CLAY

TLS: 2pp., 12mo. In good condition. The letter begins: 'Dear Al: | Last Thursday morning, while sitting in a barbar chair, I asked myself a question which a number of people have been asking me recently, namely, What are you doing at Harvard? I couldn't come up with a very satisfactory answer, so I went to a friend's house on Cape Cod for the weekend. Monday I saw the head of the English Department at Harvard, H. C. Baker. He said, "Follow your star," which seemed to me a little romantic, but all the same good advice.

2pp., 8vo. On both sides of a leaf of scored 29.5 x 23 cm paper. Aged and folded. The first page is numbered 330 in the top left-hand corner, and headed "I love to hear the Story"'. The first page carries the first and third verses of Miller's hymn, scored for piano, signed at foot 'Frederic Clay.' On the reverse, with no heading, is the score of the second verse: 'I'm glad my blessed Saviour was once a child like me / To show how pure and holy His Little ones might be'.

Scored on two facing pages, on two 25 x 34 cm leaves of music paper attached to one another along one edge with a thin strip of glue. Good, on lightly-aged paper, in red card folder with white label. Scored for voice and piano, with the two verses of libretto by Tom Taylor. Signed at end 'Frederic Clay. / Tenor Ballad from "Court & Cottage".', with ownership inscription alongside: 'Henry Wodehouse / 24 Upp. Brook St.' (According to the Survey of London, Hon.

Letter: 1p., 16mo. In fair condition, trimmed into a lozenge, and with tracesof glue from mount on reverse. He writes that he is sorry to have missed Robinson, and that he hopes to be in Louisville when he visits again. 'I gave away, long ago, all of Mr Clay's letters to myself. I have obtained however from his friend H. T. Duncan one of his autograph letters for your son.' Portrait: 19.5 x 27.5 cm. In fair condition, lightly-aged. Beneath the image: 'Engraved by J. C. Buttre' and a facsimile of Prentice's signature, with the words 'OF KENTUCKY' beneath it.

ONE. Letter, signed 'Wm Brown'. 3 pp, 12mo. Bifolium. 25 lines. Text clear and complete. Good, on lightly-aged paper. He is 'greatly disappointed' that, '[h]aving gone to the expense of building the Hall of Inventions & Science', 'the five Learned Societies' that 'induced' him 'to make that addition to the Library, have taken no effectual means to make it available for the purpose intended'. Brown 'promised £100 towards the fittings', and is sending a cheque for that amount.

From the papers of Alfred Clay Abraham (1853-1942), Liverpool pharmacist, and his daughter Emma Clarke Abraham (1850-1934) of Swarthmoor Hall, Ulverston. All items in fair condition, on aged paper, with texts clear and complete. ONE: Autograph Letter Signed from Henry Murray to his late wife Mary's brother. 8 pp, 12mo. On two bifoliums. Begins: 'Although a Stranger to you I perhaps need not apologise for the obtrusion of this communication upon you, when I inform you that I am the husband - or rather was the husband of your poor Sister Mary. for alas!

140 lines of text, written out on both sides of a strip of ruled paper, with one side forming two outside 12mo pages (each 13 x 10 cm) by the folding the strip horizontally halfway down, and the reverse carrying one continuous column over a 13 x 20 cm single page. Text clear and complete. Good, on aged paper. Tozer had shone in his training as a pharmacist, with the British Medical Journal reporting his winning in 1881 of a medal in practical pharmacy and dispensing, and a certificate in botany. By 1889 he was working in Castle Street, Liverpool, for A. C. Abraham's firm of Clay & Abraham.

The Liverpool Apothecaries Company was founded in 1836 with a capital of £100,000, its premises comprising a warehouse, chemical and pharmaceutical laboratories, and a retail shop in Seel Street. John Abraham ran the dispensing department from 1838 until his resignation in 1843, going on in 1845 to found, as junior partner, the pharmaceutical chemists Clay & Abraham.

The subscription Liverpool Library within the Lyceum, founded in 1757, is believed to have been the first circulating or lending library in Europe, and the first two of these items provide a valuable insight into its status at the time when the advent of the public library system was undermining its position.

All seven items 4to, 1 p. Each good, on lightly-aged paper. All bearing the Society's stamp, and six docketed. Letter Two to Sir Henry Trueman Wood, Three to Six to G. K. Menzies, and Seven to W. Perry. Letter One: 9 July 1914. Querying whether members of the Society can describe themselves as 'Fellows'. Letter Two: 22 March 1916. Being 'unable to get an earlier passage [to America] owing to cancellation of boats', he will be delighted to preside over a meeting.

Octavo: 28 pp. Unbound, stabbed and stitched. Slightly dogeared, on grubby, lightly-spotted paper. Loss to top right-hand corner of title-leaf (not affecting text). Marked up in ink in a contemporary hand. COPAC lists copies at the British Library, Manchester and National Library of Scotland. The 'Alabama Question' related to what indemnity should be paid by Great Britain for damage done to United States commerce by the Alabama and other confederate cruisers built in British ports.

Two pages, small octavo. Good, on lightly aged paper and ruckled paper, with some staining to the verso of the blank second leaf of the bifolium. His correspondent's 'paper on the high death rate in Liverpool' was not returned to Clay after being read at Manchester, 'nor can the Secretary of the Department (Captain ) obtain any intelligence of it from the reporters'. One of the reporters has sent the Captain an abstract prepared by the author. Clay asks whether he has the manuscript in his possession, and if so, whether he will send it to him.

Stapled and unbound. Octavo: four leaves (eight unpaginated pages). On aged and lightly spotted paper. Vignette on title page. Includes list of plates and 'Specimen Entry' of pages 51-3. Verso of last leaf headed 'from CONSTABLE'S BIBLIOGRAPHICAL LIST', comprising 'THE CARTER-POLLARD DISCLOSURES', 'BIBLIOGRAPHIA SERIES' and 'DORMY HOUSE CATALOGUES'.