorded in ‘Cesta na Sever’ (‘A Year in the North’) – this presentation copy is a
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small testament of the warm reception he received throughout the region. With the prospectus 14. Joyce (James) Ulysse [Ulysses.] Traduit de l’anglais par M. Auguste Morel, assiste par M. Stuart Gilbert. Traduction entièrement revue par M. Valery Larbaud avec la collaboration de l’Auteur. Paris: La Maison des Amis des Livres, 1929, FIRST EDITION IN FRENCH, 523/875 COPIES printed on Alfa Vergé paper (from an edition of 1,000 copies), pp. [viii], 870, 4to, original cream wrappers printed in blue, very light dustsoiling and faint pinprick foxing to cover, touch of corner creasing, nicked at foot of upper joint, edges roughtrimmed, original prospectus for this edition with tipped-in photograph of Joyce to front (’Photo d’amateur’) laid in, very good (Slocum & Cahoon D17) £700 This edition published by Adrienne Monnier at her bookshop La Maison des Amis des Livres, across from Sylvia Beach’s Shakespeare and Company on the rue de l'Odéon.
15. (Monet.) CLEMENCEAU (Georges) [Typescript and manuscript extracts from:] Claude Monet, les Nymphéas. n.d., circa 1928, 8pp. typescript with frequent holograph corrections and additions, and a 2pp. manuscript headed ‘Conclusion’, pp. 8; [2], 4to, the manuscript sheets slightly browned, a couple of very fant spots to edge, very good £1,200 These extracts represent two key passages from the French statesman’s memoir of his close friend. The typed extract offers a lyrical passage that begins ‘L’eau attirait la brosse de Monet’, the opening of the work’s fourth chapter (‘Le Jardin de Monet’) – though it follows a similar course to the published work, there are substantial differences, offering variant readings in both the typed and the manuscript material; there is extensive drafting, showing the labour of the author in trying to capture the talent and inspiration of his subject. Similarly, in the manuscript fragment of the ‘Conclusion’, we have a striking opening that is recognisable in relation to the finished work (though it is not identical) –though it is not identical, asking ‘Est-il nécessaire de conclure?’, rather than stating that ‘Il n'est peut-être pas nécessaire de conclure’ – and has many passages in common with its published counterpart. Georges Clemenceau was a politician and journalist, alternating between the roles in the course of his life, during an eventful period in both his native
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France and the United States – where he spent the latter half of the 1860s, covering the aftermath of the Civil War for ‘Le Temps’, whilst also teaching and running a medical practice. He returned to France, with his American wife Mary Plummer, at the beginning of the next decade, mediating – in his role as Mayor of the XVIIIe arrondissement – between the Commune and the Government, following the fall of the Second Empire. By the end of the century he had fallen out of favour in political circles, but maintained his activism through his journalism – it was his paper, L'Aurore, that first published Zola’s incendiary ‘J’Accuse’ during the Dreyfus Affair. Returning to politics, he rose to the position of Prime Minister in 1906-1909, and then took the same office in 1917-1919 – playing a key role in the allied victory, and in the Treaty of Versailles that followed. Though his political activities account for the largest part of his reputation, his friendship with Monet is an important aspect of the biographies of both men – it was Clemenceau who convinced Monet to endure cataract surgery in order to retain his sight, and who prevailed upon him to donate ‘Les Nymphéas’ to the state (additionally insisting, as President of the Council, that they should reside in the Musée de l'Orangerie). 16. Milne (A.A.) Now We Are Six, with Decorations by Ernest H. Shepard [Second printing.] Methuen, 1927, the borders of half-title a little browned, pp. x, [i], 102, crown 8vo, original red cloth with Shepard vignettes in gilt to both boards, band of fading at foot of upper board, the backstrip lettered in gilt and darkened, corners lightly rubbed with a touch of wear, gentle bump to bottom corner of upper board, t.e.g., endpapers with Shepard designs, good £1,000 A pleasing presentation copy, inscribed by the author on the half-title: ‘This book belongs to Dorothy Hyson. It was written by me, and it’s all about my son. A.A. Milne’. The recipient was the notable actress, celebrated in the West End from her youth – Hyson worked as a cryptographer at Bletchley Park during the War, and retired from her successful career on the stage following her marriage to actor Anthony Quayle in 1947. 17. Mirrlees (Hope) Lud-in-the-Mist. Collins, 1926, FIRST EDITION, pp. viii, 319, crown 8vo, original light brown cloth (the earliest issue binding), the upper board with border in dark brown, backstrip with green morocco label lettered in gilt, this lifting a little at one corner, small nick at foot of backstrip, slight lean to spine, small pressure-mark to upper board, top edge dusty, others lightly spotted, small blind-stamp of Harrods Circulating Library at foot of rear pastedown (no other marks), good £300 The author’s most enduring novel, a seminal work of fantasy.
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Unpublished, with signed photos 18. Jacobs (Bertram, a.k.a. Benedict James) [Original typescript:] Four Plays: The Little Brother or, The Rabbi and the Priest; [Uriel Acosta or,] The Ban; The Man with the Puckel; Overdoing It. n.d., 1918-1935, typescript in blue and red ink, with occasional manuscript corrections and additions by the author, two leaves with tape repair to tears, otherwise some occasional handling marks, pp. [ii], 14, 38, [ii], 43, [ii], 33, [ii], 27; [ii], 25, 15, [i], 13, [i], 10; [ii], 13, [i], 14-36, [i], 37-51; [ii], 14, 4to, half claret morocco and grey cloth, lettered in gilt to upper board, lacking backstrip and generally worn, edges speckled pink, 3 studio photographs of the author signed by Jacobs to verso, laid in along with one repeated (and unsigned), fair £400 Presumably the author’s own copy, prepared by him for publication at some stage late in his career (but never published) – the holograph corrections are not extensive, occasionally glossing the Yiddish. The first play, the most substantial by far, is an adaptation of Milton Goldsmith's novel - it is prefaced by a performance history (including in Italy and the USA) and some contextual apparatus. Bertram Jacobs was a Welsh Jewish writer, whose publication history consisted in the main of books relating to his work as a lawyer; whilst practising as a barrister he wrote numerous film screenplays during the silent era, under the name Benedict James – a name that is present here only on the fly-title of the first work. The plays here date from between 1918 and the 1930s - there is no date displayed on the volume itself in respect of its production. Unpublished numbers in the composer’s hand 19. Norton (Frederic) [Manuscript] Chu Chin Chow. 1916, 120 pages of manuscript music in pencil and ink for voice and piano and solo piano (to accompany processions and dances), with numerous amendments and alterations, including 6 numbers from Act I (including the Prelude and ‘My Head, my head’, a later addition to the show, present in the 1931 printed edition), 3 numbers from Act II (including ‘I built a Fairy Palace’, also a later addition), and 4 numbers from Act III (two of which are incomplete); also, 3 complete suggested new numbers ‘Seventeen’, ‘The Prayer in Desert’ and ‘Slave Duet’, 14 further pages of sketches and ideas including ‘Egyptian Creation’ and ‘River Music’, [with] Scrapbook of newspaper review clippings, 4 photographs from the original production (Daily Mail copyright stamp on verso), a bromide print of Frederic Norton by the photographer Angus Basil, 1924, a typed account by Norton’s sibling of his Chu Chin Chow experiences, including, owing to the indisposition of Courtice Pound, having to take to the stage for one performance and singing songs without knowing the words: ‘he was able to get by through constantly saying “By Allah”’, Frederic Norton’s notebook of correspondence, licensing arrangements and jottings related to Chu Chin Chow, (including ‘The discovery of America was nothing to the
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discovery of ‘Bisto’ / Monte Christo’) and the seating plan for the Chu-ChinChow Dinner, December 14th, 1919, The Criterion. £3,000 ‘Chu Chin Chow’, the most successful musical comedy of the age, premièred at His Majesty’s Theatre, London, in August 1916 and ran for five years, a record which was only surpassed in the 1950s by ‘Salad Days’. The production in New York, starring Tyrone Power, proved highly popular, and two film adaptations followed - a silent film, in 1925, and a talkie, in 1934 from the Gainsborough Studios which preserved most of the original music. The story itself, an adult pantomime version of ‘Ali Baba and the 40 Thieves’, chimed with the contemporary vogue for orientalism, and provided an evening’s potent escapism for soldiers on leave from the Western Front. It returned to the West End stage in 1940, though the run was interrupted by the London bombings, and in the 1950s was produced on ice. Norton’s music, according to theatre journal The Era (1916) had ‘a touch of the East but for the most part it was on a level with the tender melody of musical comedy’. Several of the songs became hits in their own right, notably ‘The Cobblers Song’ and ‘Any Time’s Kissing Time’, which remained in the repertoire for half a century. The manuscript itself provides an invaluable insight into the working processes of a musical theatre composer, particularly the presence of 3 versions of Act I, no.4, ‘Cleopatra’s Nile’. It is clear that Norton was operating at speed: there are numerous crossings-out of sections, changes of accompaniment and additions hastily pinned over irretrievably altered bars, the music for Act I, no.1 Abdullah and Chorus, for example, spreading across pages half occupied by crossed-through passages from later songs. The three complete suggested new numbers do not appear to have been published or performed on the public stage.
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‘My darling Susan... Your loving Virginia’ 20. Woolf (Virginia) [i.e., Virginia Stephen] Autograph Letter signed, to Susan Lushington. Athens, 19th Sept 1906, black ink on paper, the date amended from the 16th, p. [1], crown 8vo, folded in original envelope, addressed by Woolf, the stamps excised, very good condition £4,850 A poignant, unpublished letter - hitherto in the archives of the Lushington family, by descent - written on hearing, via her half-brother Gerald Duckworth, of the death (from peritonitis) of her friend Margaret Massingberd (née Lushington) of Gunby Hall. The Lushington family and the Stephens were close from childhood, and Woolf’s response to the news - ‘this is so terrible that we can’t believe it’ - is charged with emotion, partly (the letter suggests) through an association with Woolf’s half-sister Stella Duckworth, who had died nine years earlier - similarly from peritonitis, and equally suddenly. Woolf writes of Margaret, ‘She was so wonderfully good to us when Stella died, & she has always seemed to belong to us & to be a part of Stella & mother. And so she will be always’. She goes on to express concern for Susan and her other sister, Kitty Maxse - who was the acknowledged model for Clarissa Dalloway (’almost Kitty verbatim’, she told Vanessa Bell) - and assures her that ‘Darling Susan, we would do anything we could for you’, before signing, ‘Your loving Virginia’. Woolf was then on her first visit to Greece, she and Vanessa having joined their brothers there (the ‘we’ of the letter conveying their collective disbelief) this is the only known letter to survive from her during the trip, which became further marred by the tragic death of her brother Thoby from typhoid fever.
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The Bible and modern science 21. [Geikie (John Cunningham)] [Manuscript Lecture, drop head title:] The Six Days of Creation. c. 1890, manuscript in ink on feint ruled paper, serrated line in the lower margin and twin file holes, 26 leaves, written on rectos only,small folio, split pin at top left hand corner, a little spotting at either end, first page stained pink at fore-edge £1,200 An elaborate and quite detailed exegisis of the creation as described in Genesis. The ‘Six Days’ are not to be taken literally, and in fact, when examined critically, the six days are found to correspond to the geological progression towards the ultimate goal of Creation, viz. the appearance of mankind. The whole sweep of geological knowledge is accordingly correlated to the Bible story. The question at the end is, how did Moses come to have such a detailed not to say cutting-edge - knowledge of geology. The answer is that he didn’t, and the Biblical narrative is God’s dictation. The lecture was originally accompanied by slides, and apparently some sort of tableaux. The thesis is very much that which is adumbrated in Geikie’s Hours with the Bible, 1890, and uses some of the same phraseology. Edinburgh born, ‘Geikie was well known as a writer of popular books on biblical and religious subjects. Scholarly, imaginative, and lucid, his books dealt on orthodox lines with historical and practical rather than with theological themes. His most ambitious work was Hours with the Bible’ (ODNB). We can’t find any direct link between James Cunningham, and the brother geologists Archibald and James.
Jefferson and Sally Hemings 22. (Jefferson.) DENNIE (Joseph), James Thomson Callender, and others. The Port Folio. By Oliver Oldschool, Esq. [pseud. i.e. Joseph Dennie]. Vols. 1-3, and 5. Philadelphia: Printed and sold by Hugh Maxwell [imprints and colophons vary], January 1801 - December, 1805, 4 vols., lacking vol. IV (and all after vol. V), and No. 31 in 1801, and Nos. 8 and 12 in vol. V, general title-pages to vols I, II, and V, fairly consistent paper, but 2 numbers in vol. II on bluish paper, variable browning and foxing, ink splashes &, burn holes in a few leaves in vol. II, on the whole a good copy, pp. [i], 416; [i], 416; 425; [i], 408 (with gaps as noted above), 4to, contemporary half calf over marbled
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boards, gilt ruled compartments on spine, lettered in gilt direct, yellow edges, a little rubbed, a few abrasions, crack in upper joint of vol. i, but binding solid, engraved armorial bookplate of an earl of Dalhousie, presumably George Ramsay ninth earl of Dalhousie (1770–1838), governor-in-chief of British North America £3,000 Dennie's Port Folio was one of the leading literary and political magazines in the United States at the start of 19th century. Begun in 1801, the periodical was particularly critical of the administration of Thomas Jefferson, and Dennie was charged with seditious libel after publishing a particularly scathing attack on Jeffersonian democracy, ("A democracy is scarcely tolerable at any period of national history. Its omens are always sinister, and its powers are unpropitious..."), a charge of which he was acquitted. The attacks on Jefferson included a series of 6 satirical poems by James Thomson Callender (a native Scot, whose ‘work rivalled Thomas Paine's in its radicalism’ (ODNB): he was dubbed ‘Newgate Callender’ by Cobbett), which focused on Jefferson's relationship with his slave, Sally Hemings (by whom he had several children). These are found speard over several numbers in the 1802 volume, July to December The Portfolio ran until 1827, but it was at its height in its early years - under Dennie, who died in 1812. Loosely inserted is a printed ‘Prospectus of a new Weekly Paper, submitted to Men of Affluence, Men of librality, and Men of Letters, [Philadelphia: no printer], pp. [6], 2 [blank], super royal quarto, loose, browned and a little stained, sometime overstitched, a little frayed. The last, blank, leaf appears to part of the piece (a somewhat extravagant use of paper. The last printed page, to be filled in by subscribers, has just the words Names, and Abode, at the top. ESTC W33604 (state with the last word of the first column on p. [1] is ‘with’), 5 copies all in the US, 3 of them in the American Antiquarian Society; BAL 4635. Medicine for America, Cullen leading 23. [Pearson (George)] [Lecture notes by an unknown scribe]. London and elsewhere: 1802-55, manuscript in ink on paper, a little foxing in places, and edges tinged brown, pp. [vi], 460, [4], [8, Index], 4to, [bound with, pasted inside front cover:] single sheet broad side, drop head tile: Marine Humane Society. Directions for the recovery of the apparently Daed from Drowning. No printer, Halifax [Nova Scotia], April 4, 1809 contemporary ?deerskin, double blind fillets on sides with a delicate inner roll tooled border, upper hinge cracked, held by 1 cord, a bit rubbed and worn, headcaps a little defective £7,500 A fine volume of medical Lecture Notes, providing a panorame of the medicine of the early 19th century, both at home, and in America.
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The compiler of these Notes evidently returned to them again and again, as later marginal notes attest. The Royal College of Surgeons has a set of Lecture Notes for Clarke, but neither Clarke, nor Pearson, are listed in the Wellcome on-line manuscripts catalogue. The volume is in two parts. The first is notes of the Lectures of George Pearson in London in 1801 and 1802, with some associated material. At the end, there are Notes on the midwifery lectures of Dr. Clark, i.e. presumably John Clarke (bap. 1760, d. 1815) - who had been a pupil of John Hunter. In between is the commonplace book element, kept up in North America, and seemingly Halifax, Nova Scotia, in particular. The the compiler was apparently an American, if not originally, at least in practice, and this volume was in use for half a century, that is, an entire career. The whole is preceded by a 2-page, ruled in red, ‘The Classes, Orders & Genera of diseases, according to Cullen.’ Then begins ‘Plan for Ascertaining & Investigating disseases [sic] By G. Pearson.’ This procedes to p. 50. Starting on p. 53 is ‘Slow nervouse Fever, or Typhus Mitior (of Cullen).’ On p. 65 ‘[Small pox, or - crossed out] Exanthematic Fevers,’ begins a lengthy section on small pox and vaccination, including a quotation from Jenner: this was the main bone of contention between Pearson and Jenner. The section is rounded off with various other diseases, especially cholera, extending to p. 325. Pp. 314 to the end are on cholera, and includes extracts from newspapers and journal chronicling the progress of various outbreak in Canada and the United States, and theories thereon propounded. In the midst is ‘Establishment of the Humane Society (London), the wording of which, in places is followed in the broadside. Notes on the Lectures of Johhn Clarke which follow are ones delivered at his home, No, 1 New Burlington Street (he also lectured at St. Bartholomew’s), and are dated 1802 & 1803. At the end are ‘Forms of Medicines, from Hamilton’s Midwifery.’ A number of pages have been torn out, notably between the Pearson portion and the midwifery section, and within the page count, some pages are blank. The broadside, which is foxed, laid down on the inside front cover, split at fold with the loss of a letter or two, seems to be unrecorded. The binding is curious, and may be American. The skin (?deer, ?moose) is not of a type we are familiar with in British bindings of the period. 24. Hook (James) A Collection of Favorite Songs Sung by Mr. Dignum, Mr. Denman, Mrs. Franklin, the Two Miss Howells, & Mrs. Mountain, at Vauxhall Gardens... [with] Second Collection of Favorite Songs Sung by The Two Miss Howells, Mr. Dignum, Mr. Denman, Mrs. Franklin, & Mrs. Mountain at Vauxhall Gardens... A. Bland and Weller’s, 1798, engraved throughout, titles with vignettes of views of Vauxhall Gardens, musical notation for voice and keyboard with up to 7 systems per page, faint toning, final leaf of first collection with two tears, neatly repaired on verso, inch section of foreedge of seventh leaf of second collection cut away, not touching music, second collection with early manuscript numerals at upper corners, pp. 1, [ii, blank], 2-17 [i, blank]; 1, [ii, blank], 2-18, folio, twentieth-century red cloth, spine with
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section of earlier gilt-lettered calf re-laid, head and foot with slight damage, boards faded with small stains, engraved bookplate by C.J. Harper of A.M. Broadley, The Knapp, 1911, good £850 From 1774 to 1820, James Hook was the musical director and organist at the famous Vauxhall Gardens, composing around two thousand songs specifically for the venue and performing an organ concerto every evening at closing time. Music played a significant part in the entertainments on offer, performed by the most feted musicians and singers of the day, and attracting huge crowds 61,000 revellers were recorded at a fancy-dress proprietor’s jubilee in 1786. These particular collections of songs (featuring, in the first set, Lillies and Rose, Come buy my Wooden Ware, The Little Singing Girl, As forth I rang’d the Banks of Tweed, Loves Telegraph, Drink to the Girls left behind us, How tedious alas are the hours, Young Jemmy is a pleasing Youth; and in the second, Jemmy’s the Lad that I Love, From Scenes of Love and Soft Delight, Womans only Wish, Tis all a Jest, And A for Love of Me, Come Buy my Daffodillies, No not yet, Tis You and you only I love) are uncommon Worldcat citing BL, Bodleian, Newberry and Geneva. Alexander Meyrick Broadley (1847-1916), after a colourful civil service career in India and Tunis, banishment from London Society, due in part to the Cleveland Street Scandal, and subsequent exile to Paris and Brussels, finally returned home to build his Dorset retreat, The Knapp, where he spent the last 20 years of his life writing, collecting and grangerising books. The United States of America 25. (United States. Declaration of Independence.) REASONS ASSIGNED BY THE CONTINENTAL CONGRESS, for the North American Colonies and Provinces with-drawing their Allegiance to the King of Great britain. In Congress, July 4th, 1776. A Declaration by the Representatives of the United States of America, in General Congress assembled. Printed for J. Dodsley, 1777, contained in The Annual Register, or View of the History, Politics, and Literature, for the Year 1776, printer’s ornament on title with a single rule above and below, text in double columns, pp. 2361-70, entire volume pp. iv 112, *113-*192, 113-270, [2]; 259, [9], 8vo, contemporary half sheep, blue Herrnhut ((Fulneck) paper boards, skin lacking from corners, date in gilt in second compartment down, a bit worn and discoloured (Todd, William B. ’A bibliographical account of the Annual Register’, Library, 5th ser. v.XVI (1961), pp. 104-20; ESTC N63037; Sabin 1614) £1,500 The first book-form British printing of the Declaration of Independence, followed by the Articles of Confederation. The latter date from 4th of October 1776.
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The Annual Register of course supplies a splendid panorama of its point in time. There is much regarding events in the colonies, leading up to the Declaration of Independence. And, for flavour, an essay on ‘Slavery absolutely inconsistent with, and even contrary to, sound policy’, and, in the poetry section (where there are other American pieces), an ‘Ode on the breaking of a china quart mug belonging to the buttery of Lincoln College, Oxford.’ There is no indication of provenance, though the binding points to the north of England. This is one of several variants, and one of the least common. 26. (Midwifery.) MALADIES DES FEMMES GROSSES, Traité des accouchements, Maladies des femmes accouchées, et celles des enfants nouveaux nés. No place, [c. 1760], manuscript in ink on paper, in a single regular, but slightly crabbed hand, with attempts at calligraphic flourishes, with 5 small drawing of instruments on 3 pages, coloured in yellow, the foreedges of the last third or so leaves cut close, with loss of a few page numerals, pp. [v, Table du probabilité de la durée de la vie], 237, [1], contemporary calf, double gilt fillets on sides, spine gilt in compartments, and lettered direct (see below), spine a bit defective at either end, slight insect damage to lower edge of upper board, good £900 A comprehensive treatise, without however any apparent authorship. The lettering on the spine does not help: the 3 lines ‘SANR / DEREC / PRON’ does not seem to bear any relation to the contents. The work is prefaced by a brief survey of the science of obstetrics, the author remarking how the field had formerly been the domain of women only, but that the situation had changed, so that now in Holland and England man-midwives abounded. The recent literature is surveyed, the last item being Roederer’s Elementa artis obstetriciae, 1753, ‘just published’ ‘vient de donner... un fort bon Livre.’ The defects to the spine allow us to see that the volume is crudely side-stitched. The MS will have been written out while the leaves were unbound, and the binder has been a little unkind to some fore-margins; the title itself is cropped, with the ‘nts’ of accouchements on a returned line.
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Distilling 27. (Medicine. Jesuit.) MANUSCRIPT RECEIPT BOOK. Italy: Fatto l’Aggiunto Anno 1743, manuscript in ink on paper, in 2 hands (see below), large drawing of a flowering plant in a pot with handles on first page, a little bit of spotting, and minor staining at edges, some corrosion of the ink, mostly to the page numbers, which seem to have been added later, pp. [i], 1 [verso of first leaf] - 64, [5, blank], [4, Index], [4, blank but for marginal rules], folio, contemporary vellum over carta rustica, lacking rear fly-leaf, paper label on upper cover with ‘No. 13. 1743’ in ink, soiled, upper cover heavily scored at top (possibly removing evidence of provenance) £2,000 An expansive collection of recipes for numerous waters, elixirs, oils, poisons, aqua vitae, &c, in Italian. The text up till page 59 is in one hand, another thereafter. At the foot of p. 59 it states ‘Finis colloquia’, though the appositeness of ‘colloquia’ is not clear. The last recipe here is Cioccolato Perfetto (cinnamon, vanilla, cacao, sugar, in proportion). The recipes are sometimes introduced as cures for specific ailments, other provide no suggestions of usage. Some are brief, others lengthy. The opening page has the Jesuit motto ADGM at the head. On p. 1 there is a recipe from Queen Elizabeth of Hungary (?Hungary Water): this recipe is in Latin. Loosely inserted at the front, on separate pieces of paper, are a recipe for turtle soup, and notes on irregular pulse. The front flyleaf seems to be the original wrapper, its corresponding part at the end now missing. It is rather browned, but doesn’t affect the surrounding area.
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28. [Gardemau (Baltazar)] [Holograph Sermon on Circumcision and Uncircumcision]. No. 106. Coddenham, Suffolk, 1703-13, manuscript in ink on paper, the paper a little browned, and with a few spots, or smudges, the ink through-setting in some places, but all perfectly legible, a few corrections to the text, pp. [24], 8vo, stitched £750 The text is Galatians 6, v. 15, ‘For in Christ Jesus neither circumcision nor uncircumcision avails anything, but a new creation.’ Garedmau thoroughly agrees with St. Paul, and gets in a few swipes at ‘Papists’ too. Gardemau was a Huguenot, born in Poitiers in 1655, who fled France on the revocation of the Edict of Nantes. Although not university educated, he became the Anglican vicar of Coddenham in Suffolk, to which was added nearby Ashbocking in 1692. He records at the end the time and place of his preaching it - 3 times in each parish between 1703 and 1713: someone else seems to have preached it at Coddenham 29 years after Gardemau’s death. There is a notice of him in Francis Haslewood’s 1897 ‘Church plate in the county of Suffolk.’ In it we learn that ‘ a few years back, in a secret repository behind the Bookcases of his library, were discovered about 300 of his sermons, singularly well written, in good English, full of scripture quotations, giving evidence of no mean acquirements and capabilities as an English preacher and Calvinist divine.’ This, then, is an escapee from that cache.
29. [Emes (Thomas)] Vindiciæ mentis. An Essay of the Being and Nature of Mind: Wherein the Distinction of Mind and Body, The Substantiality, Personality, and Perfection of Mind is Asserted; and the Original of our Minds, their Present, Separate, and Future State, is freely enquir’d into, in order to a more certain Foundation for the Knowledge of God, and our Selves, and the clearing all Doubts and Objections that have been, or may be made concerning The Life and Immortality Of Our Souls. In a New Method, By a Gentleman. Printed for H. Walwyn, 1702, FIRST EDITION, tear in upper margin of titlepage (no loss) repaired, somewhat water-stained (we have seen worse), burn hole in I7 with the loss of a few letters, or bits of letters, pp. xii, 180, [1, Errata, here bound after preliminaries, 8vo, modern calf backed boards, old lettering piece (’Emes / on / Mind’) preserved (ESTC T117131) £600 ODNB puts it that ‘Emes's fame rests not so much on any activity during his lifetime but on the absence of it following his death’, a reference to his failure to resurrect at the appointed time. Emes (d. 1707), ‘medical practitioner and millenarian’ acc. ODNB, otherwise a quack. This work evinces a belief in the possibility - nay, gives an example - of resurrection (coincidentally opposite the burn hole), somewhat before ‘Emes became one of the British adherents of a millenarian group known as the French Prophets, soon after they arrived in
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London in 1706’ (ibid). It was one of their number who predicted Emes’s resurrection. Scarce: ESTC records an variant, with Emes’s name on the title, T179082, Dr. Williams’s Library only. 30. Anonymous. UN SOLITAIRE L’Analyse des vertus en abregé. Paris: [De l'Imprimerie de J. B. Cusson], Jean Guignard, 1698, FIRST (ONLY) EDITION, woodcut device on title, title a little stained, and with a couple of chips to fore-edge, some foxing, worming in the lower margins, [xvi], 358, [10, ads],12mo, mid- to late-19th-century red calf backed boards, spine slightly darkened, corners a bit worn, exposing cloth tips £850 An extremely rare (the only copy we can locate is in the BNF), brief, and vigourous, exposition of the virtues according to established religion, heavy on the sins of the flesh. It is in two parts: Vertus Théologales, and Vertus Cardinales. The second part is less intensely religious, and strays into the prudential. The author refers to the work as ‘un fruit du Desert’, aluding to his solitary retreat. Music and morals 31. Chiavelloni (Vincenzo) Discorsi della musica... Dedicati all’Emin. e Reveren. Sig. Card. Iacomo Rospigliosi Nipote della santita di nostro signore PP. Clemente Nono. Rome: Ignatio de Lazeri, 1668, FIRST (only) EDITION, with an engraved frontispiece signed by Carlo Cesio, title-page woodcut vignette, woodcut decorated initials, head and tailpieces, damp-staining in inner margins at beginning, occasional browning, faint spotting throughout, small stains through leaves Pp3 to Qq2 and small internal tear to fore-margin (Yy1), early annotations at upper margin and through first 4 lines of opening of Discorsi I (A1r), repairs to title-page, with the loss of a letter or two of the banner, probably masking the removal of a library stamp, a few leaves at the beginning reinforced at inner margin, pp. [xvi, including frontispiece, the last leaf blank], 556, [2], 4to, contemporary gilt-tooled vellum over pasteboards, arabesque roll-tooled border, triple fillet panel surrounded by floral and star tools with outstretched eagle tools at each corner and delicate scrollwork cornerpieces, central coat of arms of Bernardino Cardinal Rocci, spine with lateral double arabesque roll-tooled design, title lettered in ink over the gilt, rear inner hinge repaired, minor soiling/staining, inside front cover ex libris 'Bibliothecae Petri Buoninsegni, Senis 1814' and Landau 16654, (Gregory-Sonneck p. 58) £3,800 A significant association copy of this important work on morals and music, dedicated by Vincenzo Chiavelloni, canon of the Cathedral of Rieti and member of the famous Roman Accademia degli Sterili, where these Discorsi were delivered, to Bernardino Rocci (1627-1680), leader of the aforementioned
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Academy, who was named bishop on 22 April 1668 (and was later elevated to Cardinal in 1675). ‘[Chiavelloni’s] Discorsi della musica (Rome, 1668)... consist of 24 essays on the relationship of music to moral values and the development of virtue and as an aid to philosophy. The work relies entirely on ancient classical authors and is thus an example of the 17th-century Italian interest in the broad humanistic knowledge found in the works of philosophy, rhetoric and aesthetics of classical Greek and Latin sources. Of particular value to Baroque music aesthetics is the emphasis on music as a vehicle for representing and controlling the emotions of audiences, an aspect of ancient classical philosophy that was the basis for the Baroque theory of the Affects’ (Oxford Music Online). Quoted from his latest catalogue in the Monthly Review, Vol. 16, 1757, a Mr. Baretti describes the point of the Discorsi as ‘not so much the instruction of Italian musicians, as the reformation of their morals; and to say truth… their morals want as much correction as their music, which has, for these fifty years past, much degenerated from its antient solemnity. Chiavelloni, amongst other good things, tells these pretended Virtuosi to abstain from expressing effeminate passions, and singing obscene songs, to which they are in general too much addicted.’
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32. Gunter (Edmund) The Description and Use of the Sector, Crossestaffe, & Other Instruments. VVith a Canon of Artificiall Sines and Tangents, to a Radius of 10000.0000. parts, and the vse thereof in Astronomie, Navigation, Dialling, and Fortification, &c. The second Edition much augmented Printed by William Iones, for Iames Bowler, 1636, with additional engraved title-page (which extends the title further), engraved frontispiece, diagram on printed title, 2 woodcut plates, and 2 printed slips, 1 folding, bound in, numerous diagrams and illustrations in the text, some full-page, others nearly so, slightly browned, a few patches of minor staining, one leaf with 2 small holes, 1 in the fore-margin, 1 with minor loss to text, [xii], 78, [2], 79113, 116-163, [1]; 266; 56, 59-64, 67-75, [1]; [114], 4to, contemporary calf, double blind fillets on sides, on the upper cover, at the outer upper corner there is a sequence of numbers from 1 to 10 blocked in blind, descending vertically, the sequence repeated half way through below (an unusual feature), repeated, one line only, on lower cover, rebacked, corners and edges repaired, fly-leaf at the end ruled in columns in red, small blue paper label inside front cover with a name scratched out, much later pencil annotations and workings in pencil in a few places (ESTC S103555; see Taylor p. 196) £6,500 A good, large, complete copy of the second and best edition of Gunter's collected writings (called The Works in the third edition of 1653), edited by Samuel Foster, with additions, including a chapter on the mathematics of fortification, not published before. The volume is in four separately numbered parts, comprising the Booke of the Sector, Booke of Crosse-stafte, Use of the Canon and Table, and the Canon Triangulorum, the last with a separate title page. Waters says the Booke of the Sector ‘must rank with Eden's translation of Cortes's Arte de Navegar and Wright's Certaine Errors as one of the three most important English books ever published for the improvement of navigation... [Gunter] opened up... an entirely new field, that of arithmetical navigation’ (Art of Navigation, p. 359). And further, ‘Gunter's exposition of finding a ship's position by calculation since it was eventually published to the world, must be classed as one of the most influential scientific works on navigation.’ ‘Easily the most substantial of Gunter's works was The Description and Use of the Sector, the Crosse-Staffe and other such Instruments (1623) which explained instruments which he had designed. Apart from the two mentioned in the title it also included an astronomical quadrant and a ‘cross-bow’—an alternative to the backstaff used by sailors for solar altitude measurements. Although this instrument did not become popular the others all did, in one form or another. The Gunter sector was a much more complex instrument than Thomas Hood's. It allowed calculations involving square and cubic proportions, and carried various trigonometrical scales. Moreover it had a scale for use with Mercator's new projection of the sphere, making this projection more manageable for navigators who were only partially mathematically literate. The sector was sold as a navigational instrument throughout the
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seventeenth century and survived in cases of drawing instruments for nearly three hundred years. The most striking feature of the cross-staff, distancing it from other forms of this instrument, was the inclusion of logarithmic scales. This was the first version of a logarithmic rule, and it was from Gunter's work that logarithmic slide rules were developed, instruments that remained in use until the late twentieth century’ (ODNB). A scarce book anyway, it is often found incomplete (e.g. the Macclesfield copy). The matter is not helped by the fugitive nature of the inserts (sometimes called plates, but really inserts), and the fact that one of the plates is a volvelle, intended to be cut out. For some reason, the additional engraved title is sometimes missing. Several of the text illustrations extend well beyond the boundary of the text, and are therefore liable to cropping. In this copy only one if these is touched, and that barely.
33. Felicianus (pseud., attributed to Petrus de Ilperinis Romanus) De divina praedestinatione. [Augsburg: Monastery of SS. Ulrich and Afra (with Anton Sorg's type), 1473-74], EDITIO PRINCEPS, 11 leaves, of 12, lacking the final blank, rubricated throughout, 3- and 4-line initials and an 8-line one at the beginning crudely filled in, tear in the fore-margin of leaf 10, going inwards and upwards but just avoiding the text, skilfully repaired (probably caused by the slightly corroded tab on the following leaf), folio (280 x 205 mm), vellum over boards of the first half of the 20th century, probably German, ink lettering on spine (ISTC if00053000) ÂŁ5,000 A rare production from the short-lived
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press of the Monastery of SS. Ulrich and Afra, under the direction of Melchior von Stamham, a patron of learning. The abbot went ahead with the printing press ‘despite all entreaties of his friends’ (BMC), starting in 1473: but he died at the end of January 1494, and printing ceased shortly thereafter. Little is known of the author, who died in 1381. He was a Dominican, and his brother a cardinal. 34. Henry VI (king of England and lord of Ireland, and duke of Aquitaine, 1421-71) King's Pardon issued to William Bulkeley in Eyton [Eaton], Cheshire, for ‘trespasses felonies and all offence’ in the Marches of Wales, [docket on verso], signed by the clerk at the end [John] Pemberton. Westminster: 10th February 1458, manuscript in Latin, on vellum, 212 X 420mm, in a fine Chancery hand, 33 lines, calligraphic initials at head, large remains of Great Seal, white wax seal, loss of right quarter of seal, also loss to tail and cracked, creased, slightly browned £5,000 A royal pardon issued during the negotiations (and therefore part of them) that led to the the famous Loveday reconciliation between the factions of Lancaster and York, which brought to an end the Wars of the Roses, though not a complete cessation of rivalries. The Loveday of March 1458 was Henry VI's last major intervention in politics before he lapsed into feebleness, and the subsequent dominance of Queen Margaret. The ceremony had been preceded by weeks of intense negotiation between the parties and it is probable that this pardon was issued as part of the peace process. The Bulkeley's were Lancastrian officers and were dominant in Cheshire and north Wales. One William Bulkeley was part of the king's officers charged with arresting Richard, Duke of York when he returned from Ireland and landed in north Wales. His pardon ‘all felonies, rebellion, negligence, extortion, concealments and any consequent outlawries ‘ perfectly understandable. The calligraphic initials are an attractive feature. Among words capitalised the treatment of Angliae is rather muted, compared with Franciae and Hiberniae.