Amory 2025

Dean Cooke Rare Books Ltd

a catalogue of recent acquisitions & selections from stock, to be exhibited

3-6 april 2025 booth e10 at the park avenue armory ny

ONE

¶ The remarkable provenance of this book traces its journey through a series of owners, whose hands record their different responses to this richly diverse and engrossing text. From ecology to antiquarianism to pilchards, the annotators display their particular interests through their manuscript interactions.

ELIZABETHAN ANTIQUARY

The Elizabethan antiquary and poet Richard Carew (1555–1620), is best known for his Survey of Cornwall. (1602). A pioneering work, it is above all a representation of Cornwall as its author saw it, in terms of the landscape and climate, and of the occupations of men and women whose lives these shaped. Such matters as the local tin mines, the fishing industry, and the games people played, including hurling, all come within the compass of his lively pen.

Carew includes an early account of the use of sign language by two deaf people, reflecting his lifelong interest in languages: he taught himself Greek, Italian, German, Spanish, and French, and his panegyric, The excellencie of the English tongue (1614), entangled him in a dispute which involved (among others) Richard Verstegan, Thomas Nashe, Edmund Spenser, and William Shakespeare.1 This feel for language may account for one of the pleasures of the Survey of Cornwall: Carew’s exuberant style. This, according to Halliday, 2 is perfectly encapsulated in his remarks on Cornish rats: “alike cumbersome through their crying and rattling, while they dance their gallop galliards in the roof at night”.

This passage attracted the attention of our earliest annotator, who has written “good store” beside the printed marginalia “rats”. The following paragraph concerning lice, or “slowe sixe-legged walkers” as Carew dubs them, has been marked out with a very neat manuscript manicule pointing directly to “Lice”.

¶ CAREW, Richard (1555-1620).

The Survey of Cornwall. Written by Richard Carew of Antonie, Esquire.

London: Printed by S. S[tafford] for Iohn Iaggard, and are to bee sold neere Temple-barre, at the signe of the Hand and Starre. 1602. FIRST EDITION.

Quarto. Foliation: [4], 159, [5] leaves. Collated and complete with the initial blank leaf. [STC 4615]. 18th or early 19th century half calf, gilt panelled spine, red morocco label.

FIRES AND FISH

Judging from their annotations, this anonymous reader seems interested in the Cornish landscape and its uses, picking out such matters as the denudation of land by the tin mining industry whose practices, Carew declares, “yeeldeth a speedie and gainful recompense” at the expense of the soil quality, or as our annotator says, “spoil much grownd” (a striking early modern instance of ecological concern). They make further scattered remarks upon

inclyned to furze & broome”. They also make occasional note on property rights, especially regarding the complicated operations of land management, ownership, leasing, and enclosures (“fines for .3. lyves”, “al imp[ro] vem[en]t in fine not in rent”, “they take for lyves not for yeares”).

The other important economic industry in Cornwall was sardine fishing - the subject that most occupies our first scribe’s attention, especially its consumption and export to Spain. They have underlined the words “The trayne is well solde” and noted in the margin “15li a tune” (presumably the current market rate); and they estimate the

quantity of pilchards and the markup on the original price paid to fishermen when the fish reach their destination in Spain: “i000 of pilchardes are sold for, 3s ther, & in Spayne for 8s”. But, as Carew notes, the fish must not only be caught, but also prepared for export – work which benefits “almost an infinite number of women and children” who carry out the “bulking, washing, and packing”. These words are numbered one to three in manuscript, and a note to the margins elaborates on each task: “1. Laying by ye walls in order / 2. After making them on stikes & washing the silt & [ smudged] of / 3. puting in barels to presse them”.

Our piscine-preoccupied annotator also weighs in on how sardines are to be eaten. The best way is to present “the pilchard for service at the table is drest thus taken out of the barell, & scrape of the skine & take out the bone, & then mince them & then put them in a platter, shred (?) with spanich onyons, & oil and bringe also minced / this dish the Spaniard eates to relish a / cup of wine without once [–shaved] it in [any?] fire” [last six words shaved].

THE HERALDS

The next reader, and the first to claim ownership, was the herald and antiquary Peter Le Neve, (1661-1729), who has inscribed the front blank A1 “Liber Petri Le Neve Rouge Crois [Pursuivant] 1695”, to which position he was appointed in January 1689/90, and advanced to Norroy King of Arms in 1704. Le Neve was fellow of the Royal Society and helped found the Antiquarian Society, becoming its first President. He was an active transcriber of early manuscripts and a voracious book and manuscript collector; it has been said that he was miserly in many things, but would “give more for a Book than it was worth, grudging no expence of that sort”.3 At a sale of Le Neve’s library over 12 days from 22 February 1731, over 2,000 printed books and 1,252 manuscript lots were sold, the latter including 584 heraldic manuscripts from Sir Thomas St George's collection, 72 pedigree rolls, 22 portfolios of pedigrees, and 28 boxes of charters.

Our book passed from one herald to another; its subsequent reader was the arms painter and herald painter, Josiah Jones (d. 1764) (not William Burton as a note to the endpaper claims). Although he has not inscribed the volume with his name, Jones has a distinctive hand which has something of a “modern” appearance about it. Were it not for the fact that he signed and dated some of his work, it might easily be taken for later in the 18th century or even into the next.4

Jones’s focus of attention in this book was the genealogical section. Although Carew was interested in the affairs of armigerous Cornish families, his Survey of Cornwall is unencumbered by the heraldry that bulks so large in other chorographies. Jones seems to have considered this an oversight, and has augmented the volume with no fewer than 74 heraldic shields in the margins, mostly annotated with names and tricked. Nonetheless, his method of augmentation was quite parsimonious and does not interrupt the flow of Carew’s narrative.

manuscripts through marriage. But there is no evidence that he did; instead he likely acquired some from le Neve, who had in turn received some from Morgan’s daughter. Among other material that Jones acquired from le Neve is the genealogical section of the volume commonly known as le Neve’s ‘Equestion Book’ [BL Add. Ms 62541]. Sir Anthony Wagner thought that Jones bought the whole volume, but close inspection reveals that it was only later and for some unknown reason that the genealogical and hippological sections were bound together to create the volume. As is the case in our book, Jones was only interested in genealogy.

Jones lived in Vauxhall and Lambeth and is known to have transcribed manuscripts at Lambeth Palace Library, which would have been within easy walking distance. His transcriptions include copies of manuscripts such as

Monumental Inscriptions, Arms & Co: which he has signed “Jos. Jones” and added the introductory note “These things were gather’d whilst the work was doing at Palace of the Archbishop of Canterbury 1749”. Later records show Jones was still working there in 1758, which overlaps with Andrew Coltée Ducarel’s time as keeper of the library. We know that Ducarel was aware of Jones: Thomas Thrope’s “Catalogue for 1840 of a Most Choise and Truly Valuable Collection of Autograph Letters” includes a letter dated 1762, from Sir Peter Thompson to Ducarel, informing the latter that he “knew Mr Jones near forty years back; he was then painter to Drury Lane play-house”.5

¶ References:

1. Carew’s The excellencie of the English tongue, was first published in the second edition of William Camden’s Remaines (1614).Quoted in ODNB, S. Mendyk.

2. Richard Carew of Antony: The Survey of Cornwall. Halliday, F.E. (Ed. and Intro.) (1969).

3. Thomas Woodcock in the ODNB.

4. We are very grateful to Dr Robert Colley for identifying the hand.

5. The biography and the complicated story of the dispersal of Morgan’s library is the subject of a forthcoming publication by Dr Robert Colley, who has been extremely generous in sharing his scholarship prior to publication.

6. Alston, R. C. Inventory of Sale catalogues… 1676-1800. (2010).

7. Robin Myers in the ODNB.

8. Ibid. Alston.

books of prints and drawings; library of books and manuscripts, of Mr. Josiah Jones, painter: including the valuable collection of heraldical manuscripts of the late Sylvanus Morgan. [Sale catalogue, Samuel Paterson, 3 December 1759]. We do not know exactly why Jones sold so much of his library, especially the valuable Sylvanus Morgan manuscripts, but he may have been quite old (we have been unable to establish his date of birth) and starting to divest himself of his bibliographic assets. Whatever the case, the sale catalogue following his death in September 1764 still featured around 400 books (including some of his manuscript transcriptions). Paterson’s services were again called upon, and in December of the same year, he issued A catalogue of the genuine collection of prints and drawings, books, and heraldical manuscripts, of Mr. Josiah Jones, late of Vaux-Hall, painter, deceased. 6

ORDERING AND INDEXING

The next record of ownership is by the abovementioned Andrew Coltée Ducarel (1713-1785), a French-English antiquary, librarian, archivist, and lawyer who fled to England with his Huguenot family in 1722. He was educated at Oxford, was elected FSA at the age of twenty-four, and served as librarian (1754-7) and as treasurer (1757-61) of Doctors’ Commons, also writing a valuable reference work entitled A summary account of Doctors Commons.

In 1757, he took the position of librarian at Lambeth Palace Library – its first lay librarian and the longest serving, He put a great deal of effort into ordering the library’s collections by greatly improving the catalogues both of the printed books and of the manuscripts.

He has affixed his engraved armorial bookplate “Andrew Colteè Ducarel / L.L.D. / Doctor’s Commons”, to the paste-down, and inscribed the front blank “A Ducarel 1770” to the blank endpaper. A three-page manuscript index of surnames (“Index Cognominum”), bound in at the end, also appears to be by him. It is written on 18th-century paper, and the hand is very similar to examples of Ducarel’s held at Lambeth Palace Library [MS958f6; MS958f12; dedication to: MS5194a].

Our volume was included in the sale of Ducarel’s library, entitled A catalogue of the very valuable library of books, manuscripts, and prints, of the late Andrew Coltee Ducarel. [Sale catalogue, Leigh and Sotheby, 3 April 1786],8 where it was described laconically: Lot “361 Carew’s Survey of Cornwall 1602”. A year after this auction, the book came into the possession of “John (inscription to title page). A pencil note to the front endpaper claims that it is in the hand of the philanthropist and prison reformer, John Howard (1726?-1790) – an entirely plausible contention, but unsubstantiated. The most recent ownership record takes the book back to its Cornish roots: the armorial bookplate to the front endpaper reads “CLC / Treverben Vean” i.e. Lieutenant Colonel Charles Lygon Somers Cocks (1821-1885) of Treverben in Cornwall.

CONCLUSION

Charting the provenance in this copy amounts to its own chorographical study. The connections traced, especially those concerning the connecting paths in the libraries of Peter le Neve, Josiah Jones, and Ducarel have yet to be clearly mapped, but they offer an extra dimension of appeal to an already hugely engaging volume.

£7,500 / $9,700 Ref: 8302

¶ A gender fluid spy, diplomat, and soldier, Chevalière d’Éon challenges our understanding of 18th-century attitudes to the politics of sex and gender. The story of their espionage in Britain and the ensuing public drama add further intrigue to an already compelling life. This rare broadside, written by his nemesis-turned-supporter, is at once the author’s confession and his defence of d’Éon, intended to restore their reputation.

CHARLOTTE / CHARLES / CHEVALIÈRE

Charlotte d’Éon de Beaumont or Charles d’Éon de Beaumont (1728-1810), usually known as the Chevalière d’Éon, lived openly as a man for the first part of their adult life, then as a woman until their death. Having entered diplomatic service in the 1750s, d’Éon spied for the French Russia and was appointed to Louis XV’s ‘secret service’. In 1762, they were posted to London to negotiate the Treaty of Paris; its successful signing the following year earned them the Order of Saint-Louis and the title ‘Chevalier’. During this period, however, and under the cover of their role as interim French ambassador, they collected information for a projected French invasion of Britain.

The arrival in London of the Comte de Guerchy, the new French ambassador, signalled a crisis for d’Éon, who lost their position and found themselves at odds, both politically and personally, with de Guerchy. After d’Éon published details in 1764 of the French government’s attempts to recall them – a serious violation of diplomatic protocol – de Guerchy engaged one Peter Henry Treyssac de Vergy to act against d’Éon.

¶

[Chevalière d'Éon (1728-1810); Treyssac de Vergy, Pierre Henri (c.1740-1774)] A True Copy of the last Will and Testament of Peter Henry Treyssac de Vergy, deceased as proved at Doctors-Commons by his Executor, the 10th of October 1774.

London: W. Humphrey, Gerrard Street, Soho. 1775. [Publication details in plate]. Folio (460 x 280 mm). Single sheet, a little creased.

Only one copy located in the UK at the Guildhall Library [ESTC No: T197474]. No copies located in the USA.

Probably by virtue of having kept the more sensitive information about their spying activities close to their chest –with the implied threat of making it public – d’Éon apparently avoided serious censure from the French government. Their return to France was sanctioned on the strict condition that they lived openly as a woman –possibly to force them to the margins of political life. In any case, d’Éon spent the rest of their life as a woman, even after returning later to Britain, beyond the reach of the French authorities. De Vergy, though, soon had a change of heart about his shady assignment.

“THE WRONG WHICH I HAVE DONE”

In this broadside, published in 1775 after de Vergy’s death, he explains his change of allegiance and issues a solemn apology to d’Éon for “the wrong which I have done to him, to his Fortune, to himself, and to all his Family” for his role in “Designs which were so hurtful to him; Designs, whose Blackness I was ignorant of, till the Moment when the Count de Guerchy thought that the Destruction of the Chevalier d’Eon ought not to be retarded any longer”. Indeed, it had been on de Vergy’s evidence that “the French ambassador was indicted in the court of common pleas of having incited [de Vergy] to kill D’Éon” (ODNB).

Contemporary accounts suggest that it was de Guerchy rather than D’Éon who needed rehabilitation. The latter’s popularity may have been largely due to speculation about their sexual identity (which in the 1770s was much discussed in London coffee houses and became the subject of a wager at the Stock Exchange), but Guerchy became something of a pariah, to judge by episodes as the stoning of his London residence by an angry mob (ODNB).

The top half of the broadside is taken up by a mezzotint of d’Éon, perhaps to help convey that the chief topic of de Vergy’s account is not himself but his former quarry (some descriptions have erroneously stated that the portrait depicts de Vergy himself). The question of d’Éon’s sexual identity, unsurprisingly, is not alluded to in this “last Will and Testament”, and the evidence suggests that, although some (including James Boswell) expressed distaste at their gender fluidity, just as common a contemporary reaction was fascination, or even admiration (Mary Wollstonecraft being one such admirer).

This broadside is an enthralling document from the final chapter in the remarkable story of Chevalière d’Éon; a story which raises questions about the changing views of gender in 18th-century Europe, and suggests that a more open attitude about gender and sexual politics long preceded our contemporary conversations about LGBTQ+ identities.

£1,750 / $2,260 Ref: 8298

THREE

¶ John Woodhouse had died long before this 1687 printing of his popular almanac, but so reliable was his “brand”, that the Stationers continued printing his almanacs into the 18th century. As is often the case with such widelycirculated books, the inverse law of print survival has reduced Woodhouse almanacs to a few surviving copies from various years. Only two copies of this 1687 edition are recorded (British Library and Yale).

This copy has been interleaved throughout with blanks. Its owner has annotated approximately 10 pages with notes, mostly payments (“Paid Jane Nancy’s maid her half years wage due ye 23d of December last past, being 02-00-00”, “Paid Jack in full of all notes to this day 00-6 -3”) in 1688, but is been picked up and used again in 1714 to add a couple of further pages of notes, one of which is so dense as to make transcription almost insurmountable.

¶ WOODHOUSE, John. Woodhouse 1687 a new almanack for the year of our Lord 1687 : being the third from the bissextile or leap-year, and from the worlds creation 5636 : wherein is contained a brief description of the four quarters of the year : excellent notes of husbandry and gardening for every month of the year : with the names of all the p[r]incipal fairs, and a description of the high-ways in England and Wales.

London: Printed by R.E. for the Company of Stationers. 1687. Octavo. Pagination 40 p. Second part (pp. [17-40]) has special title page: Woodhouse 1687 : a prognostication for the year of our Lord God 1687. [Wing, A2866; ESTC, R33053].

Contemporary full sheep, wallet style binding, rubbed, lacks tie.

£450 / $580 Ref: 8308

FOUR

¶ The pseudonym “Cardanus Riders” was an anagram of the compiler, Richard Saunders, whose almanac first appeared in the 1650s and was so successful that the “brand” survived even longer than the likes of Dade and Woodhouse, with editions of Rider recorded in the 19th century.

¶ RIDER, Cardanus. Riders (1688.) British

Merlin: bedeckt with many delightful varieties and useful verities, fitting the longitude and latitude of all capacities within the islands of Great Britain's monarchy. With chronological observations of principal note to this year 1688.

London: printed by Tho. Newcomb, for the Company of Stationers, 1688. Octavo. 48 p. Interleaved with 39 blank leaves, of which 32 pages have annotations. Contemporary full sheep, wallet style binding, rubbed, tie intact. Title pages frayed with small area of loss

This copy has been interleaved and annotated with financial accounts from the late 1680s (“the 29 of September i689... for Doctor Johnston 2 closes” expenses incurred “i691 at my mothers funerall” through to 1705 (“ffeb 1704 took up ye Liquorice in ye 2 qu in Holden Garth next Hospitall... in Micklegate & above”, “Cutting of this Liquorice”, “Hay sold in ye year 1704”). On one of the pages, there is a short list of household goods taken in 1687, including ”the 10 of ffebruary 87: A table in ye house...” “A Little Chest”, “A Range in ye house”, and “Six shelfes”

The earliest edition of Riders’s almanac recorded in ESTC was printed by John Field in 1654 (one copy only, Folger). It came under the control of the Company of Stationers, and the right to publish it passed from Robert and William Leybourn to Samuel Griffin who each held the rights for around a decade.

Next, it came to Thomas Newcombe who held onto this lucrative publication from the mid-1670s until the late 1680s when his apprentice, Edward Jones, took command. Indeed, the 1688 was the last to appear with

FIVE

¶ This poignant English Civil War pocketbook from a little-documented parish, reminds us of the number of individuals from the early modern period who have left little or no trace in the historical record.

When first produced, this would have been an attractive artefact comprising over a hundred blank leaves with a 1641 book of Psalms bound at the end. The contemporary sheep binding is rubbed and the boards have indentations, from having been carried around as a notebook. Our scribe has added learned and pious notes over a period of time, most likely whenever such thoughts occurred to them.

Two names are inscribed partway through the “Barnabas Atkins / 1648” (f.11v); then “Barnabus Atkins is my name” and “God is good and grasiouse / Hester Atkins / 1648” (f.12r). These answer to records at St. Martins, Tipton (or Tibberton) in Staffordshire: Hester Atkins (Bap. 25 March 1633) and Barnabas Atkins (Bap. 21 September 1634). The manuscript notes are fairly sophisticated, and since Hester and Barnabus would have been 15 and 14 respectively at the time of the inscriptions, we attribute most of these notes to their father, Robert Atkins, “clerk, lately of Tibbington alias Tipton, parish clerk of the parish church of Tibbington”.1

¶ [ATKINS, Robert]. 17th Century

Manuscript Pocketbook [bound with]

Sternhold & Hopkins, The Whole Book of Psalmes, 1641.

[Tipton, Staffordshire. Circa 1641-1648].

Octavo (170 x 112 x 20 mm).

Manuscript: Approximately 181 text pages on 100 leaves (several leaves excised).

The Whole Book of Psalmes: [10], 91, [3], p. Collated and complete. [Wing, B2381].

Despite Atkins père’s evident knowledge of Ancient Greek and Hebrew, he does not appear in the alumni lists of Oxford or Cambridge universities, but must surely have attended a grammar school. John Parkes reports that “the name of ‘Robert Atkins, minister of Tipton’” appears “in the Protestant List of Tipton residents in the Library of the Palace of Westminster”.2 Stebbing Shaw, writing his History & Antiquities Of Staffordshire at the end of the 18th century, complained of the poverty of extant material relating to Tipton, a state of affairs further illustrated in a printing of the Tipton Parish Register which lists Atkins’ name only as “occurring” between 1621 and 1634.3

Given the date of the Psalms bound into the end, we suggest the book was begun around 1642, which may coincide with the beginning of Robert Atkins’ Tipton ministry. The text, in a small, neat hand, is mostly in English, with numerous abbreviations and contractions, as well as some Ancient Greek and Hebrew. Various changes in the ink support the notion that Atkins has returned at different times to correct, amend, and expand on his thoughts. Atkins uses an aphoristic style (e.g. “D. It is a grevious sinne to omitt duties / privatine sinnes provoke aswel as positive sinnes of omiss: aswell &c” (f.30v.), apparently more for his own reflection and recollection than for use in

sermons or homilies. On occasion, however, he alights upon an image or phrase that may have found its way to the pulpit, for example: “Those yt oppose or fight against ye truth are like the fluds beating against strong rocks being ye more miser: dashed in peeces though fire & sword assault it yet will it not die” (f.31v.)).

A short time after their father’s use of the manuscript, Barnabus and Hester have claimed the book. At first their additions are juvenile, but they become more sophisticated (e.g. “ye the law of moses my seruant which I commanded … the heat of the fathers to the children to there fathers & lest I comme & smite the earth with a curse”).

Bound in contemporary sheep, blindstamped rules, rubbed, corners bumped, spine worn with traces of worming.

Provenance: inscriptions to ff. 11-12r of “Barnabas Atkins / 1648” and “Hester Atkins / 1648” (see details below). 20th century bookplate of Essex & Chelmsford Museum, manuscript label dated 1843 front board.

Whether or not the upheavals of the Civil War affected the Atkins family, Robert chose not to record such matters here, perhaps preferring the abstract realm of eternal truths such as “knowledg of God. Is a virtue whereby wee doe not only conceive there is a God but so know him exper yt wee may worsh: him. to know him is as to prize him love him &c.” (f.34r.). Primary sources from this conflagration-heavy period of English history are notoriously scarce and piecemeal, but this notebook survives to speak eloquently of its primary owner’s earnest piety, illuminating the work and beliefs of a provincial clergyman whose existence is barely represented elsewhere.

References:

1. Ancestry.com

2. John Parkes, History of Tipton (1915).

3. Tipton Parish Register.

£3,000 / $3,880 Ref: 8261

SIX

¶ An apothecary’s shop provides the setting for our unusual volume. The scribe, one “R. H.”, was, according to a note to the endpaper, “a Quaker and very curious Chymist who kept a large shop in London”. The copious annotations of this “Chymist” record his own experiments together his thoughts on those by Kenelm Digby, open a window into the workshop practices of a late 17th century apothecary and alchemist.

The importance of apothecaries and alchemists in the history of science and medicine should not be underestimated. Isaac Newton, for example, was himself an alchemist whose earliest encounters with its theories were at the apothecary’s shop where he boarded at the age of twelve, and where he was inspired by John Bate’s Mysteries of Nature and Art (1634), which he borrowed from the apothecary.

The English natural philosopher and courtier, Sir Kenelm Digby (1603-1665), developed an interest in scientific experiments early in his life, was one of the Founder Fellows of the Royal Society, and according to John Aubrey, “retired into Gresham College at London, where he diverted himself with his chemistry and the professors’ good conversation”. After Digby’s death, his records of experiments were published as Collection of Rare Secrets reissued as Chymical Secrets

ODNB remarks: “some of his research, especially in embryology, made positive contributions to scientific progress. All in all, Digby was one of the most remarkable thinkers and scientific enquirers of his day.”

¶ DIGBY, Kenelm, Sir (1603-1665); annotated by “R. H.”. Chymical Secrets, and Rare Experiments in Physick published since his death by George Hartman, 2 parts in 1 vol.

London: Printed for will. Cooper, at the Pelican in Little Britain. 1683 [Part. 2 dated 1682]. Octavo. Pagination [16], 272, with 4 engraved plates. The second part has a separate titlepage on L1r; register and

“A LOVER OF NATURAL TRUTHS”

Our 17th-century scribe remains anonymous, except for the initials “R. H.” after a note on p.56; but a later note –probably 18th-century – to the front endpaper reads “This book belonged to Mr –xx a Quaker and very curious Chymist who kept a large shop in London a Lover of Natural Truths and that by Labour and Experience [attd] - he attain’d – The Notes are worthy the consideration of ye Lovers of this Art. S. Mann”. Harris’s Eighteenth Century Medics, lists a Samuel Mann who in 1762 was apprenticed to John Beck, Apothecary of Armsley, York – a plausible match with our “S. Mann”, if not quite conclusive. But it is surprising that an apothecary working at so late a date counted himself among “ye Lovers of this Art”, when the “Art” had already begun its decline by the time of the book’s publication a century earlier.

Collated and complete. [Wing, D1421A (a reissue, with cancel title, of Wing D1426A)]. Underlining and manuscript notes in Latin and English to approximately 90 pages.

Contemporary panelled calf, worn and broken, spotting to text. 19th century bookplate to pastedown “Supreme Council” and the Masonic slogan “deus meumque jus”.

The 17th-century annotations show a high degree of active engagement. Some 31 pages have printed text underlined, 29 pages have marginalia (mostly with manicules), and six have interlinear notes. Our scribe has also made nine additions to the index, for example inserting “Acetum Radicat” before the first printed entry under “A” (and similarly annotating the given page, “171”, apparently assigning this Latin name to the preparation described by Digby as “The Dissolvent” – perhaps to mark a significant correlation with their own learning). Their confident additions are no doubt connected with their own, evidently extensive, practical experiments in alchemy, as we shall see.

“R. H.” is well read in the core alchemical texts and liberally cross-references authors and works. The Augustinian canon and alchemist George Ripley (d.1490) makes frequent appearances (“vide G: Riplea in pa et etiam Bassilius valentius” (p.152), the latter signifying the pseudonymous 15th-century alchemist Basilius Valentinus; “vide G Riplei in Medulla Alchimiae folio 127 et folio 157” (pp.63). So, too does the Majorcan philosopher and theologian Ramon Lull (c.1232-c.1316), whose coverage includes extensive marginal notes on p.114 (where “Milius”, i.e. the alchemical writer and composer Johann Daniel Mylius (c.1583-1642), is also acknowledged) and a citation on p.68 of Llull’s Testamentum and his other major work Liber de secretis: “Talem aquam [spirit] in venenies [recte invenies] in Testamento novissimo R. Luly pa 64. 66. Et in lib[ro] experimentorum pa 184”. Also invoked in the annotations are the polymath / theologian Roger Bacon (c.1220 – c.1292) (“vide Rogerum Baconem in sua Arte Chimica passim et precipue (in) pa[gina] 339 et in pa” (p.125.)), and the German alchemist Johann Glauber (1604-1670), whose eponymous salt our annotator traces to a process outlined on p.194 for “a wonderful Salt, that is exceeding fusible” (“NB Hoc est [salt] Enixum Glauberi”).

Sometimes our scribe sweeps up several such names in one sentence, as in the vertical note next to “Elixir ex vina & sole”: “NB This is a very excellent and true process, if well don: see Bas: Valentius his manu and R. Lullij and G. Ripleai but note yt when yr [gold] is dissolved to draw yr spirit often, and at last to a very thick oyle wch yw must fix gradually in a Gentel heate” (p.153). This sense of someone completely immersed in their materials is also evident on pages 55-56, where the recipe for ‘‘Tincture of Mars’’ has copious marginal notes that combine several modes of commentary: the cross-reference to other works (“Vide Bassilium Valentinum in particularibus or is pa 19 set pa 192”); endorsement of methods described (“I believe this process of ox. is a very good and true one”); and the mention of another practitioner (“This calcination of [gold] and the ox. is the best of all other I euer met wth I doe believe it was Docr Antony’s way”).

This devoted familiarity is also reflected in a comment on p.175 referring to a rare manuscript they either own or have access to: “Vide mea manuscripta Italia etatis R Lullium in expositione 13 excellentissimus modus calcinandi [gold]”. This suggests a late-13th or early-14th-century manuscript, written in Italian, by or about Ramon Lull – no trifling possession for an 17th-century “Chymist”, even a “very curious” one.

“BELIEVE ME”

Our scribe is, however, a ‘hands-on’ commentator, with considerable practical experience of many of the experiments described by Digby. Sometimes they let their expertise speak for itself, as on pages 252 where marginal annotations include a recommendation to use a “Glass retort”, especially if it is “well coated”, as it will be “better than an Earthen one” (they also suggest an ‘improvement’ to Digby’s instructions by offering an alternative method “To make the true spirit of [tartar]”, directing the reader to distil it Glauber teacheth”).

In other instances, they make a direct address to the reader, professing a firm belief in their own informed judgement and asking that we, too, share that belief. To a printed recipe outlining “An Operation with [gold] and [spirit] of [antimony]” (pp.65-68), they have added annotations in Latin and English: “Hic processus est notandus quia verus et optimus” (This process is to be noted because it is true and the best); and “I looke uppon this process to be true and the best of all others either in this or any other booke” – and a further note commends the recipe to future readers: “My friend who ever thou art that shalt have this Booke hearafter trust to this process above all others”.

Their desire for the reader’s faith in them is even more plainly expressed on pp.250 Laxative and Emetick Cream of Tartar”) when he appends the printed remedy: “NB when yw draw of yr spiritt mix alittel sirupp of Gilij flours wth it give it to ye patient it will revive him if he has any life left in him” – and

beseechingly adds: “believe me (as experience’d)”. On the following page, after detailing an alternative to the printed text (“Instead of quicklime, take slackt lime, and then you may doe it in a Retort without feare of heate to Break yr Glass and the spirit will be the same”), they again implore the reader: “believe me”. The Latin notes, too, feature similar sentiments: a long marginal note to “Concerning May Dew” includes the phrase “confide dictis meis et hanc meam assertionem serva tibi ipsi” (Trust my words and keep this statement of mine to yourself) (p.116); and near the end of the volume, after recommending “Good Cerule Roman vitriol” (p.270) for staunching blood, by “beating it into powder put it into a spoon then lett 2 or 3 drops of the Blood fall uppon it &c”, they command the reader: “experto crede” (Believe in experience).

Our annotator’s use of Latin includes a tendency to translate some of Digby’s printed English into Latin, for example on p.18. This is in striking contrast to the practice of his contemporary, Nicholas Culpeper, who in 1649 famously translated the Royal College of Physicians’ Pharmacopoeia into English, thus demystifying a work closely guarded by the College and creating a medical handbook for the lay reader. Is our scribe engaged in a bid to remystify their field?

CONCLUSION

An unusual confluence of philosophies has coalesced into this small medical artefact: a profusely annotated copy of Digby’s Chymical Secrets which illuminates the importance of alchemical thought in the world of 17th-century

emerges as a fascinating figure: a Quaker apothecary steeped in the works of his alchemist forebears and committed to experimentation, keen to insert himself into the waning alchemical tradition and tempering his apparent confidence with appeals to his readers’ faith in his expertise. Perhaps the final word should be given to him as he commends his work to future readers: “My friend who ever thou art that shalt have this Booke hearafter trust to this process above all others”.

£4,500 / $5,800 Ref: 8293

SEVEN

¶ This rare Scottish Enlightenment manuscript deals with an abiding theme throughout the period: how to reconcile the torrent of new scientific and medical discoveries with the tenets of theology that still presided over every sphere of existence?

The manuscript itself bears no inscription that explicitly identifies its author (although the titles “West Street Chapel 1780” and “New Road Chapel” may have a significance, as we shall see); however, the contents include a section laying out instructions on the publication of the scribe’s works. From these, we can confidently attribute the notebook to Andrew Wilson (1718-1792).

Wilson was born in Maxton, Roxburghshire in Scotland and graduated in medicine from the University of Edinburgh, in 1749. After receiving a practitioner’s licence and a fellowship from the Royal College of Physicians of Edinburgh in 1764, he established a practice in Newcastle and later (1775 or ‘76) in London, where he was appointed to the Medical Asylum. A proponent of natural philosophy, Wilson published many medical treatises and works that integrated his wide-ranging interests in science, medicine, theology and philosophy.

¶ [WILSON, Andrew (1718-1792)].

Original manuscript philosophical notebook.

[Circa 1780]. Oblong notebook (190 x 80 x 6 mm). Contemporary stitched paper wrappers with titles in ink manuscript

“West Street Chapel 1780” and “New Road Chapel”. Approximately 44 text pages on 40 leaves. Written in a small, neat hand (approximately 10,000 words).

Contemporary plain brown-paper wrappers, minor ink splashes to text.

Watermark: Horn, GR.

References:

1. Telford (ed.), The Letters of the Rev. John Wesley, Vol. 5, p.205.

2. John P. Wright in the ODNB.

The cover’s “West Street Chapel” inscription may signal a link with the founder of Methodism, John Wesley, who founded West Street Chapel in the West End of London and used it in the second half of the 18th century. Wesley knew of Wilson and his work: in a 1770 letter to one of his itinerant preachers, he writes: “I am glad you have Dr. Wilson near. A more skilful man, I suppose, is not in England”.1

Our manuscript appears to be a working notebook, albeit a neat one with relatively few crossings-out. Its unusual format – a tall oblong with fragile paper covers and a simple stitched binding – may indicate that it was homemade. The majority of the contents comprise Wilson’s detailed arguments in natural philosophy; he opposed the Newtonian idea that the deity needs to intervene in the creation, arguing instead that all natural phenomena, including gravitation, are to be explained purely mechanically. The natural philosopher must then uncover these underlying laws of nature and reveal the work of the creator 2 .

Of particular interest is the section, mentioned above, in which Wilson gives instructions regarding the publication of his manuscripts. He begins: “It is my will and desire that after necessary correction of the language & distinct paragraphing my MSS be published in the following order”. What follows are titles and subjects that clearly allude to a number of Wilson’s already (as of “1780”) published works, organised into three categories: “These on Natural Science” (four works, beginning with “1. My observations of the Newtonian principles of philosophy” – probably his Short observations on the principles and moving powers assumed by the present system of philosophy (1764)); “These Publications and Writings relative to Physiology or the Theory & the Practice of Medicine” (five, including “2. Aphorisms on the Diseases of Infants” – a close match for his Aphorisms on the Constitution and Diseases of Children (1783)); and “Theological” (three, including “Revelation the Language of Nature” – possibly his Human Nature surveyed by Philosophy and Revelation (1758)).

Although Wilson’s printed works are well represented in library collections, this appears to be his sole surviving manuscript, especially as any similarly constructed examples probably disintegrated long ago. Here he gives the clear impression of someone organising and curating their legacy, and strikingly brings to bear on his own works a kind of categorisation that reflects the emerging field of taxonomy.

This unusual homemade artefact by a key figure in the Scottish Enlightenment is a remarkably well-preserved example of the many complex intersections of science, religion and philosophy during this period. It provides a window onto the intellectual life of its owner, as well as demonstrating that the drive to synthesise science, medicine and theology extended – naturally enough – to how the likes of Andrew Wilson wished to organise their own published work.

£3,250 / $4,200 Ref: 8272

EIGHT

¶ The most well-defined figure in this archive is Susanna Harrison, whose notebook [1] is the chief draw. Her entries represent the attempts of an intelligent woman from a well-to-do family to find an outlet for her energies –especially creative – in a constrained social existence.

The Harrisons lived in Lincolnshire, to judge by the placenames sprinkled throughout. Susanna Harrison (d.1775), subject of a note in item [1]; Thomas Harrison (1748-1804?), whose name appears on the back of a business card; Rachel Harrison (1748-?), also referenced on the business card; and Bridgit Harrison (d.1733) and Bridgit Harrison the younger (d.1737), both mentioned in item [2].

¶ HARRISON, Susanna (d.1775)

Small family archive of notebooks.

[Circa 1770-1810]. All items in original (some homemade) bindings and generally good original condition.

[1]. 18th-century notebook. Octavo (152 x 92 x 15mm). Approximately 22 text pages and 20 pages of designs (three pencil; 17 in ink), on 103 leaves with four embroidery samples loosely inserted and piece of folded paper containing red pigment stashed into the pocket of the binding. Original vellum wallet-style stationer’s book. Slightly soiled but very good original condition with functioning clasp.

The first section gives a series of instructions for 25 dances ranging from the well-known (“Flowers of Edenborough”, “Hunting the Squeril”) to the apparently hitherto lost (“Rolling on the Grass”, “The Ladies Setifficat Rant”, and “Wainfleet Boys” – probably a local dance, since Wainfleet is a Lincolnshire town).

There are some eight pages of religious verse, one of which is written in a simple code (“Wh28 459 siv459C172 t4 th2 C94ss[...]”). Further on, another hand has recorded several family deaths, including that of “my Sister Susannah” – our main scribe, we assume, for this volume. At the rear are 20 pages of designs in pencil and ink, closely resembling the original samples loosely inserted. Tucked into the rear pocket is a sample of powdered red pigment, folded inside a scrap of paper.

[2]. 18th-century receipt book. Octavo (153 x 95 x 2mm). Approximately 7 text pages on 5 leaves. Homemade notebook made from a few folded sheets of paper stitched into a crudely cut piece of vellum.

Receipts for land rentals e.g. “Nouember ye 20th 1735 ye 22 shillings Receiued of Richard Smith ye Sum of Ten Pounds of a House In attaerbe dew may Day Last”.

[3]. 18th-century manuscript terrier. Octavo (165 x 90 x 5mm). Approximately 35 text pages on 43 leaves. Some leaves excised, one cut with loss of upper half. Crudely made notebook , quires stitched into vellum-covered paste-board.

Entitled: “A Terrier of the Carr meadows belonging to wadington Snitterby and atterby”. The text includes names, quantities and some notes to the versos.

[4]. Hellaby’s Town and Country Lady’s Repository; or, Memorandum Book for the Year 1807. Boston. Printed by and for J [ames]. Hellaby. and sold by Lackington, Allen and Co. and Champante and Whitrow, London. [1807]. Octavo (165 x 90 x 5mm). Pagination 132 (lacking 90-91) engraved title page and folded frontispiece. Green wallet-style binding.

No other copies are recorded in library collections. Pennsylvania State University Libraries have a similar publication under the slightly different title of Hellaby's pocket repository [1806] which is included in a sammelband of five Georgian women’s pocketbooks. Our copy has a handful of manuscript notes.

[5]. Advertisement for ‘Joseph Goodyger Weaver, Wheatley. Single sheet (205 x 170 mm). Folded, upper left corner torn.

Brief manuscript accounts to upper margin . Docketed on the reverse “Mr Storey of heapam Lincoln[shire].

[6]. Sundry items including a business card for “Clulow & Unett, Manufacturers of Eartheware”, a bill, a remedy, a letter dated 1792 referring to their land at Atterby, and a few letters from later in the 19th century. All items relate either to the Harrisons or the Storeys.

The supporting documents [2] to [6], with their comparatively pedestrian concerns, set Sarah Harrison’s notebook usefully in a context that allows her creative pursuits to stand out against their background. These sections, nevertheless, are unified by their prescriptiveness: they establish patterns –terpsichorial, moral or lacy –that must be followed, echoing the confinement of expression so adroitly explored by the likes of Fanny Burney and Jane Austen that Georgian women had to live within.

£3,750 / $4,850 Ref: 8211

NINE

¶ Several hands in this well-used manuscript volume keep track of the general flow of work and business, life and death: inventories are recorded, cattle branded, taxes, rents and expenditure accounted for, and so on. And among these notes and accounts are some 10 recipes and remedies.

Thus, at one end of the tete-beche arrangement, an inventory “of ye good & Chattls of Aron Wright distrained by me Walter Stanhope” is followed by a small clutch of recipes in a different hand. First, four brief equine remedies, including “A good purge for a horse” (“halfe a dram or a dram cream of tarter two drams anni seeds […] in a pint of warme ale about four in ye afternoone”) and “ffor stratches or scabed heels”.

On the opposite page is a recipe “To make Birtch Wine”, which specifies “two pounds of Best powder shugar” to “every wine gallon of Birtch juce” sanctuary of each a handful / Gentian an ounce sena”, slise all in a gallon of old Beer w ruste iron”. The entries at this end then revert to business matters, mainly comprising rents, land tax payments and other expenses from 1706 to 1730.

At the opposite end, our scribe begins on “Aprill ye last day 1711” when he “Accounted w Mother Baron & payd her for Rich Table” as well as “four paire of new

¶ [STANHOPE, Walter (?)]. 18thcentury manuscript Accounts and Recipes.

[Bolton, Bradford, Yorkshire. Circa 1706-58]. Quarto (202 x 167 x 22 mm).

Approximately 100 pages of accounts and sundry notes arranged tete beche (roughly 40; 60) on 134 leaves.

shoes” and “worstett wool for stockings”, followed by a similar set of accounts for 1712 (although they then unsystematically revert to 1708-9 and 1706). Most of these detail leases, bonds, and mortgages, alongside costs of building repairs and maintenance (“Wright for sageing bords”, “for glaseing ye windows”).

Sandwiched between “Repairs att Bolton” and a “Field Book” (two pages of acreage measurements for various closes and “Leays”) are a pair of related recipes in another hand: “To make a Rich frute Cake” and “The Eiseing of it”. The evident size of the cake (“three pounds & a halfe of fine flower”, the same of “currants”) makes the “quart of cream”, “one pound of butter” and “ye yolke of twelfe eggs” seem a little less sclerosis-inducing, but “rich” it certainly is, especially with the “Eiseing”, which contains “a pound of double loafe loa lofe shugar”.

A further ten pages of accounts are recorded, including “Monthly Assessment for ye poor according to ye pound

Rent” and annual land taxes. Again, business is interrupted by recipes, this time three of them: “To make Cowslop wine” (“six gallons of water”, “twelfe pounds of fine powder sugar”, “30 quarts of Cowslops & six Lemons slised”) has a helpful footnote that adjusts the recipe’s quantities for each of three sizes of pot (“great”, “red” and “little”) in the household (with the further information that “great pot will hold 14 quarts of water […] little pot will hold 11 quarts of water & 13 quarts & 3 gills of fflowers”). On the next page is another “To make Birtch Wine”, then “Mrs Buck receipt to make salve” (involving “bees wax”, “ffine Rosin”, “ffrankinsence”, “white pitch”, “camphor”, “venus turpentine”, “sweet oyle or oyle of Ollives”, and a handful each of “Bishup leaves plantine self-heal St John Grass Winter Cherry Smaleige Loveige Arkangle Bettoney”; all these to be combined “with May Butter unsalted”).

In the 1740s, another scribe adds to the volume, concerned more with sartorial refinement than bodily health or sustenance. From “Will: Rawson” they buy “3 yrds: Super fine Cloath for Coat & Britches”, “4½ yrds Shallown”, “Swan Skin 1.yrd”, and for the finishing touches “Silk half ounce”, “Gold thread buttons” and “Buttons what please”.

As to authorship, there are several mentions of the name Stanhope, including the reflexive reference in the inventory mentioned above, but elsewhere the scribes refer to “me Mother Baron”; and, in the 1770s, another scribe records a series of payments to “my Bror Geo: Greene”. All of this is complicated by the early modern penchant for colloquial monikers.

This early modern miscellany, with its clear signs of use, conveys the ebb and flow of life in an early 18th-century household, as finance, property and livelihood intermingle with health, husbandry, and the necessities and pleasures of food and drink. Nowhere is this better illustrated than the presence – after pages of accounts concerning coal, linen and clothing – of “House keeping meat” expenditure between 1772 and 1786, the considerable fluctuations of which tell a story all their own.

£1,250 / $1,600 Ref: 8269

TEN

¶ The spirit of Scotland suffuses this manuscript, which features several recipes for preserves and remedies from a famous 17th-century Scottish woman medical practitioner – possibly an acquaintance of our anonymous scribes.

Only 29 of the available 80 pages of this slim volume have been used, but the presence of at least three hands, who between them have contributed some 60 recipes and remedies, indicate it was used in a very busy household (that it saw regular use is confirmed by the marking of several recipes as “Approved” and a few instances of crossing out). The receipts have been arranged tête-bêche (often referred to as dos-a-dos), with culinary at one end and remedies at the other (although, as is often the case in household receipt books, order is never entirely adhered to).

PRESERVES

¶ [SCOTTISH RECEIPTS] 17th-Century Household Manuscript of Recipes and Remedies.

[Scotland? Circa 1690]. Folio (305 x 190 x 10 mm). A total of approximately 29 text pages (19 culinary; 10 medical) on 40 leaves. Contemporary mottled calf, the text block appears to have come loose at some point, and then stitched back in.

Watermark: Arms of Amsterdam.

The culinary recipes include around 20 fruit preserves, one of which is a general recipe “To keep frute all the year long for tarts”, for which you’ll need “a new pipkin that will hold 3 quartes and a pound of sugar”; you are then instructed to “frute then sugar a layer of each” until the pipkin is filled, and cook “in the oven after the household bread is drawn”. More specific recipes include “syrop of Mullberries”, “syrop of Gillieflowers” (both of which are “approved”), and how to preserve cherries, “Apricocks”, “quaddliongs”, and “figges”. Oranges can be preserved whole (“scrape them with a peece of glass”) and made into a “past” (“the best way” requires “Civill orenges”), “Marmalet”, “Sirope”, or “chips” (these last two can also be used to preserve lemons). There are also recipes for cakes (“plume”, “portugall”) and jellies (“Goosberries”, “Raspberries”, “plumes”), as well as six for wine (including “Cherry”, “Currant”, “Goosbery” or “any sort of ffuite”). Sugar of course features throughout this section (“lump”, “Loafe”, “fyne white”), which includes a recipe “To clarefie suger”.

At the opposite end of the volume, the overlapping hands have written 21 remedies on five leaves. There are several interesting attributions within this section, the first of which is recorded on p.1: “Recept of my Lady Kincairdens Pills”. This probably refers to Veronica (nee Sommelsdyk) Bruce (c.1640-1700), who married Edward Bruce, 2nd Earl of Kincardine FRS (1629-1681), a Scottish inventor, politician, judge, and co-developer (with Christiaan Huygens) of a marine pendulum clock. Also acknowledged is “Doctor Pitcairne”, whose “ordinary Jentell Purg” calls for “sclised reubarb” and “Senna”, to which should be added “a much kin of ordenery tabell Eall”. This should be applied “6 or 7 tim’s, & after 4 hours if it do’s not work you nay give 3 spoonfull’s more, you may mark in the fution of less quantity”.

HAMILTON’S HERBAL HEALING

The most notable attribution accompanies a group of five receipts by Margaret Hamilton, Lady Belhaven and Stenton (bef. 1625–c.1695), a Scottish medical practitioner of the period known for her knowledge of herbal remedies who achieved further notoriety for her part in faking her husband’s death.

On pp.3-5 of this manuscript, she supplies remedies for “A Plaister for Wormes in Children” and “ane other Remidy for wormes in Children with this

. The latter calls for such things as wormwood, gentian and currants, beaten together, and this mixture to be steeped “in a pint of Muskadine”; then, after “two or thrie dayes at the face of the moon lett the Child eat a good quantitie”, followed by periods of fasting. Among Hamilton’s other remedies are treatments for “The ffalling fundament” and “itch or breacking out of Children” (which “may be used without hurt Ether to young or old”), and the generically named “The ointment”, with ingredients such as “fumatarie ground jvie English tabacco” mixed with numerous herbs. Despite its detailed instructions (“anoint the places where the spotts are with a little thereof”), there is no indication as to the condition it treats.

More specific is a receipt “For a tetter or ringworme”, which directs the reader to “anoint the place” with a mixture of such things as “white wyne vinegar”, “juice of a Lemon”, and “a litle honey”. All of these remedies have apparently been “Aproved by my Lady Belhaven (also spelt “Balheaven”, and “Balhaven”), but, as we have not identified the scribe, we do not know if she received these directly from Lady Belhaven or whether they were circulated among Scottish households.

Outwith the Belhaven selection, the remedies continue with the likes of “Tablets for coughs”, which call for readymade “distolled water” of “red roses Scabious sweet Margoram Hysop Coultsfoor Maiden hair”, mixed in a pan with “Burage”, “Buglas” and other herbs. “When all is boylled”, add “white suggar Candie fynly beaten or refyned Suggar”, together with “liquorish”, “Oyll of Cinamon”, “Anniseseeds” and other ingredients. To make the mixture into pill shape, “work your tablet past with a litle of the Suggar”, being careful not to add too much, for “if you mix much at once you will make it Dry too fast”. Once they have been prepared, strew “some of the Suggar upon papers” and dry them “before a ffyre” ensuring the heat is only “very moderate”. But “Iff yow have not the distolled water you boyle the herbs of those that are mentioned in spring watter”.

The attributions locate the household firmly in Scotland: Kincardine and Belhaven are roughly 30 miles west and east of Edinburgh respectively. This is a well-to-do family, to judge from the prominent use of sugar and fruit, not to mention the aristocratic name-dropping. Despite its slightness, our manuscript shows clearly the traces of a social network, providing several coordinates for the wider transmission in Scotland of various remedies, notably including several attributed to the renowned medic, Margaret Hamilton, Lady Belhaven.

£4,500 / $5,800 Ref: 8289

ELEVEN

¶ Remedies to treat horses, cows, dogs and the occasional “Christian” are to be found in this cheaply made but beautifully presented manuscript book. The high incidence of equine remedies, as well as the presence at the back of a “Table Of the Price Value & Virtue of most of the principal Drugs belonging to Farrying as they are Frequently Sold at ye Druggests in London”, lead us to assume that our anonymous scribe was most likely a farrier – that is, someone practising both blacksmithing and veterinary care – with an evident sideline in treating humans.

The volume was clearly intended to be a reference book containing its owner’s best tried-and-tested remedies, rather than an “on the hoof” notebook. The remedies have all been numbered, although a few have been left blank for the intended remedy, and two unnumbered remedies have been added at the end. It has been written in a very neat cursive hand, probably in one or two sittings, and several loose-leaf additions confirm the notion that this is a compilation of trusted remedies: one of them, “for a Cow or horse”, is annotated “Entered in ye Book 219”, and indeed the same receipt has been squeezed in under “219” as an alternative remedy for “A Lax or Looseness”.

The remedies include cures for conditions such as “a Moon Blind Horse” (no. 19), “a Canker in ye Tongue” (no. 118), “Pox in a Horse” (no. 70), and “Strangullion” (treated with “Juniper Berries and a Handful of Beef Brine” (no. 190)).

¶ [FARRIERY]. 18th-Century Manuscript Book of Remedies.

[Cambridgeshire?, England. Circa 1788].

Quarto (210 x 175 x 8 mm). Approximately 75 unnumbered text pages (including a nine-page at the end) on 48 leaves. A tiny fragment of what would have been plain grey wrappers remains, but stitching intact.

Watermark: Britannia; countermark: CM in italics.

There are recommendations for perennial pests like gadflies (“For Warbles under a Saddle” (no. 57)) and overenthusiastic riders (“For a Horse yt is over Rode” (no. 107)), as well as formulations “To make a Horse Piss & Dung” (no. 115) and the more fragrant “Perfume for a Horses Head” (no. 218); and one cross-species concoction claims to be effective for “A Strain in a Horse or Christian” (no. 105).

The two unnumbered receipts both address forms of derangement: “Insanity”, which “a respectable author attended with uncommon success”; and in prophylactic mode, “Canine Madness”, the entry for which considers how the disease passes between dogs and humans (“It is generally allowed by Physicians, that ye spittle of a mad animal, infused into a wound is the only cause hereto known”), and assures the reader that, even if this does occur, it likely “does no sudden mischief”, so a thorough and prolonged dousing with warm and cold water alternately should prevent the bitten human from contracting the disease.

identify the subject of two loose-leaf remedies (“For a Nervous Disorder or a great Shaking” and “The Piles”), which are intended “For Alice Murphet” and “For Alice Murphy”. We assume the second is an error, as they are both dated 21 August 1788 and have been annotated in the same hand, but in slightly different ink: “by order of Mr Levitt”. While “Mr Levitt” remains elusive, the patient was probably Alice Murfit (1757-1842), who was born at Stretham, Cambridgeshire, and died in nearby Ely.

Our scribe shows themselves to be well organised and practical in their use of simple, inexpensive materials to create a handy reference work that evokes the conditions encountered and measures required in the field of husbandry (both animal and human) in the late 18th century.

£950 /$1,230 Ref: 8282

TWELVE

¶ This unrecorded set of 18th-century cards contains a range of morally and philosophically instructive information, including ‘On Cruelty to Animals’, ‘Benevolence and Humility’, and ‘On Negroes’, presented across a range of parsimoniously printed cards in their original slipcase. This is apparently the sole surviving set, and it raises many questions, several of which remain unanswered.

The presentation of information in ‘bitesize’ chunks and the material’s instructional tone might suggest a pedagogical function, perhaps for a younger audience; however, other factors may confute this reading.

¶ [LEWIS, M. and LEWIS, Caroline Amelia (owners)]. Educational Cards entitled ‘Literary Present’.

[England. Circa 1785]. Each card measures approximately 126 x 80 mm. 12 cards, printed to one side only. Contained in, what appears to be the original slip case, with engraved label (cut from larger title piece), pasted to one side, early repairs.

Provenance: Each card is inscribed to the blank side “M Lewis” and the slip case is inscribed “Lewis / Caroline Amelia Lewis”.

The notion of a younger intended audience is at first glance borne out by the choice of material, which includes three entries from Thomas Percival’s A Father's Instructions to his Children (1775): ‘The Folly and Odiousness of Affectation’; ‘Tenderness to Mothers’; ‘A Generous Return for an Injury’. But a further examination of the range of content reveals a syllabus of relative intellectual maturity. For example, questions of moral philosophy are addressed in four extracts from Blair’s Sermons (1777): ‘Temperance in Pleasure Recommended’; ‘Benevolence and Humanity’; ‘Religion not to be treated with Levity’ (‘The spirit of true Religion breathes gentleness and affability’); and ‘Content’, which advises that ‘the principal materials of our comforts, or uneasiness, lie within ourselves’.

Further philosophical discourse can be found in ‘Sensibility’, drawn from Sterne’s A Sentimental Journey (1768) (‘Sensibility! Source inexhausted of all that’s precious in our joys, or costly in our sorrows!’); as well as in ‘The Character of a True Friend’, from William Enfield’s The Speaker (1774); and in ‘Creation’, from Goethe’s ‘Sorrows of Werter’ (1779), which adopts a more poetic style of contemplation (‘Weak mortal! all things appear little to thee for thou art little thyself’).

Moreover, one can infer a relatively progressive attitude from two particular entries: ‘On Negroes’, from Sterne’s Tristram Shandy, which is the ‘tender tale’ mentioned by Sterne in his correspondence with Ignatius Sancho; and ‘On Cruelty to Animals’, from Soame Jenyns’s Disquisitions on several subjects, advocating animal rights by attributing personhood (‘the majestic bull is tortured by every mode which malice can invent for no offence, but that he is unwilling to assail his diabolical tormentors’) and positing their intrinsic right to life, since ‘We are unable to give life, and therefore ought not wantonly to take it away’.

The excerpts amount to a kind of ‘cheat sheet’ for moral philosophy, enabling the reader to make an intelligent contribution to discourse within a social setting. But who is our budding moral philosopher? All 12 cards have been inscribed “M Lewis” on the back, suggesting a concern that these may be lost or mixed with other, similar cards in the course of a social event. They have also inscribed the slipcase, and beneath is a slightly later inscription of “Caroline Amelia Lewis”. This may well be the Caroline Amelia Lewis whose baptism is listed on ancestry.com as being in Manchester on 8 April 1810 – and whose parents’ names are Mary and Maurice. This doubly tantalising lead may well point to the cards’ original owners.

Who published the cards? Their source material derives from a handful of 18th-century A Father’s Instructions to his Children); Dodsley (Sorrows of Werter, Disquisitions on several subjects, and Tristram Shandy – for which he was joined by T. Becket and P. A. De Hondt for Vol. 4., and they in turn published Sterne’s Sentimental Journey) and a syndicate of William Creech, W. Strahan, and T. Cadell (Blair’s Sermons). Given the close typographical match of the printed cards to their original sources, and that all these texts appeared in the 1770s, any of them could have produced the cards cheaply and simply, generating a potentially lucrative product from already available material. It’s also possible that the cards were ‘pirahttps://www.msn.com/ en-gb/news/uknews/labour-s-jess-phillips-reveals-she-was-told-to-not-apply-for-a-job-because-she-was-pregnant/ ar-AA1AuWeJted’ and their printer concealed by anonymity.

Regardless of which publisher it was, they would have been confident, given the recent proven track record of the texts in book form, that the cards would find a readership with an appetite for these progressive ideas and their dissemination in social spaces of Georgian Britain. As such, these thrifty cards offer insights into the intellectual and social concerns of their 18th-century owner, although a more detailed study of those concerns requires the resolution of questions around the identity of both publisher and reader.

£2,750 / $3,350 Ref: 8238

THIRTEEN

¶ The standard manual of legal stiles (or precedents) for the early-modern Scottish lawyer was George Dallas’s System of Stiles (1697), a formidable folio of no fewer than 904 pages. Walter Ross referred to it as the ‘vast opake body’ of the work, and described how the hearts of apprentices ‘failed within them, when presented, in the Writing -office, with such a frightful volume of arid, naked, unintelligible Forms’. (ODNB).

No wonder, then, that some legal professional chose to compile their own books of precedents. This folio volume, written in a clear and legible hand, could be easily consulted by any legal professional, and precedes Dallas’s work.

The volume is entitled “Stylorum Veterum ac Recentiorum Collectio A me

Guilielmo Granteo Juniore de Creichie Fideliter Conscripta Anno Salutis Humana Millesimo Sexcentesimo Nonagesimo Quinto”.

William Grant was laird of Creichie. Based on a 1696 Poll record of the “Paroch of Fyvie”, he was married to Katherine Grant (nee Gordon): “William Grant of Criechie should pay of the proportion of the hundreth part of the valued rent of 1 pound 10 shillings Scots, effeirand to the duty of the said land in his own labouring, its absorbet in the highest, in which he is raited being 12 pounds Scots inde with generall poll Katherin Gordon, his spouse William, James, and Loodwick Grants, his sons”.

¶ [GRANT, William]. Late 17th-Century Manuscript Book of Legal Stiles. [Fyvie, Aberdeenshire. Circa 1695]. Folio (325 x 200 x 20mm). Pagination 90, [2, blanks], 179, [1, blank].

Contemporary sheep, rubbed and scuffed, worm damage to final leaf (no loss of text) and rear board.

Provenance: 18th century ownership of “Theodor Morison”, and bookplate of Thomas Fraser Duff to paste-down

William next appears in 1700, as a tutor to Elizabeth Barclay Lady Towie’s son, “Patrick Barclay Being only of Eleven years of age of therby is in the custody and Keeping and under the Education of William Grant of Creichie his Tutor Testamentar”.

This volume is divided into two sections: the first section comprises 90 pages, beginning with “A Moveable Bond”, and moves through examples such as “Form off Ane Bill off Captione”, “off Letters off Poynding”, “Sumonds of Generall Declarator”. “Form off Ane Inhibitione”. The second, much longer section, is separately paginated and runs to page 179. It includes examples of “Form off Ane Discharge”, “Suspensione”, “Letters of Apprizing”, “Acts of Court”, “The next thing Proposed is Personall & Reall Executione”.

The earliest extant style book is that by compiled by Oliver Colt (NAS RH13/2), circa 1600. Style books compiled before the Act of Union include one at Edinburgh University by William Lindesay of Culsh, c.1685 (MS 3066/7); one at the University of Glasgow: one circa 1695 (GB 247 MS Murray 554); and a circa 1685 at Yale University (Boswell Collection, Box 156, folder 2854), which belonged to James Bowell.

Style books continued to be compiled into the 19th century, but this manuscript was written in an interesting period in Scottish law. Twelve years later after it was written, the Act of Union was declared, and although Scotland retained a different legal system from England, the English were the dominant party in the Union and exerted their

The manuscript is written in a very neat and legible hand, with pages laid out clearly. It was intended as a reference work, but Grant has included numerous decorative flourishes throughout the volume. His creativity makes for a visually appealing volume, which offers a comprehensive overview of late 17th century Scottish law.

£1,750 / $2,260 Ref: 8305

FOURTEEN

THUCYDIDES; HOBBES,

Thomas (1588-1679, trans.) Eight bookes of the Peloponnesian Warre written by Thucydides the sonne of Olorus. Interpreted with faith and diligence immediately out of the Greeke.

London: imprinted [at Eliot’s Court Press] for Hen: Seile, and are to be sold at the Tigres Head in Paules Churchyard. 1629. FIRST EDITION, FIRST ISSUE. Pagination [34], 536 [i.e. 535], [13] p. complete with 5 engraved plates (3 folded).

-century half calf, marbled boards, rebacked and recornered. Small, marginal tears, section torn from upper margin of title, paper flaw to (b2), scattered spotting and occasional light damp staining, closed tear to map, repaired to reverse.

In this rare first edition, first issue of this classic work, two giants of European literature are brought together across two millennia: the founder of political realism, Thucydides (c.460 –400 BC), and one of its most famous adherents, Thomas Hobbes, who developed his arguments under the strong influence of his ancient Greek forerunner, whom he named as his favourite ancient historian.

Hobbes’ Leviathan (1651) and other political works were years away when he began translating Thucydides’ History of the Peloponnesian War; and by his own account in the book’s preface, “After I had finished it, it lay long by me”. His hesitancy has been puzzled over, but when it finally appeared in 1629 as his first published book, it was recognised as a significant achievement: the first complete translation of Thucydides directly from the Greek (the only previous English edition of the History having been based on a French translation of a Latin translation – “traduced, rather than translated”, as Hobbes himself puts it). What drew him to the book appears to have been “the cool dissection of political motivation and the ‘realist’ approach to power, together with the peculiarly Thucydidean analysis of the role of rhetoric in political debate”; but regardless of his motivation, this translation established him “at a stroke as one of the leading Grecianists of his day” (ODNB).

Hobbes’ translation of Thucydides was, many scholars suggest, in tune with his age: the 16th-century insistence on reading ancient Greek and Roman works “for their ethical values” had worked against the popularity of a writer famous for his “reluctance to point a moral and his scepticism about the influence of ethical principles on human behavior”. By Hobbes’ time, “scepticism in the realm of faith and morals and a belief in self-interest as the dominant motive in human affairs were growing stronger” – a change in attitudes also detectable in the work of early Jacobean contemporaries such as Francis Bacon.1

Hobbes frames his rendering of Thucydides in four prefatory sections. The “Epistle Dedicatorie” consists of a eulogy of his late patron, the Earl of Devonshire, via an address to his son, whom he assures, using an apt metaphor, that “never was a man more exactly coppied out, then he in you” (that Hobbes was angling for a renewal of his employment with the Earl’s family is obvious, but in this he was unsuccessful). In an introduction entitled “To the Readers”, he turns his eulogising towards his ancient Greek model, of whom he writes: “as Plutarch saith, he maketh his Auditor a Spectator. For he settteh [sic] his Reader in the Assemblies of the People, and in the Senates, at their debating; in the Streets, at their Seditions; and in the Field at their Battels”.

Then, in an account “Of the Life and History of Thucydides”, Hobbes, after recounting what can be known or inferred about the ancient historian’s career and fate, commends his approach (he “wrote not his History to win present applause, as was the use of that Age, but for a Monument to instruct the Ages to come”), and defends his work against criticism, for example unfavourable comparisons with that of Herodotus. Finally, Hobbes diligently presents an index of the “names of the places of Greece occurring in Thucydides, or in the Mappe of Greece, briefly noted out of divers Authors, for the better manifesting of their scituation, and enlightning of the History”.

All this conscientious throat-clearing before the translated work itself is an effective bit of scene-setting for Hobbes’ first published book – a masterly act of cultural transmission that looks back to a key influence on his thought and forward to some of the ideas that became central to his later political philosophy.

£12,500 / $16,100 Ref: 8197

FIFTEEN

¶ The lives of 18th-century women are often recorded in scant detail. Elizabeth Risebrow (1722-1790) is a case in point: she was the daughter of Samuel Risebrow, surgeon, of North Walsham, Norfolk, and his wife Anna. In 1747 she married Robert Bayfield, gentleman, of Antingham. Elizabeth, however, gives a good account of herself in this rich and varied archive. Her writing style is fluid and often observant or witty, and she is clearly well read and aware of the era’s coterie culture.

Elizabeth’s inscriptions in [1] date these poems to her early-tomid-twenties, suggesting that her versification ended the same year as her marriage began. The first poem poignantly expresses her wish to “enjoy a house […] Near to a wood near water”, with a menagerie and “two Hundred pounds a year”. Elsewhere, she touches on the place of women in society, remarking that grief over the death of an infant was “Without Doubt the more as this was a Boy / As Girls are esteem’d no more than a Toy”.

Elizabeth engages in a culture of exchange which she reinforces through classical allusions (“Juno”, “Cupid”, “Leander”) and coterie names (some poems are signed “E. Risebrow” or “ER”, while in others she uses the sobriquets “Rosalinda” or “Belinda”). One of the central figures is a “Miss Kitty Cooper”, who is sometimes admonished for remissness (“write a Long Letter, or else you Receive / no more Letters from me”). Other figures include the Berneys who lived at nearby Westwick House.

In [2], Elizabeth relates in lively prose a trip with three friends. She comments on the places she stayed (“the River abounds with Plenty of Soles Smelts & other fine Fish in great Perfection” (p.2)) and their architecture (“The East Window is all of A Bright Colour’d Blew Glass both odd & Prett” (p.3)), and adds historical notes and reflections. Early on, they are accosted by “four Rude Disorderly Fellows who Oblig’d the Gentlemen in their own Defence to Draw their Swords & take their Pistols” (pp.4-5), but after an ineffectual skirmish, the ruffians depart; and soon Elizabeth is making calmer notes on agriculture and landscapes.

¶ [BAYFIELD (née RISEBROW), Elizabeth (1722-1790)] 18th-century archive of manuscripts.

[North Walsham, Norfolk. Circa. 1743-1810?].

The archive comprises:

[1]. Manuscript notebook entitled “Verses on several subjects” [Circa 1743-47]. Slim quarto (185 x 155 mm). 34 text pages on 31 leaves, plus two loose leaves. Contemporary stationer’s wrappers.

[2]. Manuscript notebook entitled “Travells of a Month into Yorkshire in 1746”. Slim quarto (195 x 160 mm). Approximately 30 text pages on 17 leaves. Contemporary stationer’s, marbled wrappers.

[3]. Manuscript notebook of “Sentimental Memorandums and Observations from the different books I have Read since the year 1766: Eliza: Bayfield”. [Circa 1766-88]. Demi quarto (208 x 80 x 13 mm). Approximately 67 text pages on 68 leaves. Vellum stationer’s book, lacking clasps.

[4]. Manuscript book of recipes and household remedies. [Circa 1780-1810]. Small oblong notebook (115 x 88 x 11 mm). 66 pages of text and pasted-in clippings. Limp-calf, rear cover missing.

[5-7]. Two 17th century books from her library (QUARLES,Francis(1592-1644). Emblemes. 1676, and SALLUST (86-34 B.C). C Crispus Sallustius. 1621), and a Manuscript Travel Journal, which we assume was written by a descendent as it is dated 1839.

Elizabeth may have begun [4] – the first two (“For a sore Throat Mrs Coleman, Hembsby” and a receipt for removing ink) resemble her hand – but different hands have continued it from the late 18th to the early 19th century. Interspersed among the recipes (including the amusingly titled “Milk of Roses For Ladies Noses as well as Toeses” by a “Mr Randall”) are printed clippings (e.g. “make a never-failing Mouse Trap, by which forty or fifty Mice may be caught in a night”.

Elizabeth Risebrow’s archive offers a valuable panoply, from her literary diet and self-reflective responses to observations of the world around her and musings on history, to original verse and engagement with coterie culture. Taken together, her manuscripts arc across her single and married life and offer rare first-hand insight into the world of an 18th-century provincial writer and reader.

£9,500 / $12,200 Ref: 8248

SIXTEEN

¶ A remarkable mid-18th century almanac, with two writing tables, both of which shows traces of use. The almanac has been interleaved with 41 blank leaves. The two writing tables, which appear to be gesso coated, have been used to record written notes and calculations.

There are annotations to approximately seven pages with notes such as “frances Harise gave me warning house Maid Octb 26/1742 the same day I gave Letty Coast Warning My London Cook” and “Lord Anson was Maried to Miss York Eldest Daughter to Ld Chanceler Hardwick they was Maryd of Mundy Marks day Aprill 25/1748”

¶ SAUNDERS, Richard Rider’s British Merlin: For the year of Our Lord God 1742. Being the bissextile or leap-year. Adorn’d with many delightful and useful verities, fitting all capacities. in the islands of Great Britain’s Monarchy. With notes of husbandry, fairs, marts, and tables for many necessary uses. Compiled for his country’s benefit by Cardanus Rider.

London: Printed by R. Nutt for the Company of Stationers. [1741]. Duodecimo. Pagination 48, text complete, interleaved with blanks and two gesso coated writing tables.

Contemporary red morocco, elaborately gilt tooled, edges gilt, Dutch floral endpapers, metal slots for stylus (missing) with decorative floral bosses.

£850 / $1,100 Ref: 8306

SEVENTEEN

¶ Rare first edition of the first book by Mary Matilda Betham, an English poet, diarist, and portrait miniature painter whose unconventional outlook exacted a heavy price on her livelihood and mental health.

¶ BETHAM, Mary Matilda (1776-1852). Elegies, and Other Smaller Poems.

Ipswich: W. Burrell. [1797]. Only Edition.

Octavo. Pagination xii, [1], 128, errata present, but lacking half-title and final advert leaf. Contemporary half calf.

She championed women’s rights, calling for the greater participation of women in parliamentary affairs and writing Challenge to Women (1821). Poverty and troubled relations with her family exacerbated her mental health, leading to her incarceration in an asylum, but by the 1830s she returned to writing poetry, and in her old age became a popular figure with both her peers and the upcoming literary generation.

£1,750 / $2,260

EIGHTEEN

¶ The key draw of this manuscript, once thought lost, is a translation of a passage by Boethius that represents an exchange between two notable early modern figures – Alexander Pope and Sir William Trumbull. This is especially significant because, as Joseph Hone remarks, “Pope’s poems appear in contemporaneous manuscript miscellanies surprisingly rarely, probably because of the strict controls he exerted over control of his holographs”. The inclusion of such an early example of Pope’s work in a manuscript miscellany, is perhaps explained by Hone’s point that scribal publications often helped to “crystallize [...] literary networks” 1 .

A comparison of the hand in our manuscript with similar miscellanies by Trumbull at the Beinecke (Osborn b176; b177) shows a very close match, which, combined with other evidence leads us to attribute it to him with confidence.

The presence of the Boethius translation enables us to establish our scribe’s identity. The heading reads: “Mr Popes Transla[ti]on of Boetius in pag. Before: O qui perpetua &c” (the “Before” referring to the previous page, where “Boet. Lib. 3” is written out in the original Latin). Pope’s translation did not appear in print until the 20th century and only survives in two handwritten versions, of which this is one. Its presence here therefore suggests a social connection with Pope; and the figure who was known to have exchanged translations of this passage from Boethius’ De consolatione philosophiae with Pope was Sir William Trumbull (1639-1716), a civil lawyer, diplomat and politician Trumbull’s reputation as a civil lawyer brought him into the orbits of the government and the court. He was an avid book collector and forged friendships with figures such as John Dryden and the young Alexander Pope, who “idolized him in some of his early verse as a paragon of virtuous ‘retirement’” 2 .

¶ [TRUMBULL,SirWilliam(16391716); POPE, Alexander (1688-1744)].

Late 17th-century manuscript miscellany.

[Easthampstead Park? Circa 1690-1705].

Octavo (146 x 100 x 10 mm). Pagination [1], 1-114, [115-7], (pp. 70-100 blank).

Contemporary gilt tooled black panelled morocco, rubbed.

Watermark: Arms of Amsterdam.

References:

1. Joseph Hone, Alexander Pope in the Making, Oxford University Press (2021)

2. ODNB

3. Hone, ibid.

We are extremely grateful to Joseph Hone and Stephen Karian for their generosity in sharing their scholarship.

The bulk of the material in this manuscript consists of original prayers and meditations by Trumbull, with extracts from printed texts by the likes of Isaac Barrow (1630-77), Thomas à Kempis (c. 1380- 1471), and Sir Matthew Hale (1607-1676). The main draw, however, clearly concerns Boethius.

Some of the scant documentation of the friendship between Trumbull and Pope concerns a passage from the third book of Boethius’s De Consolatione Philosophiae which became an item of exchange between the two men. The Brotherton Library holds a copy, in Pope’s hand, of his translation of these lines, accompanied by a letter, dated 19 February 1704, on which Trumbull has used space to make his own attempt at rendering the passage. Joseph Hone speculates that Trumbull intended “to share this effort with his young neighbour”, as “a closed, private act of scribal transmission” 3

Our manuscript provides a rare addition to the small crop of surviving documents that bear witness to this two-person network of exchange. On page 114, under the heading “Boet. Lib. 3”, Trumbull copies out the first and final lines of the 28line poem, which begins:

“O qui p[er]petua mundu[m] ra[ti]one gubernas Terrani Caliq Sator, Qui tempus ab a’vo Ire jubes, stabiliq manens das cuncta moveru, &c”.

The “&c” stands in for 18 lines, after which Trumbull ends with the final seven lines (“Da Pater, augustam Menti conscendere Sedem”

“Principium, Vector, Dux, Semita, Terminus idem.”

Puzzlingly, he then adds two further prayers before he copies out “Mr Popes Transla[ti]on”

The happy reappearance of Trumbull’s manuscript after 60 years hidden from view not only restores to visibility the second of only two known manuscript drafts of Pope’s unpublished translation of Boethius; it also helps us to tease out the currents of influence in Pope’s early career, and shows that these currents were two attempt on the same passage, and the resulting exchange of ideas between Pope and his early mentor may well have driven his own development.

£12,500 / $16,100 Ref: 8182

NINETEEN

¶ This impressive volume serves as the vehicle for a sustained burst of engagement with the first full translation of Livy into English, by a scribe whose wide reading and industrious cross-referencing is evident in many precise citations, but whose literary diet seems only to include English-language texts.

The schoolmaster-physician Philemon Holland (1552–1637) completed his translation of Livy’s history of Rome –a massive work, even though only roughly a quarter of Livy’s original survives – in the final years of the reign of Elizabeth I. The first full-scale translation of Livy into English, it was published in 1600 as The Romane Historie, and “became something of a seventeenth-century classic”, making its influence felt “in Shakespeare’s Coriolanus as well as Heywood and Webster’s Appius and Virginia” 1. It was also deployed in that century’s internal upheavals, according to John-Mark Philo: “With his account of Rome’s transition from monarchy to a consular republic, Livy was readily exploited in debates concerning the government and constitution of England, serving as one of the most prominent authorities of political thought during the English Civil War” 2 .

Our copy of the Romane Historie has been annotated in a neat and careful hand on more than 620 pages. These additions range from one or two words in the margins (and could, at first glance, be mistaken for printed marginalia) to several lines, often making reference to other works our scribe has come across that they feel are related to the printed text. The index has also been augmented.

Clues to the annotator’s identity are scarce: of the other works on Roman history they refer to, all are written in English, so this is not necessarily an Oxbridge-educated scholar. However, their binding design is interesting; their initials “W.D.” surround a lozenge comprised of acorns and marigolds. These were often used as Royalist symbols, so perhaps indicate a Royalist leaning,

¶

LIVY, LIVIUS, Titus; HOLLAND, Philemon The Romane Historie written by T. Livius of Padua. Also, the Breviaries of L. Florus: with a chronologie to the whole historie: and the Topographie of Rome in old time. Translated out of Latine into English, by Philemon Holland, Doctor in Physicke by Philemon Holland.

London, Adam Islip, 1600. First edition in English.

Folio. Pagination [10], 804, 809-1351, 1354-1403, [43] p. Lacks initial and final blanks. Title page from another copy of the same edition, library stamps (deaccessioned). Section torn from 6c3, with loss to blank lower margin and part of the woodcut tailpiece. 17th century reverse calf, recently rebacked.

p.457.” They only occasionally comment directly on the printed text, apparently being much more concerned, as here, to find and record the correspondences between a line or passage in Holland’s Livy and other texts they have encountered.

And those other texts are many: the most frequently cited are “Plutarch Liues” (at least 80 times) and “Rawleys Hist” (over 50 times) – although some of our scribe’s page number references, oddly, bear no correspondence to the pagination of Raleigh’s famous The Historie of the VVorld (1614). Slightly less frequent in their appearances are the likes of “Au[gu]stin[e]’s City of God”, Pliny, and Polybius (all in English); and there are a handful of references to contemporary history books (“Guicciardins History of Italy”, “Speeds Hist: Ed: 1623”, “Netherland Hist:”) and titles on travel (“+ 5e Georg Sands trauells p.240. Purchas Pilgrimage. Pag.

337.339. Lithgows Trauells p.175” (all on p.572). Although a few religious works are mentioned (City of God, George Carleton’s A Thankfull Remembrance of God’s Mercie (1624), Thomas Beard’s The Theatre of Gods Judgements (1597), The Acts and Monuments aka Foxe’s Book of Martyrs “Acts & mon[ and conspicuous in their relative absence, which is unusual for this era; our scribe is very focused on Roman history in translation.

¶ References:

1 Philo, John-Mark, An Ocean Untouched and Untried: The Tudor Translations of Livy (Oxford, 2020).

2 Ibid.

Most or all of the books mentioned were published in the first half of the 17th century, and in some cases, we can narrow down the possible editions of a work our scribe was consulting. We have already mentioned their use of “Acts & mon[uments notes include one on p.51, “Se Carlto[ Thankfull Rem[embr]ab[rance]. p.270” refers to a book that went through four editions between 1624 and 1630, but only the third and fourth editions of A Thankfull Remembrance were long enough to accommodate the annotation’s page reference (1627 edition: pp.291; 1630 edition: pp.292). Similarly, the reference “Beards Theatre of Judgmt p.479” leads us to assume they are working from the 1612 or the 1631 edition, since these have paginated to 542, and 592 respectively (plus unpaginated auxiliary pages), whereas the 1597 edition ran to 472 and later editions only go up to 444.

Holland’s translation of Livy already makes for a formidable artefact, but our scribe’s intensive interaction with its contents and their careful tracing of connections with an array of other sources increases this volume’s appeal. The largely secular tone of its annotations and the exclusively English-language references set it somewhat apart from the standard scholarly practice of its time, and helps to broaden our notions of the ways in which 17th-century readers chose to engage with classical texts.

£9,500 / $12,200 Ref: 8274

TWENTY

¶ [HOUSEHOLD MSS] Late-18th-century culinary and household remedies.

[Circa 1795]. Octavo (180 x 110 x 10 mm).

124 pages on 62 leaves (arranged tête-bêche).

Contemporary limp calf, heavily worn, text block detached from binding.

Watermark: “J Whatman 1794”.

The medicinal and the culinary were considered close kin, since food was key to regulating health and medicine was thought of as a kitchen-table art (and sometimes both shared a few of the same ingredients – for example, certain herbs).

This compilation has over 100 recipes, mosty desserts, including puddings such as “Custard”, “malbrough”, “rich plumb” “Chipman” , “Sippet”, and “ Vermicella”). Cheesecakes, custards and similar are represented by the likes of “Lemon Mince Pies”, “Almond Custards”, “A Lemon Syllabub”, and “Yellow Flummery”.

There follows a hearty selection of cakes and biscuits, including “Shrewsbury Cakes”, “Rout Cakes”, “a Plumb Cake” and, along with several gingerbread recipes, “Ginger Bread Nuts” (with a handy hint to “make your Nuts the bigness of a Nutmeg bake them on tun in a slack oven”). A few recipes have addenda; for example, “To make Wigs” (a kind of leavened teacake), adds “you may add a little grated Ginger if you please in place of Mace & Lemon Peels”. It may be pure coincidence that the only remedy included in this abundance of sweet dishes is for a “Certain Cure for the Tooth Ach”.

There are over a dozen wines included: “Ginger Wine” is popular enough to account for three recipes, while “Lemon” and “Raisin ” have two apiece. Attributions seem mostly to refer to acquaintances (“Mrs ^Bacon Mann”, “Mrs Bingley”) but one exception is “Lemon Pickle”, is copied from John Farley’s The London Art of Cookery (various editions, 1783-1811).

The 28 or so remedies feature some familiar concoctions such as “Daphies Elixir” and “Stoughton Drops”. The inclusion of several remedies “For a Pain in the Bowels Colick and Indigestion”, “For a pain at the Stomach”, “For a weak Inside” and “For the Piles”, lead one to wonder whether the preponderance of cakes, desserts and wines in the culinary section has had repercussions for the household’s digestion.

£750 / $970 Ref: 8168

¶ [HENRY SAINT-JOHN, VISCOUNT

BOLINGBROKE (16781751)] Autograph letter to George Lyttelton.

[4 November 1741]. Quarto. Four pages, later pencil marks, browned along fold lines. Provenance: George, first Baron Lyttelton (1709-1773); thence by descent; The Lyttelton Papers: The Property of the Viscount Cobham, Sotheby's, London, 12 December 1978, lot 92.

TWENTY-ONE

¶ A major 18th-century politician bitterly defeated and disheartened could still be fully engaged in his nation’s affairs and make penetrating and prescient observations, as this letter demonstrates.

Bolingbroke was a leader of the Tory opposition to Walpole and one of the most articulate politicians of his generation, but retired to France after Walpole’s re-election in 1735 left that opposition in tatters. Here he pours out to his correspondent, George Lyttelton, “the overflowings of an heart full of unaffected & disinterested concern for our unhappy country”.

Bolingbroke takes aim at the Hanoverian monarchy, whose accession he blames for “…two principal and fatal errors”: firstly, “the foreign interests of Britain must be conducted in a certain Subordination to those of Hanover”, and secondly, “the domestick interest must be submitted to those of a party, even when it dwindles, and degenerates, as we have seen it do, into a ministerial faction”. The latter has given rise to the formation of “a Jacobite party, strong enough, or rather mad enough, to rebel six & twenty years ago”, which still stokes “dissatisfaction […] tho the embers of jacobitism are scarce alive in any corner of the Nation…”.

Bolingbroke’s condemnation of the 1715 Jacobite rebellion as “mad” is significant, since he himself had been implicated in that uprising; and despite his dismissive assessment of popular support for the Stuarts in Britain, his remarks in this letter about widespread discontent with the Hanoverian settlement foreshadow the final Jacobite rising in 1745, just four years later.

£1,200 / $1,550 Ref: 8220

TWENTY-TWO

This unpublished work is the only known manuscript by Stephen Switzer, “one of the most outstanding authors on practical gardening during the first half of the eighteenth century”. 1

THE AUTHOR

Internal evidence supports an attribution of this manuscript to Switzer: at the head of the “Table of the Contents” he refers to “Grass, Seeds, flowers, Roots &c. Sold by the Seedsman and Gardiners in and about London Especially by S. Switzer att the flower pot over against The Court of Common pleas, Westminster Hall”; and on the seventh leaf of the synopsis the writer pens a note at the foot of the page “for a farther Enquiry into the Etimology of the Phascolus or kidney bean I refer to my Practical Kitchen Gardiner Sec 5, Chap XLIV, pa 236” – the author of which volume was the same “S. Switzer”.

[SWITZER,

Stephen (1682-1745)].

Author’s manuscript with running title: ‘A Synopsis or practical Compendium of Husbandry & Gardening’.

[London. Circa 1740]. Folio (314 x 200 x 14 mm). 63 leaves. Text to rectos: 1 (notes in Frenchinadifferenthand),10(“The Preface”), 14 (“The Contents”), 38 (“A Synopsis...”). Some alterations, corrections, or additions in ink in the same hand.

Contemporary vellum, soiled and discoloured, covers bowed, text damp stained, final leaf frayed affecting a few letters. Watermark: Pro Patria; Countermark: LVG.

Stephen Switzer (1682-1745), a landscape designer, author and seedsman, was born in a village near Micheldever, Hampshire into a family that had farmed in the county for generations. He was apprenticed at the renowned Brompton Park Nurseries run by George London and Henry Wise, under whom he “rose to be lieutenant […] in their projects, and also formed a congenial relationship with the architects Vanbrugh and Hawksmoor” (ODNB). Switzer played a key role in laying out the gardens of great houses including Castle Howard, Blenheim Palace, Grimsthorpe Castle, and possibly untold others, according to Henrey, who believes he “may have been responsible for many undertakings for which he received no credit from contemporary writers”. 2

Switzer drew on these experiences and his wealth of knowledge for his first book, The Nobleman Gentleman and Gardeners Recreation (1715), which began with a history of gardening that is still a valuable text for researchers. Two further volumes soon followed, the trio collectively becoming known as Ichnographia rustica. In the next decade he consolidated his reputation as a landscaper in the service of the Earl of Orrery and Lord Bathurst, published Introduction to a General System of Hydraulicks and Hydrostaticks (1729), often considered his magnum opus, and went into business as a seedsman, based at Westminster Hall, where he “became a public figure from the mid-twenties,

corresponding widely about improvements in the various aspects of landscape making fertilizers, hydraulics, or beneficial legumes and issuing a series of informative pamphlets”.

It seems to have been as a seedsman, with a growing clientele beyond the landed wealthy, that Switzer developed a kind of ‘consumer guide’ approach to his publications; Henrey explains that he became irked at being “often obliged to write directions for his . Far better, and more potentially profitable, to set these directions down in marketable form. Our manuscript is one such example in (partial) draft.

The manuscript was written circa 1740, to judge by a reference to the “Late Lord Peterborough”, i.e. the Commander of the Chief of Forces sent to Spain and Ambassador to the Court of Turin who died on 20 October 1735 on a voyage to Lisbon. Switzer’s death in 1745 both gives us a chronological cutoff point for the book’s composition and raises the strong possibility that this volume represents an unfinished – or at least unpublished –final work; the contents pages make it clear that this material amounts to the first eight complete chapters of a book which was projected to run to 30 chapters. We do not know whether Switzer ever completed the other chapters, because he has used a stationer’s blank book, so the subsequent chapters may have been completed in further stationer’s volumes.

Switzer himself explains his reasons for writing this particular book, besides the self-evident goal of income through publication. In the preface he acknowledges a marketplace filled with other such works; but “Numberless

as they are”, these books “Fall very short of A System or Chain of Directions” (f.1.). He boasts that this new volume is “more Intelligible, than Any other Attempts of this Kind as yet Published whatsoever” (f.1.), and stresses its originality, rebutting any possible objection that a new publication in this field must have been “pyrated from Evelyn, Mortimer, Lawrence, Bradley or […] Miller”. On the contrary – his work is “Entirely New, And Generally the Result of Practice, more than Books Taken as they truly are from the Field and Garden itself ^themselves, and from Gentlemen and others of Great Veracity’s and Experience in all ^several of the Different Counties of Brittain”.

The seedsman in him emerges soon thereafter: “the Reasons which have Induc’d him to the following methods or manner of Publication” are rooted in “those Lists or Catalogues [by] the best seedsmen and Gardiners about London” – resources which provide “no more than the bare names of Seeds and Plants they sell”; whereas “This Synopsis or Compendious Catalogue” supplies “not Only

References:

1. Henrey, Blanche. British Botanical and Horticultural Literature before 1800. (1975). p.235.

2. ibid p.326.

3. ibid p.328.

preface, he accepts the notion that “Tis true that the Erroneous writing or badd spelling of the name of any Species of Herbs or plants Does in No wise Detract from its Intrinsic Value; and provided the Vegetable be good it is no matter (as some will, Undoubtedly be ready to say) whether the Name of it in Catalogues be right or Wrong”; but he continues: “if it Does not make better so it Does not make it worse […] The Etymology or Right pronunciation of a word an Amusement [is not] Unbecoming any Gentleman of Reason or Learning”.

It seems logical that a seedsman might seek to bring consistency to the spelling of plant names, if only to ensure that customers and sellers know exactly what they are buying and selling. But Switzer’s exploration of the roots of words appears to be motivated more by intellectual curiosity than by the practical question of consistency, and he concludes that the gardener is “Certainly Left to write or Speak as he pleases”. After all, “the Language of Botany is not the Chief Aim of the Author”; rather it is to provide a “Compendious Narrative” which takes in the various aspects of the plant.

A summary of the chapter on “Cepa or Onions Leek Ciboule &c” provides convenient example of the scope of his narrative. He begins with an “Introduction”, in which he makes an initial stab at derivation (“from the French Oignion”), and a historical overview (“it was held in Great Esteam […] amongst the Egyptians […] and Heroditus

(as Mr Evelyn observes) writes that there was Ninety Tunn of Gold spent on them whilst the Pyramids were Building”). He details the best conditions for cultivating them (“Of the Soil and seasons of soweing”), acknowledging that none are “so fine as those Brought Either from Portugal or Spain”. He gives details of the varieties of onion, listing “Shasbourgh”, “Red Spanish”, “English of Mixt”, “Welch”, as well as “Leeks”, “Ciboles”, “Cives”, “Shalott” and others. For each he recommends how to grow them and to use them in the kitchen (Spanish make “Excellent Sauce”, but “Welch” are “fit for nothing but Soups”). Along the way he draws attention to locations where plantsmen are succeeding in growing varieties (“The Red Spanish kind is also rais’d att Axbridge in Somersetshire”). Each section is rounded off with an etymology (“Of Garlick Etymology Kinds &c”), with sources scattered throughout the text (often “Miller”, “Bauhinus”, or “Evelyn”) or, if longer, they are bordered off into footnotes (“* See Millers Dictionary Sub titulo Allium Garlick quad Exiliendo Cusuit Roii Hist: Plantarum Lib: 21 Chap 5 pa: 1125”).

CONCLUSION

This manuscript shows Switzer setting out his patch in the field of horticulture as an authority who knows whereof he writes, with knowledge “the Result of Practice” and of retail experience: he knows what is needed, both by plants and by their growers. He writes with a kind of knowledgeable ease earned by a lifetime’s experience, although his handwritten volume strikes a poignant note, since this was one project destined not to come to fruition; but as the only surviving manuscript by Switzer, it remains an artefact full of insights into the methods of a major figure in early-18th-century English horticulture.

£12,500 / $16,100 Ref: 8250

TWENTY-THREE

¶ A profusely annotated Plantin Bible, with 16th century annotations in secretary and italic hands with underlining throughout. It was owned first by the prominent 16th-century physician Thomas Moundeford – and annotated in either his hand or a contemporary – then by the influential 18th-century Scottish moral philosopher Frances Hutcheson.

Thomas Moundeford (1550-1630) was president of the College of Physicians and author of a slim volume entitled Vir bonus (1622) (dedicated to several worthies including James I, the Bishop of Lincoln, and a batch of judges) in which he “praises the king, denounces smoking, alludes to the Basilicon doron, and shows that he was well read in Cicero, Tertullian, the Greek Testament, and the Latin Bible” (ODNB).

If the hand is indeed Moundeford’s (his inscription (see opposite page) is too elaborate to bear comparison with the annotations), we can see him engaging thoroughly with this copy of the Latin Bible: some 465 individual pages have been copiously underlined and annotated (circa 385 in the Old Testament, and circa 80 in the New). Notes range from single-word memos with relevant printed text underlined (“Ebrietas”, “sapientia”, etc) to longer marginalia running over several lines (e.g. “Angeli lenarates ne flarent mali & qui spirit verbi dei impe anter pro omibus posint repugnant verbi dei” f.70v NT). In his inscription to the rear, he states “praetiu vs . anno 1569 . Ætatis 18”, so if the annotations are his, he may well have made them as a callow 18-year-old eager simply to mark, learn and inwardly digest the contents.

¶ [MOUNDEFORD, Thomas (1550-1630); HUTCHESON, Francis (1694-1746)] Biblia, Ad vetustissima exemplaria castigata, 2 parts in 1,

Antwerp, Christopher Plantin, 1567. Octavo.

Foliation [8], 303, [1, blank], 74, [4]. Woodcut architectural title border, I7 verso printed correction slip pasted in. [D&M 6150].

18th century speckled calf, spine gilt in compartments with tulip decoration. Front board detached, small hole in lower margin of title, margins cropped affecting manuscript notes.

Francis Hutcheson (1694-1746), whose inscription appears on the first page of the preface (“Franc: Hutcheson 1720”), was Professor of Moral Philosophy at the University of Glasgow and author of several treatises on beauty and virtue, morality, and the emotions, as well as the posthumously published, multi-volume A System of Moral Philosophy (1755). He exerted a significant influence on David Hume, Adam Smith and other Enlightenment thinkers, and several of his works “were widely used in Scottish and American universities in the eighteenth century” (ODNB).

Hutcheson’s library was passed to his son Francis Hutcheson M.D. (1721-1784), whose engraved bookplate is on the front pastedown.

Moundeford’s facility with Biblical Latin, noted by the ODNB, could have originated in his labours with this text; at the very least, the annotations, show the scribe in the process of developing their skills through copiously and studiously annotating this book.

£3,500 / $4,520 Ref: 8237

TWENTY-FOUR

¶ This remarkably rare 18th-century chess manuscript represents an early attempt at a systematic study of a particular variation of the game by drawing on multiple sources. It also reveals a social world in which competition thrived through shared knowledge – a world at whose centre lay the nascent London Chess Club, which seems to have become the catalyst for a step change in the codification of chess. In 1774, the club engaged François-André Philidor (1726-1795), the era’s most exceptional chess player, as a teacher.

A London edition of Philidor’s Analyse du jeu des échecs (1777), published by subscription, included a dedication to the chess club. This edition is quoted in our manuscript, and some of its subscribers feature prominently.

This manuscript, arranged dos-a-dos (at one end entitled “Gambitt[s]”, and at the other, “Gambitt[s] Refused”), contains a detailed analysis of the main lines of the Bishop’s Gambit opening. It compares notes from Philidor’s 1777 edition with variations from printed and manuscript sources including works by Alessandro Salvio, Pietro Carrera, Giambattista Lolli and Philipp Stamma. Intriguingly, there are numerous references to “Barwell”, (Edward and Nathan Barwell were subscriber’s to the 1777 Philidor) which appear to stem from a manuscript either written by him, or in his possession.

The manuscript bears the bookplate of Richard Penn (1735-1811), lieutenant governor of the Province of Pennsylvania from 1771 to 1773 and later a member of the British Parliament. We can find no record of

¶ [PENN, Richard (owner)] A highly unusual compilation of 18th-century chess gambits.

[Italy and England? Circa 1780]. Octavo (190 x 120 x 17 mm). Approximately 160 pages of text and chess notation on 126 leaves (some loosely inserted leaves). Bound in an Italian 18th-century panelled calf with elaborate gilt tooling, rubbed. Text block loose in binding, some leaves loose.

Watermarks: Horn above LVG (similar to Haewood 2736, after 1714); Horn above GR, countermark IV (Haewood 2754, 2756, and 2758, circa 1754-1800); and Bird below an F (Haewood, Briquet, and Gravell record similar papers as Italian).

The binding appears to be Italian stationer’s binding. The first and final leaves are written in Italian on paper produced in Italy. Augmented with English paper, and the text continues in Italian, French, and English.

Provenance: Bookplate of Richard Penn Jr. (17351811) to pastedown: Pennsylvania in a ribbon above a crest (on a wreath [argent and sable], a demi lion rampant argent, gorged with a collar, sable charged with three plates), Richard Penn beneath.

Inscription to pastedown: “Mr Rimington Wilson / Chess Library”. James Wilson Rimington Wilson “was well known for many years as an ingenious solver of problems” whose library was sold at Sotheby’s in 1928.

Penn having an interest in chess, but one of his children, Richard Penn, FRS (1784-1863), published a volume (1833) that included Maxims and Hints for a Chess Player. The hand of our scribe, while bearing some resemblance, is not a close match for either Penn, so the connection remains elusive.

One further possible figure for our compiler is the mathematician George Atwood (1745-1807), a club subscriber who also recorded games by Philidor and others. But again, the similarities to Atwood’s hand are not conclusive.

Whether our author is Atwood, Penn or another player, our manuscript demonstrates that others connected to the London Chess Club were stimulated to seek to codify and systematise. Equally interesting is its attempt to draw date opening compilation for individual use. To have a manuscript that epitomises the transformation of chess under Philidor at the London Chess Club at the end of the eighteenth

£20,000 / $25,800 Ref: 8066

TWENTY-FIVE

¶ The first complete edition of A Mirour for magistrates, an influential sourcebook for Elizabethan dramatists, including Shakespeare, who “was familiar with it and used the story of Queen Cordelia for some points in ‘King Lear’”. Also, to be found here is the story of Locrine, “which was used in the anonymous play of that name wrongly attributed to Shakespeare in the Third Folio”. The book is “a collaborative collection of poems in which the ghosts of eminent statesmen recount their downfalls in first-person narratives called ‘tragedies’ or ‘complaints’ as an example for magistrates and others in positions of power”.

The 1610-09 edition collects all three earlier parts of Mirrour for Magistrates and adds ‘A Winter Nights Vision’ and ‘England’s Eliza’ (an account of the reign of Elizabeth I), written by Richard Niccols. According to Pforzheimer, “The general-title in all copies examined is a cancel, for what reason cannot even be conjectured. Originally A Winter Nights Vision had a dedication to Prince Henry, Sig [Oo4], but upon …[his] death ... that leaf was cancelled and a new one … was inserted in its place. Evidently the substitution was delayed for most copies occur without any dedication.”3 Our copy is notable for having its cancel leaves and dedications present.

£9,500 / $12,200 Ref: 8153

¶ [HIGGINS, John (active 1570-1602)]

A mirour for magistrates: being a true chronicle historie of the vntimely falles of such vnfortunate princes and men of note, as haue happened since the first entrance of Brute into this iland, vntill this our latter age.

At London: by Felix Kyngston, 1610-09. Quarto. Pagination [20], 875, [1] p. Complete. [STC 13446; Pforzheimer 738].

Modern panelled calf, minor worming to first few gatherings, light damp staining.

¶ POWER, Henry (1623-1668).

Experimental philosophy. In three books: containing new experiments microscopical, mercurial, magnetical.

London : printed by T. Roycroft, for John Martin, and James Allestry, at the Bell in S. Pauls Church-yard, 1664. First edition. [Wing P3099].

Pagination [22], 193, [3], p. folding plate, two large text illustrations and other text illustrations, errata at end, but lacking the imprimatur leaf later.

Bound in modern calf backed

TWENTY-SIX

¶ The first edition of the first book in English on microscopy. It was written by the natural philosopher and physician, Henry Power. The son of a cloth merchant, he attended school in Halifax. He matriculated at Christ’s College, Cambridge, in 1641, graduated BA in 1644 and MA in 1648. At Cambridge he was a protégé of Thomas Browne, who encouraged him to pursue a career in medicine.

He settled in Halifax and befriended the mathematician and natural philosopher, Richard Towneley (1629-1707). They conducted experiments together in which they are thoughts to have discovered the relationship between the pressure and volume of a gas that later became known as “Boyle’s law”. However, their results did not appear in print until Power’s Experimental Philosophy (1664), two years after Boyle’s publication.

£3,000 / $3,880 Ref: 8278

1. Dictionary of Scientific Biography. 2. Knight, Natural Science Books in English 1600-1900. 3. ODNB.

Power’s Experimental Philosophy can reliably claim to be the first English work on microscopy, preceding Hooke’s Micrographia by one year and mentioning Hooke in the text as confirming some of his own observations. This book is also “the first in any language to describe (along with flora and fauna) the nature of various metals as seen through a microscope”1. Unfortunately for Power, his fame “has been somewhat unjustly eclipsed by Hooke’s larger and more handsomely illustrated volume.” But Power’s descriptions were perhaps intended as aids to a kind of rhapsodic reflection while readers peered through microscopes, rather than as substitutes for such observing. For example, when Samuel Pepys read Power, he did so with a new microscope to hand.3

TWENTY-SEVEN

¶ Poised somewhere between memoir and fiction, this lively digressive manuscript seems to be the work of an unreliable narrator. The title page suggests a sober discussion of national debt, but the text presents a story of calamity, intrigue, insurrection and misadventure, mostly in Portugal and then in England, before concluding with some thoughts on English politics and foreign policy between the Jacobite rising of 1745 and the 1784 India Bill. In that sense, it partly answers the description of the title’s final clause, being indeed “some account of the author by the editor”.

¶ FARMER, Benjamin Manuscript entitled ‘An enquiry into the rise, progress, and consequences of the National Debt, with the means by which it may be liquidated. By Timothy Quidnunc. With some account of the author by the editor.’

[Circa1785?]. Slim quarto (195 x 232 x 6 mm).

Approximately 64 text pages. Stab-stitched paper wrappers, stained and with loss to lower of rear wrapper. Written in a neat legible hand throughout, and ascribed to the front wrapper “By Mr. Benjamin Farmer” in the same hand.

References:

1. Maslen and Lancaster. Bowyer ledgers, 4441. ‘A view of the internal policy of Great Britain’. In two parts. For A. Millar. 1764. LEDGER: P1185, 1202, 1208. Perhaps written by Farmer, but ESTC queries ‘by Robert Wallace’.

2. Paice, Edward. Wrath of God: The Great Lisbon Earthquakes of 1755. 2008.

But the “author” (“Timothy Quidnunc”) and “editor” (“Mr Benjamin Farmer”) are clearly both one and the same, and the pseudonym is an allusion to the satirical “Thomas Quidnunc” character invented by Joseph Addison in the Tatler. Benjamin Farmer came from a Quaker family who intermarried with the Galtons, who became gun manufacturers in the Birmingham area in the 18th century. Samuel Galton (1720-99), having married into the Farmer family, formed a business partnership with them; Farmer & Galton supplied the government with guns, exploited the growing market in India and equipped slave traders in Africa. In summer 1755, Benjamin Farmer arrived in Lisbon with a letter of introduction to Abraham Castres, the English Envoy Extraordinary, from Secretary of State Sir Thomas Robinson. Our manuscript takes up the Lisbon story eight pages in; first, by way of introduction, there is a kind of apologia for the “Quidnuncs”: “there has always been a sort of Extravagancy in their Character which has subjected ^them to the Ridicule and Contempt of the moderate and prudent part of the Community”. The “Quidnunc” epithet, coined by Richard Steele, was a reaction to the rise of political coverage in newspapers. The Latin construction (“What now?”) described a certain kind of coffee-house news addict, and can be seen now as an attempt to exclude the ‘tradesman’ and the ‘middling sort’ from serious political discourse, at a time when such debates were opening up to the literate masses. Whether Farmer – himself from a family of tradesmen – is being satirical or self-deprecating remains unclear.

The main narrative drops Farmer/Quidnunc in Lisbon, where he is “rob^bed and treated with great cruelty” (p.8) before experiencing the 1755 Lisbon earthquake and the subsequent “conspiracy of the Nobillity to destroy the King” (p.17). Sundry other incidents include an awkward meeting with the King and “a very singular Adventure” in which he is accused of stealing a mule. There are further anecdotes and reflections before he concludes with his thoughts on the balance of power in England between Crown and Parliament, and other political matters.

One passage appears to resolve an issue of authorship: Farmer recounts that he has “written a Book, and […] # published it” (p.35), giving the title as “Internal Policy of Great Britain, in two parts Millar, Strand 1764” – a book which has for some time been tentatively ascribed to Rev. Robert Wallace (1697-1771), author of Characteristics of the Present Political State of Great Britain (1758), but unconfirmed in the limited biographical accounts of Wallace. Farmer’s remark supports a tentative attribution in the Bowyer Ledgers. 1 An ostensibly more reliable attribution may be found in Two very circumstantial accounts of the late dreadful earthquake at Lisbon, Exeter 1755 (reprinted Boston, 1756), of which the first account was “drawn up by Mr. Farmer, a merchant, of undoubted veracity”. 2

This strange, fascinating manuscript provides a firsthand account of an English businessman’s personal experience of the 1755 Lisbon earthquake and fire and adds substantially to mercantile history and Anglo-Portuguese trading relations. It also offers evidence that Farmer, not Robert Wallace, was the likely author of A View of the Internal Policy of Great Britain. The mixture of vivid autobiography and anecdotes, political commentary and mischievously ambiguous approach to presentation deserves closer attention.

£2,500 / $3,200 Ref: 7988

¶ According to a manuscript note to the front free endpaper of this copy of Aubrey’s Miscellanies, it “book belonged to Alexander Pope: of with whose hand writing this Book Abounds”. Indeed, the ink annotations continued to be attributed to Pope until relatively recently. A letter with Pope’s signature pasted on (“yr Friend & Sert A. Pope Aug. 16. 1732”) was probably added for comparison; but Pope’s hand changed markedly over his lifetime, and even manuscripts known to be his hand often do not resemble each other.

The front and rear boards bear the arms of the MP and bibliophile Sir Mark Masterman-Sykes (1771-1823). When his collection was auctioned in 1824 this book (lot 98), described as having “manuscript Notes by Pope, and his Autograph”, was acquired by Richard Heber (1773-1833), then reappeared in the sale of Heber’s library, again with the annotations ascribed to Pope 2. However, an early 20th- century bookseller’s catalogue entry (clipped and loosely inserted) is more equivocal: “THE FAMOUS SYKES COPY, long supposed to be Alexander Pope’s, with a profusion of manuscript annotations said to be in his hand”. When the book was sold at Sotheby’s (1970), they gave no attribution, but mentioned “extensive annotations […] in a contemporary hand” and the “inserted leaf”. In 1976, the book was sold at Swann Galleries with the Sykes provenance noted, but with no reference to annotations, and went into a private collection before reappearing on the market recently.

Any comparison of our annotations with those known to be in Pope’s hand is contentious because his hand differs depending upon time and context. What seems certain is that the annotator was a contemporary of Pope’s, if not the man himself.

¶ AUBREY, John (1626-1697); POPE, Alexander (1688-1744). Miscellanies, upon the following subjects. I. Day-Fatality. II. LocalFatality. III. Ostenta. IV. Omens. V. Dreams.

VI. Apparitions. Vii. Voices. Viii. Impulses.

IX. Knockings. X. Blows Invisible. XI. Prophesies. XII. Marvels. XIII. Magick. XIV. Transportation in the Air. XV. Visions in a Beril, or Glass. XVI. Converse with Angels and Spirits, XVII Corps-Candles in Wales. XVIII. Oracles. XIX. Exstasie. XX. Glances of Love and Envy. XXI. Second-Sighted-Persons.

XXII. The discovery of two murders by an apparition.

London: printed for A. Bettesworth, and J. Battley in Pater-Noster-Row, J. Pemberton in Fleetstreet, and E. Curll in the Strand, M.D.CC.XXI. [1721].

Our annotator, following Aubrey’s lead, takes a mostly detached approach to the subject matter, frequently citing other books and authors to furnish additional information (“Mr Wood” i.e. Anthony à Wood (1632-1695); “Increase Mathers”; “Mr Baxter’s Certainty of the World of Spirits”; “Camden in his Hist. of Qu. Eliz. Sub. An. 1570”; “Bovets Pandæmonium”). They even-handedly acknowledge different sides of the debate on witchcraft, mentioning the sceptical “Scots Discovery of Witchcraft” four times, while the rational “Websters Display of Witchcraft” and its spiritually motivated response “Glanvil’s Sadd. Triumph” merit five mentions each.

Our book’s journey and strong provenance convey an absorbing mixture of hopes, desires and disappointments of dealers, auctions, and collectors. As to the content of the annotations themselves, whether or not the ‘great author’ created them, they provide an engrossing window into the world of Pope’s contemporary readers. The sheer quantity of discursive threads and additions makes it a hugely appealing showcase for the high levels of engagement and the emerging concerns with objective verification (albeit of the occult and superstition in this case) that characterised the period. Octavo. Pagination [4], x, [6], 236, [2], p.

Collated and complete with the engraved plate and first and final blank leaves. With two engraved portraits of Pope tipped in at the front; a manuscript page with a clipped signature of Pope affixed is tipped in (see below). Annotations to 63 pages which range from a few words to profuse marginalia.

Binding: 19th century diced Russia gilt, a.e.g.

Front cover detached; lower portion of backstrip missing; some spots and marks; collector’s notes in ink to two preliminary leaves; extensive marginal ink annotations throughout, some trimmed by the binder.

£12,500 / $16,100 Ref: 8203

TWENTY-NINE

¶ Among this humorous group of illustrated letters is a pen-and-ink self-portrait of Berkeley seated upon a display case. “Don’t you wish I may get a place for the Case at Mdm. Tussaud’s?!” he asks, and immediately answers his own question: “Oh yes!!!”.

George Berkeley, was a man renowned as an aristocratic snob with an argumentative and violent disposition. He was tried and found guilty of assaulting a bookseller who would not reveal the name of a reviewer who had savaged his debut novel Berkeley Castle, in Fraser’s Magazine; two days later he duelled with its editor.

But in this group of 20 letters, he is wielding only a pen, and indulging in flights of fancy, lyricism, and gentle ribbing. The letters are addressed to “Catherine”, probably Mary Catherine Berkeley (née Browne) (18291824) known as Lady Catherine. There is a palpable fondness, when he wills that she “ever depend on my wish to see you perfect in everything”.

The illustrations embedded throughout provide glimpses of our his fondness for gentle teasing. For example a drawing apparently showing Catherine attempting to scale a vertically written word, “Dignitasamente”, with the sidenote: “Mr Berkley says there is no such word in the Latin language!!!!!!” and the caption “Helping a tardy scholar over a tall word”. He reflects on the contrast between city and countryside: he rhapsodises “the birds on shore, sing as if heralding approaching summer”, then disparages “the smoky city”. In the City of Bath, he deploys his acerbic side when describing the “old chaps” of Bath with their “gay wigs and white washed faces”, and he skewers the “old Male Dusts” who “don’t do any harm, but on the contrary often lead to laughter at them an undesirable expense”.

¶ BERKELEY, George Charles Grantley FitzHardinge (18001881). A group of 20 illustrated letters. [Circa 1833]. Folded for posting.

£750 / $970 Ref: 8111

Berkeley’s personality – or at least, the aspects of it that he chose to present to Catherine – come through strongly in these letters and their light-hearted illustrations and offer an unexpected counterpoint to his public image.

THIRTY

¶ John Lightfoot was an English clergyman and naturalist, spending much of his free time as a conchologist and botanist. According to the ODNB, Lightfoot was on good terms with Joseph Banks, William Curtis, Dryander, Samuel Goodenough, Thomas Pennant, and Solander, among others. Banks introduced him to Sir John Cullum, of Hardwick House, Bury St Edmunds, and they and their families became lifelong friends.

In 1772 Thomas Pennant invited Lightfoot to accompany him on a tour of Scotland. They travelled for five months on horseback and by sailing boat. In 1777, Lightfoot published his best known work, Flora Scotica (2 vols), which pioneered the scientific study of the plants and fungi of ¶ LIGHTFOOT, John (1735 Flora Scotica: or a Systematic Arrangement in the Linnaean Method of the Native Plants of Scotland and the Hebrides

London: Printed for B. White. 1777. First Edition. Octavo. Two volumes.

Pagination *xii, v-xli, [1], 530; [2], 531 1151, [1], [24, index], additional engraved title-pages, 35 engraved plates.

Annotations and mounted specimen to endpapers (four pages), very occasionally to text. Contemporary calf, neatly rebacked, rubbed. Bookplate to pastedown of volume I of the botanist William A. Clarke (1841-1911), F.L.S.

The book was written English rather than Latin, and included information on habitats, synonymy, Scottish and Gaelic names, and the uses of plants. The work was arranged according to the Linnaean system. Pennant contributed an account on Scottish fauna, and Moses Griffith, his servant, thirty-five drawings. Lightfoot was elected a Fellow of the Royal Society for his scientific work

£650 / $840 Ref: 8297

The first edition is scarce. This copy is includes manuscript notes to endpapers, occasional notes to text, and a specimen of “lance-leaved Lightfootia” (a.k.a. Wahlenbergia denticulata) neatly mounted to endpaper and annotated with a description.

THIRTY-ONE

¶ First edition of the first English book on salads. According to Hunt, it is “a cookery-garden book with excellent recipes for unusual dishes of all sorts flavoured with the ever-useful pot herbs grown so universally in the 17th century”. In her introduction to a later edition, Fox remarks that “the book reveals his zest for living and the culture of his mind. It also shows the thought and life of a country gentleman during the reign of Charles the Second”.

John Evelyn (1620-1706) was an English writer and gardener. He was a founding Fellow of the Royal Society. He is best known as a diarist, which he began keeping in 1640 and continued until his death. He is also remembered for his Sylva, which was published under the auspices of the newly-formed Royal Society, and is the first treatise in English devoted entirely to silviculture.

¶ EVELYN, John (1620-1706).

Acetaria. A discourse of sallets. By J.E. S.R.S. Author of the Kalendarium.

London: for B. Tooke, 1699. First edition. Octavo. Pagination [40], 192, [50], p. complete with the folding table and the errata leaf. Contemporary calf. [Wing E3480, Bitting p.149; Cagle 669; Henrey 117; Keynes 105].

£600 / $775 Ref: 8106

¶ [GEORGIAN ETIQUETTE].

THIRTY-TWO

¶ In an analogy reminiscent of the metaphysical poets, “real Love” is here likened to “the small Pox” – an exception to the fairly restrained tone of these cards, which mostly forgo the light-hearted coquetry of many such sets in favour of manners and polite behaviour. This question-and-answer pair (“Are you apt to fall in love once a month or so?”, and its reply “No: - in my Idea real Love like the small Pox can only be caught once”), with its flippant treatment of what was once a serious scourge, suggests that the set dates from the era after Jenner’s experiments with inoculation and the consequent beginning of smallpox vaccination.

Early 19th-century game of manners.

[England? Circa 1820]. 50 Cards (each 92 x 60 mm). Equal numbers of blue and cream-coloured cards. Each blue question card bears a manuscript letter in ink on the reverse, which matches that on a cream answer card.

Another card asks: “What pray is your opinion of Red Coats?”, again placing this set in the late 18th or early 19th century, when the term was current (The answer “That generally they are Coxcombs, trivial as their feathers, and valuable as their stations” is an interesting, if fleeting, piece of social commentary). Some cards adopt a high moral tone (“What do you feel when performing the request of those whom you regard?” / “Gratitude:- since they but confer favours by asking them”), and a handful draw on passages from the decidedly uncoquettish Hannah More (1745-1833) (“Who are in general Subjects of the safest Counsellors?” / “Books:- for they advise without flattery, self sufficiency, Envy or reward”; and the slightly more playful “Are you fond of a dish of chat?” / “As of other dishes, if I am helped to what I like, and not cloyed with too much of it”).

Also included are a few examples of the familiar ‘riddle’ card (“What is it which all bring into the World but few carry out?” / “Innocence: alike unsuspicious and unsuspected”), and even the odd bit of wordplay (“Do you ever draw?” / “Yes: all such inferences as my Capacity allows me”). These contribute to the set’s evocation of a social world concerned with maintaining moral standards, but comfortable with joking politely about soldiers and

£500 / $650 Ref: 8170

THIRTY-THREE

¶ Wandesforde’s ‘Instructions’ were written in 1636 but remained unpublished for well over a century. They were to his Son and Heir, George Wandesforde, Esq; in order to the Regulating the Conduct

[WANDESFORD, Christopher (15921640)]. Scribal copies of ‘ Sir Christopher Wandesforde’s Instructions to his Eldest Son [and] A Funeral Sermon. Preached at the Burial of the Right Honble Master of the Rolls, Lord Deputy of Ireland.

[York. 1768]. Octavo (205 x 135 x 23 mm). Pagination [2], ix, [3], 96, [2], 22 (numbered in manuscript). Contemporary calf, gilt, rebacked with the original title label laid down, damp staining throughout and resultant spotting to later leaves.

This manuscript precedes the published version by nine years and includes the unpublished “Funeral Sermon” on the occasion of Wandesforde’s death. It was written by “H.S.” of York and a nine-page dedication explains that it was “transcribed by from an old Manuscript which I accidently met with at B*****p” It makes for interesting reading, as he suggests that the manuscript he is has copied from was itself a scribal copy, and that “the antique Orthography […] its being Sewed in a Parchment Cover, containing some Proceedings in the Court of Chancery, concerning the estate at Kirklington belonging to the Wandesforde […] make it probable that it was copied immediately from he originals soon after Sir Christopher’s Death [...] Since when I guess it has come into the Possession of Mrs. J*****’s” who was, apparently, a distant relation of the Wandesfordes. “H.S.” goes on to explain that the manuscripts which he transcribed “were not so correctly taken but that they carry in them many Marks of the haste and Inadvertency of the Transcriber”, and although he has felt obliged to “change a Word or more, as best agrees with the Contact”, he claims “these are Liberties which I have used but sparingly”. In all, a fascinating glimpse into scribal manuscript culture, transcribed before the published version and including the funeral sermon which has never appeared in print.

£750 / $970 Ref: 7918

THIRTY-FOUR

¶ Two things set this little volume apart from other legal notebooks: its fairly basic but beautifully preserved binding and the clear suggestion that the scribe’s wife played an active role in financial matters.

¶ [LEGAL NOTEBOOK] Early

18th-century manuscript accounts book.

[Ryther, Yorkshire 1706-1711].

Duodecimo (130 x 80 x 15 mm).

Approximately 119 text pages on 60 leaves. Red ruled throughout. Ink on paper in a neat, legible hand.

Contemporary vellum, wallet style binding. Very good original condition.

The volume evidently belonged to a landowner: the transactions centre around the Ryther area of North Yorkshire, and much of the income is derived from rents (“March. 25th. [1709] Rd of Mr Westbury his half yeares rent due to me at Martinmas 1708} 106.3.0.”) and commissary fees (“20.0.0. June 30. [1707] Rd of Dr Watkinson upon Acct for Com[m]issary ffees”). Several transactions record incoming rental being paid to his wife, most involving substantial sums (“Nov. 20. [1707] To my Wife} 50.0.0.”; and “Sept. 29. [1708] To my Wife at seuerall times} 70.3.6”), which would have made her a woman of considerable means.

Despite their evident standing, we have been unable to identify this couple. There are some promising clues in their interactions: for example, “[June 9. 1707] pd to Tho. and Mary Dalgarno 6.o m interest of 570l due June 11. 1707.” Thomas Dalgarno (d.1717) was vicar of Lund, East Riding of Yorkshire from 1706 to 1717, having graduated B.A. from St. John’s College, Cambridge in 1701/2. Further interactions circle round deaths (“Oct. 8. [1711] Paid to Hopwood for ye use of Richd Town & Tho. Rigg Executors of Wi Lodge deced”) and the equally inevitable taxes (“Glasse Window tax due Last Michas} 0.5.0”).

The strongest clue comes from the abovementioned “Dr Watkinson” presumably the Henry Watkinson, Doctor of Law, recorded in Dugdale’s Visitation of Yorkshire, who received a B.A. 1648/9 and LL.D. 1659 from St. John’s College, Cambridge, and held the office of commissary to the Dean and Chapter of York, which ties in with the frequent references to payments “Rd of Dr Watkinson upon Acct for Com[m]issary ffees”.

This may lead us back to our scribe and his apparently financially independent wife – both of whom resist identification in surviving records. It is as though they have effaced themselves in the process of recording their transactions with some of their more easily traceable neighbours.

£650 / $840 Ref: 8173

THIRTY-FIVE

¶ A bound collection of correspondence of an Aberdeen merchant covering a wide variety of topics including family, social and business matters.

Alexander Dingwall was a stocking manufacturer in Aberdeen. He was apprenticed to an uncle in the hosiery business, but having apparently completed his apprenticeship before his term had elapsed, he went into business with this uncle. In 1780, he married Elizabeth Douglass at Inchmarlo, Aberdeenshire, and they had six children together. He enjoyed some success in business, and “being of inexpensive habits his family were comfortably provided for”. 1

¶ [DINGWALL, Alexander (1748-1796)].

Over 70 Original 18th-Century Letters to and from Alexander Dingwall, Aberdeen Merchant.

[Circa 1750-95]. Folio album (325 x 205 x 12 mm). Approximately 70 18th-century letters, bound into a 19th-century volume, blue half roan with marbled sides. The letter are mounted rectos and versos, most with address panel mounted below, late 19th -century annotations identifying authors, and a child’s pictorial board game in watercolour of similar vintage loosely inserted.

Alexander cultivated customers in Amsterdam, Rotterdam, and Brussels, and these connections occasioned frequent business trips to those cities. The volume includes exchanges between Alexander and Elizabeth (hers written from Inchmarlo and Aberdeen; his from Rotterdam and Brussels); they address each other as “My Dearest Friend” and often strike an affectionate tone: “I need hardly tell you what I felt at your departure” declares Elizabeth in one letter. She hopes she “conceald it Pretty well”, but her friends and relations were clearly aware of her sense of loss: “evry body I am best acquainted with has given me evry attention”, and at an evening with relations “we Drunk a Bumper to a good voage to you and safe return”.

Other letters show a different side of family life. In one dated 1776, his cousin Arthur Dingwall (d.1786), a London jeweller, complains at having to judge his nephew’s literary pretensions: “an Epistle wrote by my Brother Sandies Eldest son Peter which our Brothr William desired he might write in my presence” is proving “an exceeding disagreeable office for me to be interfering”. Arthur declares that “there will be no probability of improvement … the diction bad, but the spelling shocking, beyond belief” (p.25).

A more businesslike air is to be found in three letters from Dr John Douglas, then Bishop of Carlisle and Dean of Windsor (all dated Windsor Castle, 1789-91 and signed “J. Carliol”). One concerns a Mr Gordon, who, partly thanks to Dingwall’s recommendation, is to be appointed “as a Missionary from our Society […] to the Mission of Exuma one of the Bahamas Islands” (p.25). Meanwhile, his brother Arthur Dingwall Fordyce (1745-1834), writing from Edinburgh in 1766, discusses family matters (land rents, health) and serves up some political gossip: “The whole talk of the Town is about who will gett Lord Milton’s gow – It is of great Consequence to the Douglas

Cause – The Dutchess of Hamilton and the Queen have been solliciting for Lockhart. But it is confidently reported that Montboddo had King;s promise of the first vacancy” (p.17).

Provenance: inscription to front blank: “To John Drysdale Esq of Castellan House Dunbar, E. Lothian, Old Family Letters chiefly addressed to his Great Grandfather

Alexander Dingwall, Merchant, Aberdeen. From his affection Uncle A. Dingwall Fordyce, Fergus, Ontario, Canada, 1892”.

A. Dingwall Fordyce wrote a Family Record of the Name of Dingwall Fordyce in Aberdeenshire, (Ontario, 1885), from which much of the biographical information below has been taken.

References:

1. A. Dingwall Fordyce wrote a Record of the Name of Dingwall Fordyce Aberdeenshire, (Ontario, 1885)

2. Ibid

The University of Aberdeen, Special Collections holds a similar volume: [GB 0231] Alexander Dingwall: letter book. (1772-1784) which contains correspondence “in various hands, with mainly commercial content”.

£1,000 / $1,290 Ref: 8296

Alexander Dingwall died unexpectedly at the age of 48: while improvements were being made to the family house, he fell from a ladder and broke his leg. Unfortunately, “lock-jaw coming on, death ensued on the 3rd of July, 1796”. 2

This volume was probably assembled from loose-leaf correspondence, by Dingwall Fordyce while writing his history of the family. From the gift inscription noted above, it apparently travelled from Scotland to Canada and back again. Its contents represents a cross-section of the concerns of a successful Scottish merchant, as business, charitable and political matters sit cheek by jowl with expressions of spousal affection and the venting of

THIRTY-SIX

¶ Isaac Watts’ reflections on one of the intellectual conundrums of Enlightenment thinking – whether reason and faith can co-exist – are captured in the margins of this copy of Joseph Butler’s The Analogy of Religion. Watts’ annotations, ranging from simple notes (“Objn: Ans:”) to more sustained and detailed observations, demonstrate the level of rigour he applies to his critique of Butler’s ideas as he marshals his own arguments, especially as they relate to John Locke and the problems of materialism; for, as he notes, “Others have Drawn Mr Lockes opinion to unhappy lengths” (2R1r).

Isaac Watts’ books on logic, theology and astronomy were among the most influential works of the period, and his Logick (1724) became the standard text on logic at Oxford, Cambridge, Harvard and Yale. Joseph Butler (1692-1752), in The Analogy of Religion (1736), attempted to demonstrate that a reading of scripture and of nature in all their complexity shows that God was not, as the rationalists would have it, a provable certainty – leaving no role for faith – but rather a probability.

Watts was deeply influenced by the empiricist philosophy of Locke and Isaac Newton, which he combined with ideas from his own nonconformist upbringing to form a complex mix of reason and faith. The empiricist theory that our ideas and knowledge of the world are derived through reasoning from physical experience was considered too materialist by many, and in this volume’s annotations, Watts seems to be seeking arguments robust enough to counter the materialist side of Lockean philosophy, while preserving its empirical core.

¶ WATTS, Isaac (annotator) (1674–1748); BUTLER, Joseph The Analogy of Religion Natural and Revealed, to the Constitution and Course of Nature. To which are added Two brief Dissertations: I. Of Personal Identity. II. Of the Nature of Virtue. By Joseph Butler, L. L. D. Rector of Stanhope, in the Bishoprick of Durham. London: Printed for James, John and Paul Knapton, at the Crown in Ludgate Street. MDCCXXXVI. [1736]. First edition. Pagination [12], x, 11320, complete with the half-title. [ESTC, T67971]. Contemporary full calf, marbled endpapers, early reback, rubbed, corners worn, occasional scattered spotting to text. Annotations by Isaac Watts to over 100 pages.

He expends much of his energy checking Butler’s analogies for robustness. In one passage, he concedes that “This Argt: drawn from our Intellectuall Ideas & Reflecting Powers not being injur’d by Severall Diseases, has much more weight in it than the former” (D4r), but he considers it still too weak: “Yet since some ^other Diseases & even Sleep do hinder ^ weaken or stupefy our reflecting Powers, ye Materialist will say, the Analogy of Nature here is as Strong Agt:: ye immortality of ye Soul as it is for it.”

Locke’s theory of personal identity – defining a person as an entity that can recognise itself as persisting over time –provoked disagreement among many of his contemporaries, including Butler, who he accuses Locke of circularity,

(it is “self-evident that consciousness of personal identity presupposes, and therefore cannot constitute, personal identity”). Watts, though broadly in agreement, raises some objections to Butler’s arguments along the way – for example, against the idea that a person is aware of who they are from one moment to the next, he retorts “Qu: May not Madness make Nero think himself Hercules?” (2Q3r).

A note to the rear endpaper reads: “I bought this book from Paterson Auctioneer London at the sale of the Library of Nathanael Neal Esq […] C.S. London March 1766” appears that, after Watts’ death in 1748, this book fairly quickly found its way into Neal’s ownership and became part of Paterson’s auction entitled The Genuine Library of Nathaniel Neal Esq., in February 1766, where it was bought by “C.S.”, who clearly appreciated its significance.

The endpaper note also records that the book belonged “to Dr. Isaac Watts whose name ^is in his own handwriting & also Notes in the Margin”. Watts’ inscription (“I Watts. 1736 / Pret 8r:”) has been grafted to the front free endpaper – whether from another book or from the original endpapers is not clear, but the latter seems more likely, as the inscription and publication date are both 1736. The marginal marks and annotations are in Watts’ distinctive hand throughout, exemplified by his eccentrically curlicued “ye” .

Watts keeps questioning to the end. He even appears to query the role of Christ (at least in terms of the general argument), when he asks: “Why by a Mediation?” (2P3v), and skirts scepticism with “Why Christty: not universally reveald? Why not stronger Evidence?” (2P4r). Such questions typify his relentless logical engagement with Butler’s arguments. His annotations deepen our understanding of the development of his ideas and help to trace some of the nuances in a complex and long-running intellectual debate that endures to the present day.

£9,500 / $12,200 Ref: 8049

THIRTY-SEVEN

¶ The chronological list of names in this little notebook evoke the confidential conversations at intimate dinners where key decisions in European history were made over port, or the lively gatherings and grand parties where small talk cemented social relations. And often beneath, between, and beside the punctilious records of dinner companions, intimacies slip through; the silence of a blank page speaks clearly of emotional distress, and even the colour of ink can sometimes tell us more than the words it forms on the page.

The compiler of this manuscript was the diplomat, Morton Eden, who from 1776 to 1779 was Minister to Bavaria, then to Copenhagen 1779-1782, and (after marrying Lady Elizabeth Henley (1757-1821)) to Dresden 1783-1791. He was then appointed envoy-extraordinary and minister-plenipotentiary at the court of Berlin, which is where this manuscript begins (“1791 Novr 14th Arrived at Berlin”). He transferred to Vienna in 1793, taking this notebook with him. According to the ODNB, “after reluctantly agreeing to be dispatched to Madrid as ambassador-extraordinary, he was reappointed envoyextraordinary to Vienna to negotiate the war loan to the emperor”.

¶ [EDEN, Morton, first Baron Henley (1752–1830)]. Late 18thcentury manuscript, entitled ‘Dinner Book’. [Berlin and Vienna. Circa 1791-1797]. 12mo (164 x 100 x 15 mm). Approximately 173 unnumbered text pages on 90 leaves Contemporary half sheep, manuscript title label: “Dinner Book Berlin Novr 15th 1791”. Worn and broken, lacking spine.

Eden records the people with whom they dined or supped on an almost daily basis. The occasions range from state balls and dinners to cozy suppers. He lists the names of all the attendees, including many prominent figures in Prussian and Austrian diplomacy, as well as representatives of Great Britain, Russia, Italy, Spain, Portugal and the United States. In Berlin, the Edens were frequent guests at the court of Prussian King Frederick William II (1744-1797) and Queen Frederica Louisa of Hesse-Darmstadt (1751-1805). The couple seem to have shared duties quite effectively: Lady Elizabeth is frequently recorded as having “dined” or “supped” with either the king or queen separately, as well as with the “Queen Dowager”, while Eden was entertaining elsewhere.

Besides British dining companions (“Duke of Buccleuch”, “Lord Henry Spencer”, “Lord Dalkeith”, etc), French guests include the emigré duc de Richelieu, Louis de la Trémouille, and Armand de Polignac; and on 12 November 1797 in Vienna, Eden notes a dinner with some 26 guests, annotated at the end in red ink “given to the Duke d’Enghien, who stayed here 3 days in his way to Russia”. As a member of the House of Bourbon, Enghien commanded a corps of emigrés established by the Prince de Condé, and was later executed by Napoleon for collaboration with the British. Among his other acquaintances in Vienna was American statesman Gouverneur Morris (“Mr Morris American”), who was there in the autumn of 1796 as American minister-plenipotentary to France.

The manuscript is mostly written in brown ink within red-ruled columns for dates and with a line between each day. Important events, often of a more personal nature, are written in red ink. For instance, Eden records on 19 February 1793 that they “set out for Vienna where we arrived safely on the 27th at Noon”.

Eden’s aforementioned reluctance “to be dispatched to Madrid as ambassador-extraordinary” is conspicuous in his remark in red ink that on 11 April 1794 “We left Vienna & with great regret”; and rather than record anything of his eight months in Madrid, he leaves a blank page to separate this sad day from that of his happier return “to Vienna Decr 13th 1794”. Things improve still more one week later when he reports (again in red ink) “Lady Eliz!! arrived”. The personal and the political again combine on “Janry 3d 1796”, when he writes vertically in red ink “Dinner given on Acc: of the Christening of my little Girl”, marking an event whose guests included the likes of the “Russian Amb. & Ambs” , “Earl Cowper”, “Marquis of Carmarthen”, “Mr. Le Mesurier” and over 40 others.

This last example demonstrates how the personal is often employed in the service of the political – a crucial tactic in diplomacy. Beyond its significant historical reach, this remarkable document illustrates how recording only the barest of details – in this case, the names of dinner companions – can still enable human expression to slip through the net, revealing unguarded moments and emotions in the process.

£5,500 / $7,100 Ref: 8199

THIRTY-EIGHT

¶ This is a scarce, complete and handsome set of Jonas Hanway's five letters on two of his most dearly held philanthropic enterprises: the Marine Society, which he established in 1756 to equip and prepare destitute men and boys for a livelihood at sea (four letters); and the Magdalen Hospital for Penitent Prostitutes, which he co-founded in 1758 (the fifth and final letter). Each has a separate title page, pagination, and register.

Hanway (1712-1786), was a merchant and philanthropist, often remembered for being the first man in London to carry an umbrella (for which he was widely mocked) and his opposition to tea (for which he was mocked by Samuel Johnson), he plunged himself into numerous benevolent causes, among them smallpox inoculations, the working conditions of young apprentices of chimney sweeps, the fate of infant children in workhouses, and a charity for girls abandoned to prostitution (hence his enthusiastic support for the subsequent Magdalen Hospital for Penitent Prostitutes). Among his most successful works was the Registers Bill (later dubbed ‘Hanway’s Act’), designed to improve the lives of workhouse children, which has been called “the only piece of eighteenth-century legislation dealing with the poor which was an unqualified success”, and the establishment, in 1756, of the Marine Society. The Society’s mission was to provide good education and employment to poor boys, which in turn supplied the British Navy with thousands of much-needed, welltrained seafarers. It is the world’s oldest public maritime charity, which still exists today.

£1,250 / $1,600 Ref: 8155

¶ HANWAY, Jonas (1712-1786). Three letters on the subject of the Marine Society. [bound with] Two letters.

London: [s.n.], Printed in the Year. [1758].

FIRST COLLECTED EDITIONS.

Quarto. Pagination [2]; vi, 8, 24; 23, [1]; 67, [1]; 11, [1] p., frontispiece; [2]; [2], 34; 35 [1], p. Collated and complete. [Goldsmiths, 9406 and 9408; ESTC, T93944 and T93943].

Contemporary calf, rubbed, rebacked preserving old title label. A clean widemargined copy on thick paper.

THIRTY-NINE

¶ This group comprises some 55 letters and documents, all dated 1802 or 1803. There are 25 incoming letters to Thomas Adams (which he has docketed on the reverse), and 30 draft replies in his hand, most are one or two pages in length, and one 10-page document which includes a series of drafts in pamphlet form.

¶ [ADAMS, Thomas (1771-1811)].

A collection of Letters to Thomas Adams of Alnwick, together with his Draft Replies.

[Circa 1802-1803]. A group of 55 letters and documents, various sizes, but mostly quarto.

The correspondence includes Adams’ dealings with a handful of clients and acquaintances, possibly all on the same or interrelated matters. Much of the content touches on the will of “Sir John Webb” and issues arising, particularly as they concern his daughter and heir, Barbara, Lady Shaftesbury, a “power of selling the Lincolnshire Estate in aid of the personal Estate”, and a “Purchase of a reversion in fee”. A handful of letters relate enquiries (perhaps connected with a separate case) about “the Ogle Family” of Eglingham, near Alnwick.

Various colleagues and concerned individuals correspond with “John Tarleton”, “John , and various clerks to legal worthies. Among the issues discussed are the wording of legal agreements, land and inheritance queries, and the prevarication of “I have not received one line from Mr Tarleton […] my Conduct towards him does not deserve such Treatment and particularly when he knows how much embarrassed I am for money”).

£1,000 / $1,290 Ref: 8212

FORTY

¶ These letters were written during the American Revolutionary War by a key figure in the British government: the fourth Earl of Sandwich, who, as first lord of the Admiralty, helped to transform the British Navy. The correspondence brims with the day-by-day business of managing a maritime fleet that had yet to reach the strength required of a nation with a growing empire.

The politician and statesman John Montagu, fourth earl of Sandwich, began his ministerial career in 1744 as a member of the Admiralty board, where he was instrumental in reforming many aspects of the navy, from training and discipline to ship design and dockyard management. He debuted as a diplomat at the Breda peace talks in 1746, and helped frame the resulting treaty of Aix-la-Chapelle. Almost concurrently, he became first lord of the Admiralty, but his determination to intensify the reform of the navy proved unpopular and led to his dismissal in 1751. He briefly returned to the post in 1763, then began a third stint in 1771, this time meeting with greater success.

Our collection of letters dates from this third term, which coincided with the British response to the

¶ [SANDWICH, John Montagu, 4th Earl of Sandwich (1718-1792)]. Twenty-four Autograph Letters and Notes.

[Circa 1774-81]. Folded for posting (240 x 375 mm unfolded). Address panels, some seals intact. 23 letters, each signed “Sandwich”; all but one headed “Hinchingbrook” (i.e. Hinchingbrooke House, Huntingdon, formerly the home of the Earls of Sandwich), and one letter signed by Captain Hugh Dalrymple.

Watermarks: Fleur-de-lis in shield, surmounted by crown, GR, over a bell, (Strasbourg lily), lettered “JUBB” in bell, others lettered “LVG”.

American Revolution, and all of the correspondence is concerned with naval matters – the greater portion of it relating to the American colonies.

Two of the letters have an integral address panel addressed to “George Jackson Esqr.”; this, we assume, is Sir George Jackson, 1st Baronet (1725-1822), deputy secretary of Admiralty and first clerk of the marine department between 1766 and 1782 – and a friend of Montagu’s.

NB: despite writing over 20 years after the introduction of the new calendar style, Sandwich rather eccentrically dates his letters according to the pre-1750 calendar; Jackson, however, when docketing does not. In our transcriptions we have used the ‘new style’ date shown on Jackson’s docket.

Numbering in square brackets below refers to our sequencing of the letters. A complete transcript of the entire collection is available on request.

Provenance: formerly in the private collection of the Montague family.

SHIPS

Much of the correspondence relates to the disposition of ships: in the first letter, dated “Dec. 30. 1774”, Sandwich directs that “orders be immediately given for the Romney to be fitted for a voyage to Newfoundland, and to receive a Commodore”, stressing that “these orders be given without loss of time.” Other vessels mentioned in the early letters include “the Active” (which he considers “a proper ship to be sent to America” [3]); “the Cygnet”; and “the Rainbow”, stipulating that “Sir George Collier be appointed to command her, and Michael Hindman to be her second Lieutenant.” [5].

Sandwich directs ships around various portions of a particularly complicated chessboard, balancing strategic

priorities with other considerations. On “Dec: 26. 1775”, he writes: “The Fox & Greyhound must be kept for North America, as their Captains have particularly requested that voyage, therefore the Boreas & Seaford may go to Jamaica & the Leeward Islands, & the Milford be the first or second ship to Boston.” (The 28-gun frigate HMS Milford in 1777 became the first British naval ship to engage with an armed American ship.) In the same letter (“Dec: 26. 1775”), Sandwich approves Jackson’s suggestion of “docking the Romney Surprize & Martin, & sending the Alborough immediately to Gibraltar”, noting that, if short of men, “we might take a few from the Surprize & Martin, & possibly a few more from the Romney.” [6]

HUMAN RESOURCES

These manpower issues arise several times elsewhere, with Sandwich sanctioning “a bounty” to attract “voluntier Seamen, and I think able bodied landmen should allso be included” (“Dec: 26. 1775”) [5]. Soon thereafter, he cites a remark from “Admiral Graves” that “the ships of his squadron are in great want of Marines”, and asks Jackson to propose “to the Board” that the Milford, “& every other ship that goes to Boston, should carry out 20 supernumerary private Marines”, to be reassigned “to such ships […] as are most in want of them.” Each Admiral concerned should also continue his practice of “taking out the private marines from all the ships he sends home, and adding them to the Battalions on shore till they are compleated to 500 private each.” (“Dec: 30. 1775”) [9]

Despite this need for personnel, Sandwich rules out “any of the apprentices or men who have been expelled from the yards for their late misbehaviour” [7]; but in other, often more senior cases, he makes a different call: responding to “Lieut: Duncansons” request for a “leave of absence”, he decrees that “Marine Officers are so much wanted, and their numbers since the augmentation to 80 per company so inadequate to the services required from them that I can by no means agree […] he must therefore either stick to our service or quit it.” [5]

Everywhere in the letters we find evidence of the extent to which Sandwich, as first lord, covers the waterfront. He forwards to Jackson several requests for commissions, including for “John Nash to be a Master at Arms”, and for “Lieutenant William Bett” to relieve “the Lieut: of the Hazard” [9]. He likewise relays a petition “from Captain O’Hara desiring to quit his ship”, with instructions that end with an intriguing allusion to another matter entirely: “you will therefore inform him that he has leave to retire; and appoint Captain Wilkinson to succeed him. If the Captain Smith is the person who sold his ship in America when Commodore Gambier commanded there, he & I shall not easily make up our quarrel.” [12]

The unpredictability of human behaviour – from personality clashes to outright criminality – accounts for some of the more diverting passages in Sandwich’s letters. He stresses the importance of informing “Sir Peter Parker” that “it is not intended he should have the appointment of officers, otherwise something disagreeable will happen between him and Admiral Shuldham”; and directs an official response following “the escape of Brown from the Marshalsea Prison” [5].

£12,000 / $15,500 Ref: 8270

FORTY-ONE

¶ Blackmail, lascivious goings-on, disastrous royal marriages, century-long political cover-ups… It all sounds like ripe fodder for a sensationalist, bestselling story. And that is exactly what Thomas Ashe produced, in two forms: a hefty novel, and this extraordinary manuscript poem.

Ashe’s two very different versions of The Claustral Palace are among several prurient pieces he wrote about the Hanoverians as the nation followed the conflicts between the future George IV and his wife, Caroline of Brunswick. Many of Ashe’s other sordid writings ran to several editions by dint of their popularity (for example, The Spirit of the Book (1812) and its abridgement, The Spirit of the Spirit)1, but this verse rendition of The Claustral Palace was, like its subsequent ‘novelisation’, seized by government agents and remained unpublished.

¶ [ASHE, Thomas (1770-1835)]

Manuscript entitled ‘The Claustral Palace: An Ovidian & Political Poem’.

[Circa 1811]. Quarto (252 x 190 x 8 mm). Approximately 64 unnumbered text pages (including title and part-titles) on 70 leaves (including endpapers).

Watermark: “Budgen & Wilmott / 1810”. Bound in fine contemporary red morocco, gilt.

Ashe, an Irish army officer, formed a powerful union with Caroline, to whom he became a ghostwriter2. After her marriage deteriorated, Caroline became a political scapegoat, prompting her to use the only weapon at her disposal: access to the royal family’s dirtiest of secrets. Ashe, who deployed his highsociety connections to feed his penchant for writing blackmailing novels and satires, saw ample material for storytelling, not to mention extortion. After George III confined Queen Charlotte and their six daughters at Frogmore House, scandalous rumours circulated: dodgy dalliances, violent disagreements, even venereal diseases –a goldmine of outrages which Ashe mined in The Claustral Palace.

From the outset of this verse manuscript (written circa 1811), there are several marked differences with his 1812 prose version. The latter is a long “political romance”, narrated via the epistolary form, whereas our manuscript runs to 64 pages; the novel bears Ashe’s name on the title page, but in our manuscript it has been defaced to read “Thomas Algernon Esq”.

The verse manuscript is dedicated to Princess Charlotte, the only child of George IV and Caroline, who in turn is acclaimed as “her Royal Highness’s most persecuted & most Illustrious Mother” – a more personalised opening than that to the novel. As the poem begins, we find ourselves near “proud Windsora”, where “A stately Palace rises to the sight…” and we hear “Loud shouts, and sullen groans, & dreadful doleful sighs; / Heart-rending plaints demand the pitying ear”.

With these mock-classical tones, novel and poem begin to align, as both dive into the gothic murk of that era’s

References:

1. Travers, James, A Blackmailer at Frogmore: The Adventures of Queen Charlotte’s Ghost, Amberley Publishing (2022).

2. Ibid

popular sensationalist literature. In the earlier part of our poetic manuscript, “Mad” King George appears as “A Shiv’ring Monarch [who] keeps his awful Court”; his wife, Queen Charlotte, is “a Witch to Avarice assign’d”. Ashe’s sympathy towards the princesses (“the blest Nymphs, whom rural graves confine”) reaches exclamatory heights in the third part: “Oh, World! Oh, Fortune! […] Against the Conqueror, Death, there’s none can charm”. Ashe offers his poem’s final thought: “As / None happy call, in this uncertain state / Death only sits us safe beyond the reach of fate”. The predicament of the royal children is clear.

3. Redding, Cyrus, Fifty Years’ Recollections, Literary and Personal, Vol. III, London (1858), pp. 63-64.

This poem was not available for consultation when James Travers wrote A Blackmailer at Frogmore. We are extremely grateful to him for sharing his scholarship for this catalogue.

Did Ashe ever intend to publish the earlier poem? The 18th-century journalist, Cyrus Redding, wrote that Ashe “wrote false memoirs of living people, to get paid for their suppression. One of these […] was called ‘The Claustral Palace’”.3 Perhaps our manuscript, which has been folded as though for posting, or for just carrying around, had only ever been meant as a ‘shakedown’? Perhaps, after the success of The Spirit of the Book, Ashe decided to discard this poetic

Our manuscript abounds with fantastical Gothic imagery and intrigue, but its impression of blackmail dressed up as literature gives a flavour of the kind of unsavoury profiteering that attended the crisis - ridden Hanoverian dynasty.

£2,000 / $2,580 Ref: 8241

FORTY-TWO

¶ The artist and diarist, Joseph Farington was an influential figure in the expanding interest in tourism of the 18th century. In this album of 45 drawings, he constructs a visual itinerary for the reader, using sketches created during several journeys around Scotland over almost a decade. Many of the drawings are signed, and his annotations frequently extend onto the mounts, leading us to attribute not just the pictures, but the compilation of the volume itself to the Farington, which in turn helps reveal the artist’s intentions.

By the 1780s, very few English artists had attempted a proper exploration of Scotland. Farington, however, was one of this select handful. His reputation rests largely on “the careful, accurate topographical drawings which he prepared for the folios of engravings of British views”; publications that “found a ready market among tourists confined to Britain by unrest abroad.”1 Our volume is a superb example of just such a folio, albeit unpublished.

¶ FARINGTON, Joseph (17471821) An Album of 45 Working Drawings of Scottish Landscapes. [Scotland. Circa 1788-1801]. Folio (340 x 230 x 14 mm).

Contemporary half calf, rubbed and worn, 45 sketches, neatly mounted on paper watermarked 1794. Various sizes between 165 x 120 mm and 255 x 155 mm, neatly inset onto album leaves with ruled

It was compiled by Farington himself using landscape drawings he had sketched during excursions to Scotland between 1788 and 1801, apparently with the intention of publishing a series of Scottish views similar to his Views of the Lakes of Cumberland and Westmorland (1785) and the volume History of the River Thames (1794).

TOURISM

In the late 18th century, the popularity of the European Grand Tour suffered a decline after the French Revolution and its lengthy, hazardous repercussions made travel on the Continent inadvisable for British tourists. The notion of domestic travel as a cheaper, safer route to self-education, embodied in the Picturesque Tour, took hold following the publication of William Gilpin’s Observations on the River Wye, and Several Parts of South Wales, etc. Relative Chiefly to Picturesque Beauty (1782).

Gilpin presented scenes, via prose and illustration, that promoted their suitability as subjects for painting by the amateur traveller. The pursuit of picturesque tourism became popular, and British travellers beat a path to areas such as the Lake District, Snowdonia in Wales, and the Scottish Highlands. One consequence of this was an upgrade of transport networks and facilities in these regions; another was the increasing attention of artists and writers to these homegrown landscapes.

Farington was not inclined towards some of the liberties taken by many ‘picturesque’ practitioners; his style was esteemed for its veracity and realism. Nonetheless, Gilpin greatly admired Farington’s work, and used aquatints to illustrate his highly successful Observations, relative chiefly to picturesque beauty made in the year 1772, (1786). In the preface of which Gilpin commends “Farington’s prints” which he says “render any other portraits of the lakes unnecessary. They are by far, in the author’s opinion, the most accurate, and beautiful views of that romantic country, which he hath seen”.

THE ALBUM

At first glance, our album might be taken for a display piece. But closer inspection indicates that this was a workbook, featuring sketches that have either been extracted from sketchbooks or made on single sheets over a decade. In this sense, the volume has much to say about Farington’s working practices: he has assembled an album of Scottish views, arranged in the form of a tour, but his approach is geographical rather than chronological. That said, a goodly portion of the drawings seem to trace an intensive, 12-day campaign of sketching, as we shall see.

The journey begins at Gretna Green, with a panoramic pencil sketch (80 x 265 mm), followed by views of Dumfries, including one with the town in the distance and annotated with various names: “Criffel” (a large hill to the right), “Cowhill Mr Johnson” and “Dalswinton House Mr Millar” which is of a “Red Tone” (this house would have been fairly new, having been built circa 1785 for Patrick Miller, the inventor of steam navigation; Farington’s sketch is dated “July 20 1792”).

After a sketch in the town itself, Farington’s route takes him in a northerly direction, “5 miles from Dumfries” where he draws “Armisfield”, an impressive 16th-century castle known as Amisfield Tower, home of “Mr Charteris”, in whose family it remained until the early 20th century. As he continues towards Moffat, he sketches

Lochhouse Tower (annotated “July 20 1792 Loch House seat of Johnston of Cor Head”), and on the same day he draws Raehills (“Rae Hill near Moffat, a seat of Lord Hopetoun”, “July 20th 1792”) with notes such as “Blue Hills” and “House red stone prospect”. Farington seems to have been particularly taken with Moffat: he includes another five sketches from the surrounding area as he heads towards Glasgow.

We know from an earlier drawing by Farington, now at the Met, New York,2 dated 1788 and entitled “Corra Linn, the Falls of the Clyde”, that his next stop was a return visit: here he titles his sketch “Corus Lyn Waterfall”, dates it “July 25. 1792” and adds the note “rain sit ? colour throughout”. Like his previous rendition of the scene, he has used brush and wash and squared it for transfer; and although it takes the same viewpoint, it is drawn in much closer proximity, giving greater prominence to the waterfall. This 1792 drawing also shows Farington further experimenting with the composition: he has omitted the lower section from the grid and extended the left side. The Met’s accompanying notes acknowledge Farington’s trailblazing status as an English artist exploring Scotland, and continue: “Farington sketched along the rivers Forth and Clyde in the summer of 1788 to design aquatints for an anticipated concluding volume of The History of the Principal Rivers of Great Britain. Unfortunately, the French Revolutionary Wars affected the print trade and these Scottish views were never published.”

¶ References:

1. Newby, Evelyn in the ODNB.

2. The Met. Object Number: 2011.78.

3. Newby, ibid.

It seems likely that our album is Farington’s rough layout of this intended work, and there are suggestions that this project was speculative and beset by financial worries: of the 45 drawings, 36 are dated between 20 and 31 July 1792 and cover a sizeable area. This indicates a concentrated burst of activity to gather the bulk of his material, into which he then inserted a smaller number of sketches from previous and later journeys which he took in 1788 and 1801 respectively. Thus, in the midst of these July 1792 entries he includes “Tolboth at Glasgow Octr. 23 1801”.

Returning to his July 1792 expedition, he has squared “Rock & Castle of Dumbarton” (“July 27”) for transfer, and followed it with two sketches of the “Rock of Dumbarton” looking up from the shoreline of the River Clyde. He returns the following day to execute another view of the rock, in a very free hand which emphasises the rock from a more dramatic angle, before walking into the town itself to record a more sedate street scene. Later that same day, he follows the River Clyde upstream to Ardmore, where he sketches “Mr Nobles” house. Continuing towards Gare Loch, on “July 29. 1792” he sketches “Rosneath, the Duke of Argyle’s”. This castle’s interior had been recently remodelled in the French fashion with designs by Robert Mylne; by 1800 it was in the hands of John Campbell, 5th Duke of Argyll, but in 1802, while the Duke was away, the castle was destroyed in a fire.

The next day was a busy one: Farington includes eight sketches with this date, with several views of lochs, one “taken on the water”, three at Loch Goil, (“entrance to Loch-goil”, “Head of Loch Gile”), two at Glen Gyle, and one at Loch Long (consulting a map while examining this selection enables one to determine which direction from the boat Farington was looking). He spent 30 and 31 July at Inveraray and Loch Awe, reaching as far north as Kilchurn Castle, “Glen Orch” (i.e. Glen Orchy) before descending to Loch Lomond.

Despite the effort and expense of compiling volumes such as this, it was not uncommon in this period for lavishly illustrated books never to see publication; the same fate befell several planned volumes with which Farington was involved, among them a seventh volume of the Britannia depicta atlas that were to feature his drawings of Devon, and William Byrne’s Magna Britannia, abandoned because of runaway costs. But Farington’s reputation endured, even though, as Evelyn Newby writes, “It is difficult to make a real appraisal of his paintings as they are scattered in many private and public collections, and rarely appear in art sales”.3

This carefully arranged album is therefore both an unusual artefact and a primary source for examining the working practices and artistic intentions of a prominent artist of the ‘picturesque’ – a style ostensibly at odds with Farington’s concern for veracity. Our volume shows him planning a showcase never realised in print pioneering ventures into the landscapes of Scotland.

£4,000 / $5,170 Ref: 8301

Borough of Tavistock. London: 1802, 8vo, inscribed “Thomas Coutts Esqr from the Author”.

• Two autograph letters, signed, by E. Armistead, to Thomas Coutts. 4 pages. 1798 and 1800.

• Six autograph letters, signed, by Elizabeth Fox, to Thomas Coutts. 14 pages. 1800 to 1819.

• Six engraved portraits of Charles James Fox, apparently in chronological order, distributed through the volume.

The volume has been bound by Riviere (signed to lower front margin) in fine crushed brown morocco, with gilt tooled spine and inside dentelles, manuscript title page: “Autograph Letters of C. J. Fox and Mrs Fox, 1789-1819”. All of documents have been carefully mounted on 82 thick leaves with neatly cut “peephole” sections, which allow space for thicker elements, such as seals, to nestle in and maintain the flatness of the volume.

¶ Three of the abiding themes of the life of Charles James Fox – money, politics, and personal relationships – are richly represented in this most unusual volume, which has been bound around the turn of the 20th century to create a kind of lasting monument to one of the great political figures of the late 18th century.

¶ FOX, Charles James. A remarkable volume, comprising 47 autograph letters, to Thomas Coutts, together with related manuscript and printed material.

[Circa 1789-1819]. Large folio (415 x 310 x 23 mm).

Provenance: Weetman Pearson, 1st Viscount Cowdray (1856-1927), of Paddockhurst, armorial bookplate; Sotheby's, New York, 5 June 1996, lot 230.

Throughout his political transformations, Fox was consistent in his belief in the importance of balancing the executive and legislative branches of the state, and in his fear that the former could overwhelm the latter and lead to a descent into despotism. He vehemently opposed George III policies, which drew more power to the monarch, and evolved from a relatively conservative politician into one of the most radical of his era. His actions were underpinned by his close friendships, which seemed not to be formed for political expediency but to grow organically from mutual respect.

Fox was one of the most gifted and influential figures in the shaping of politics in the United Kingdom, especially in the abolition of the slave trade: he proposed the bill that passed into law in 1807 as the Slave Trade Act. Although he did not live to see this Act passed, he considered it his greatest achievement, remarking that “if, during the almost forty years that I have had the honour of a seat in parliament, I had been so fortunate as to accomplish that, and that only, I should think I had done enough, and could retire from public life with comfort, and the conscious satisfaction, that I had done my duty.” 1

Having been a Francophile from an early age, Fox was also influential in French politics, cultivating close friendships with Lafayette, Noailles, Talleyrand, Orléans, and Lauzun, several of whom were key figures in both the French Revolution and the American War of Independence. Fox was also a prominent supporter of the latter, and occasionally corresponded with Thomas Jefferson. The members of the “Fox Club” famously wore buff and blue, the colours of the uniforms in Washington’s army, to demonstrate their support for the American cause.

THE LETTERS

Fox’s correspondent in these letters is the banker Thomas Coutts (1735-1822), who took over the eponymous institution in 1778 and transformed it into Britain’s most prestigious bank. Fox – a spendthrift who did much to popularise the pursuit of gambling – began as a client of Coutts’s, borrowing heavily from him during the 1780s,

but these letters make clear that their relationship matured into a friendship. Fox often asks after the health of Coutts’s wife and daughters, and keeps him apprised of the activities in Parliamentary affairs of his son Foxite-turned-radical MP Francis Burdett.

Fox discusses international and domestic politics, especially the French Revolution and subsequent wars with France. He expresses his continued hopes for peace and his loathing of the administration ( Court have done so much mischief that no men or measures can restore the country to its former state, either with respect to its Constitution or to its consequences abroad ” (5 September 1796)), his increasing concerns about the possibility of an invasion of Britain ( am so far convinced with respect to the Invasion as to believe that Bonaparte means attempt at it” (28 March 1804)), and his opinion of Napoleon (“The Consul’s temper is at best, I fear, rather tyrannical” – a mood, he imagines, cause which I hope will be permanent. I mean the increasing difficulties which he finds, I might almost say the impossibilities in the way of his scheme of Invasion” (13 December 1802)).

As the political and the personal mingled freely in his life and career, so they often coexist in these letters: he addresses Coutts’s concern over his daughter Sophia’s presence in revolutionary Paris, and refers frequently to Burdett, her husband. He also mentions mutual acquaintances such as the heavily indebted Richard Brinsley Sheridan, whose (“modes of proceeding are so wholly different from those of every other Person that I can not help still hoping that he will act so as to make him less blameable than he now appears to be”) – an amusing remark from an infamously dissolute individual whose own escapades inspired the character of Charles Surface in Sheridan’s School for Scandal

The Bonapartean thread continues with Fox’s discussion of the role of Sir Joseph Banks (1743-1820) and his “the Consul is unreasonably suspicious concerning Spies… However, it is possible some of Sir Joseph’s friends may have behaved imprudently … of a kind which if . Fox adds an encomium for Banks “When I was in Paris Sir J. Banks was spoken of with the highest respect both by Bonaparte

Fox also touches on the French Royalist uprising involving Jean-Charles Pichegru 1804) and Bonaparte’s suspicions concerning the role of Jean 1813): “It seems on the one hand very unlikely that Moreau should have engaged with Pichegru & the Royalists, and on the other almost equally so that Bonaparte should bring him to publick Tryal without complete Evidence against him… At any rate our Government ought to make some publick disavowal of having been concerned in, or having encouraged any attempt that was to be accompanied with Assassination” (12 March 1804). He ends here, as he often does, by immediately switching from world politics to polite salutations: “Pray give my best respects to Mrs Coutts …”.

It is Mrs Fox, however, who has the last word in this correspondence; it was Elizabeth (née Armistead (1750-1842) who had guided her husband from debauchery to domesticity, but she could apparently do little to steer him away from his bibulous tendencies or his disastrous adventures at the gaming tables. Among her letters to Coutts are two of particular poignancy. She writes on 7 July 1806, a mere two months before Fox’s death (from several conditions including liver disease, dropsy and several dozen gallstones): “I know you love my dear Husband dearly, but no one can love him as I do because no one knows so well what an angel he is”. Then, 13 years after her husband’s death and with his considerable debts seemingly still not cleared, she contacts Coutts to request a “further loan of a thousand pounds” (6 October 1819).

THE LEGACY

Elizabeth was left to inherit and manage her husband’s disastrous financial bequest, but the legacy of his remaining two themes – politics and personal relationships – were appropriated by subsequent generations with a devotion that few can claim to have matched. Leslie Mitchell argues that “Whig politics in the first three decades of the nineteenth century cannot be properly understood without taking into account the enduring power of Fox’s career and personality”, and cites several examples: the ubiquity of busts and portraits of Fox in whig houses and establishments; the circulation of “Locks of his hair and complete sets of his speeches” as whig birthday gifts; and the formation in the 1790s of the Fox Club, which held annual dinners marking the great man’s birthday (a practice that continued until at least 1907).2

Our volume provides still further evidence of the longevity of Fox’s influence: it bears the armorial bookplate of Weetman Pearson, 1st Viscount Cowdray of Paddockhurst (1856-1927), who had these letters bound in a large folio album of crushed brown morocco, and extra-illustrated with portraits, related letters, and a printed speech by Fox. Pearson was himself a fascinating figure: he turned his family’s firm of builders and contractors into one of the leading such companies in Britain, before expanding to win contracts in the US (building the Hudson River tunnel to connect New York with Jersey City; and the four East River tunnels connecting New York with Long Island) and Mexico (infrastructure projects including construction of the Grand Canal in Mexico City). The latter work led to Pearson’s investment in oil drilling, a key factor in the rise of the Mexican oil industry to global status.

Though Pearson’s foray into politics was tentative (he was Liberal MP for Colchester for a time, but retired in 1910), he was a committed advocate for causes such as welfare provision, Irish home rule, and female suffrage, in which his wife Annie (1862–1932) played an active role. For these and other contributions, Pearson was created baronet in 1894 and raised to the peerage in 1910 as Baron Cowdray, of Midhurst, Sussex. His commissioning of this lavish binding and presentation of Fox’s correspondence, complete with regularly inserted engraved portraits, is as lavish a tribute to the revered politician as any bust or statue, and also amounts to a declaration of Pearson’s own political lineage.

CONCLUSION

For Fox, politics was an absorbing aspect of life but only one among many, and his range of interests, together with an unfortunate taste for the rakish lifestyle, militated against greater achievement as a politician. But memories of his character and loyalty to what we could now call ‘progressive’ causes have far outlived those of many of his contemporaries, and this remarkable volume of letters bears witness to his major preoccupations and stands as testament to a politician who understood the importance of standing up for the rights of others and actively resisting despots.

£8,500 / $10,200 Ref: 8311

Thank you for reading our latest catalogue. We hope you'll come and visit us at Booth E10, where we shall also be exhibiting the following 17th & 18th century printing blocks:

FORTY-FOUR

¶ Original woodcut printing block from The Famous history of Tom thumb Wherein is declared, his marvellous acts of manhood, full of wonder and merriment. Performed after his second return from Fairy-Land Printed and sold in Aldermary Church-Yard, London. [Circa 1750]. [ESTC, T35344].

Boxwood. (75 x 70 mm). Some loss to horse’s face. Label to affixed to side: “Early block..., White [collection]”.

The woodblock depicts a tiny figure riding an elaborately dressed horse within a circular border with floral motifs. This image was reprinted in the 1775 edition of The Famous history [ESTC, T160913].

£600 / $775

FORTY-FIVE

¶ Front and rear cover illustrations.

Original woodcut printing block depicting Cupid shooting a dart at a woman, sat beneath a tree in a landscape setting. The style of the woman’s dress together with Cupid’s long hair, suggest an early date.

Despite the potentially wide application of this image, we have been thus far unable to identify any publication on ECCO, EEBO, or BBTI, which uses this woodcut printing block.

Boxwood. (76 x 78 mm). Small cracks and chips to edge of printed image, handwritten label in pencil (late 19th or early 20th century) reading “Early Valentine, White Collection, 80”.

£750 / $970

FORTY-SIX

¶ Original woodcut printing block from The Famous history of Tom thumb Wherein is declared, his marvellous acts of manhood, full of wonder and merriment. Performed after his second return from Fairy-Land. Edition not identified. The composition of the image is similar to one used ESTC, T35344 and T160913 (see above), but the hatching is different.

Boxwood. (26 x 74 mm). Label to affixed to side: “1640 White collection”.

£300 / $390

FORTY-SEVEN

¶ Original woodcut printing block published in at least two ballad sheets: An Answer to the Unconstant Shepherd: or; Fair Cynthia's grief and care crowned with joy and happiness by her Lover's Return, to an Excellent New Tune.

Printed for Charles Bates next to the Crown-Tavern in West-smithfield, circa 1690]. [EBBA, 37501; ESTC, R170327; Wing, A3450].

The West-Country Counsellor: or, The Devonshire Damsels Advice to the Lasses of London, In their Choice of Kind and Loving Husbands.

Printed for J. Deacon at the Angel in Giltspur-street, without Newgate. [1671-1702 ?]. [R39752]

Boxwood. (88 x 65 mm). Minor paper residue to printable surface, handwritten label in pencil to side (late 19th or early 20th century) reading “Early English Costume circa 1600, White [collection]”.

The woodcut is one of three used in the broadside. It illustrates the full body profile of a well-dressed woman; the eponymous Cynthia in one ballad; one of the “Lasses of London”; and likely others too.

£850 / $1,100

FORTY-EIGHT

¶ Original woodcut printing block illustrating the story of Jack the Giant Slayer, in four conjugate sections.

Boxwood. (85 x 8 mm). A label affixed to the side had the pencilled note: “Jack the Giant Queller, White collection circa 1600 6/”.

However, despite the abovementioned claim to its being early 17th century, the earliest example of this quartered illustration that we can find is its use as titlepage illustration to The history of Jack and the Giants. Newcastle: Printed by M. Angus and Son. [Circa 1790]. [ESTC, T147338].

Margaret Angus was a bookbinder, bookseller, printer, publisher, and stationer in Newcastle. BBTI records her dates as 1770 (or earlier) until her death in 1821.

£400 / $500

I specialise in interesting and unusual manuscripts and antiquarian books that record their histories as material forms, through the shaping of objects and the traces left on the surface, by the conscious and unconscious acts of their creators and users.

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