POET

Each letter 2pp., 12mo. Both in good condition, on lightly-aged paper. He starts the first letter by expressing 'great pride and immense joy' in sending 'my seventh book of French poems [...] According to the reviews, it is the best I ever wrote'. He continues with references to the recipient's 'short but memorable visit to Johannesburg', and to 'the uncomplimentary remarks passed by my confreres in Johannesburg', these being 'indeed compliments, for they indicate that I do not belong to them, in spite of our common profession.

On one side of an 8 x 13 cm piece of paper. In good condition, with light signs of age, and central horizontal fold. Firm, bold signature, 8 cm long, with underlining flourish. Beneath the signature, in a small hand, is the message: 'M Guinot | M: Vigny vous adresse son nom pour vous remercier il ne connait pas votre adresse'. Addressed on reverse, 'à M. Eug. Guinot'.

61 + [3]pp., 16mo. Disbound. In fair condition, on aged paper. The last three pages carry advertisements of works by Waugh and Benjamin Brierley. Waugh's investigations in 'a quiet tract of country on the eastern border of Lancashire, lying in a corner, formed by the junction of the rivers Mersey and Irwell', involves him in meetings with ordinary folk, whose speech in the local dialect is recorded. Uncommon: five copies on COPAC, variously dated to 1867 and 1868.

An interesting letter regarding a celebrated Victorian scandal. In 1884 Frederic had come to England with his wife and five children as the London correspondent of the New York TImes. He set up a second household with Kate Lyon, with whom he had a further three children. Lyons was a Christian Scientist, and when Frederic suffered a stroke in 1898, she tried to cure him by faith healing. At the instigation of Mrs Frederic, Lyon was tried for manslaughter, but was acquitted. 4pp., 12mo. Bifolium. In good condition, lightly-aged.

George James Firmage was born in New York; attended Massachusetts Institute of Technology (1947-48) and College of the City of New York (1949); BA, New York University, 1952; pursued graduate study, University of Massachusetts, 1952-54; publications supervisor in advertising and marketing services department, First National City Bank, New York, 1954; wrote several books, including E.E. Cummings: a Miscellany (1958) and E.E. Cummings: a Bibliography; editor of A Garland for Dylan Thomas (1963) and of E.E. Cummings' Three Plays and a Ballet (1967).

One page each, note and poem, creased, chipped, small closed tears, texts clear and complete. Letter: "Many thanks for your favour of the 12th inst. I have pleasure in enclosing the lines I undertook to send you & hope you will like them. If you will kindly let me know approximate date of sale I will try to get them published with an explanatory note as to their object." Typed poem, 4 verses, commencing "O, let us not, while many voices plead, | And nearer claims confront us day by day [...]". Apparently unpublished.

3pp., 12mo. Writing in a difficult hand, he thanks him for his very curious & interesting letter respecting Chr. Smart, of whose birthplace I had been previously ignorant, tho' his name was not unknown to me in connection with Horace'.

Part of a letter, the subscription, c.10 x 2cm, sl. stained but text clear, from album leaf. Text in hasty hand, as follows: "Adieu in [?] - your grateful |with all my soul - Ugo Foscolo", Perhaps to be read "Adieu in [?] with all my soul your grateful Ugo Foscolo."

A friend of Dylan Thomas and a leading poet of the 1930s London literary scene, Dyment is the subject of a warm appreciation by Robert Graecen in The Times, 8 June 1971. The present collection consists of a series of amusing poems regarding various members of the animal kingdom. ONE: Typescript of 'Fur, Feather, and Fin | by | Clifford and Marcella Dyment'. Address at foot of title-page: 'Flat 5, 53, Harrington Gardens, London, S.W.7.' 46pp., 8vo. Internally in good condition, on lightly-aged paper.

3pp., 12mo. Bifolium. Very good, on lightly-aged paper. He finds that he will be able to arrange 'a course of 3 afternoon lectures for you on Welsh and Irish Music . . at the Royal Institution during next week'. He asks Graves to 'communicate with the Assistant Secretary as to date and exact title'. He ends by stating the fee.

On one side of 11 x 18.5 cm piece of paper. In good condition, lightly aged and creased. On reverse is small circular printed paper label of the Ray Rawlins Collection. Reads: 'July 16 1767 Received of Hugh Rogers Esqr the Above Sum in Full for His Son till Last Whitsuntide | by me | Jos. Warton'. Hugh Rogers of Helston, had a son, John, at Trinity, Oxford, presuambly tutored by Warton.

Ford's first book of verse was 'Sung by the Way', published in Blackburn in 1905. She published several volumes of patriotic poetry: 'Poems of War and Peace' (1915), 'A Crown of Amaranth' (with Erskine Macdonald, 1915), 'Our Heroes' (1916); 'A Fight to a Finish' (1917). Other volumes include 'Lyric Leaves' (1912) and 'The England of my Dream' (1928). She edited the series of 'Little Books of Georgian Verse', 1915-1916. Her 'Lessons in Verse-Craft' was published in 1919 with a second edition in 1923. Her song 'In the Twilight' (1923) was set to music by Harry Brookes.

Green folder. [4] + iii + 89pp., 4to. Each page on a separate piece of paper, and the whole enclosed in a folder, on which Lister has written his name and address, and 'Prester John | R. P. Lister | 1st Carbon'. In very good condition, lightly aged, in aged and worn folder. With two-page 'Note to the Publisher' and page of 'Contents', the latter with dates pencilled alongside the 25 sections.

Both letter and typescript in good condition, on lightly-aged paper. In envelope with three postmarks between 9 and 11 September 1928, addressed 'For: Franz Felix, Esq. | Apt. 3-c | 790 Riverside Drive, | New York City.' LETTER: 1p., 4to. He explains that he is sending the 'MS' [sic] that day by registered mail, and asks Felix to keep it 'strictly confidential for the present', adding that he has 'not even told Mr. Brown [his publisher] what it is about'. If Felix has time to 'make up a sketch' Buck will collect it and take it to Brown.

On piece of 9 x 14.5 cm card. In fair condition: aged, lightly-stained and with traces of mount adhering to reverse. Reads: 'To | Lord Jeffrey | With Kind regards from | Thos: Hood'.

three pages, 12mo, bifolium, fold mark, good condition. Not an easy hand. Docketed with her name and the date of the letter. She is delighted at the invitation but can't attend the concert since she'll be in North Wales at the time, and "for some months". She would like to offer the ticket to a friend of her "dear son Alfred who has just come from Australia [ ...]. We live so retired in our hill that we see but little - almost nothing of the world [of society?] or I should have occasionally, nay very often, the pleasure of meeting you [...] [Postscript] I do not know if Tennyson is in town.

Letter: 1p., 8vo. In fair condition, on aged and worn paper. 34 lines of text. A playful (stoned?) communication. He thanks him for 'giving me the Sahara right up to the North African Coast', and explains his plans for making the area 'fertile by piping into it water from the Mediterranean'. He asks him to forward 'photocopies of this letter' to Alec Natas ('a very powerful electrician'), and to Linda Talbot. There are also references to 'Marion', Ivan Katzen, 'Lord Levy' and 'the Imperial Dentist, Sol Philips'.

1p., 4to. On a leaf removed from an autograph album, under the date 'MAY 1', and within a red and green decorative border. The poem consists of sixteen lines in four stanzas, the first stanza reading: 'When the time comes for me to die, | To morrow - or some other day - | If God should bid me make reply: | "What wilt thou?" - I shall say,'. (In the published version 'What wilt thou?' reads 'What woud'st thou?') On the reverse of the leaf is a text and signature by an "Ethel Mengens".

24pp., 12mo. Stapled. Lacking title-leaf (publication details quoted from another copy) and with damage to last leaf, on aged and lightly-creased cheap paper stock. Ten poems, five of them dated: 'Aux Affamés' (8 January 1917), 'Le Bon Fermier' (15 January 1917), 'Le Crime', La Grève Judiciaire' (September 1918), 'Le Retour du Soldat' (10 October 1918), 'Les Pauvres Gens sont comme les Pavés', 'Assez!', 'L'Abdication' (15 October 1918, regarding the Kaiser's abdication), 'Ce que demande le Peuple!', 'La Plainte du Soldat'. The item featured in the 1919 'Belgische Bibliografie'.

[2] + 44pp., 8vo. In lilac paper wraps with title in silver on front cover. Internally in good condition on lightly-aged paper; in worn wraps with creased corner at rear and small square of staining from label on front cover. Inscribed on front pastedown: 'With best wishes | from | Virginia Graham. | 1946.' A charming collection in Grenfell mode, with poems including 'Café Triste' (beginning: 'Miss Tomkinson, do you suppose | That you and I | On this same day next year | Will still be sitting here, | Eating this vegetable pie | Covered white glucose?') and 'V J Day' (beginning: 'Hurray!

In good condition, lightly-aged, with thin strip from stub to one edge of address side of card. Message reads: 'It will give me great pleasure for you to copy the 2nd. volume of the Torch-Bearers, as you suggest, for the Blind. | With my best wishes, | Alfred Noyes.'

The three items are in fair condition, lightly aged and creased. Totalling 7pp., 8vo. ONE: ALS. From Whiteleaf, Princes Risborough; 11 Nov. 1930. Begins 'I heard the other day of a poem of yours, that a young soldier carried about in the war, till he was killed. It was sent home with his papers, & some day I hope to have it - his own copy of it - from a friend, & to send it to you | Why tell you of this now? Because the news of your mother's death has been weighing on my mind, & I wanted to say a word, yet knew how unconsoling words can be.' TWO: ALS.

3pp., 16mo. Bifolium. On aged and worn paper, with closed tears to both leaves along fold lines, and glue from mount along inner margin of first page. He apologises for having to decline an invitation, having 'just told Lady Grey that I would call upon her to-night'. He would have liked to see her 'to ask your forgiveness for the many blunders I have committed to-day, tho' how to appear before you I really don't know'. He will attempt to 'throw' himself on her 'Good-nature' in a day or two, and concludes: 'I believe the debate in the Lords has confused my understanding'.

Both items in fair condition, on aged and worn paper. LETTER: 2pp., 12mo. 'I really think that to know - even to begin to know - R. was not only to be aware of his rare charm and goodness, but to love him.' POEM: 1p., 12mo. Six-line poem 'To Sylvia Lynd', signed at end 'G. R. H.' Reads 'You with your grace, your glancing wit, who drew | About you all the fairest and the best, | In lucent memory outshone anew | The image of each most admirèd guest: | And here to-night, as old friends gather round, | You by that starry company still are crowned.'

ALS, 85 Cadogan Gardens, SW; 28 September 1926, 2pp. 12mo. Written in distress following the death of his wife. 'It seems impossible for me to collect my thoughts, or this letter would have gone to you earlier. I do want you to know that I am grateful to you for the friendship of your message. She hoped, & was looking happily forward to seeing more of Mrs. Lynd & yourself.'

ALS, from 'Clooney Esq, Oldfield, Swanage, Dorset'; 9 Jan. 1935. He suspects SL is 'the fairy godmother who - partly at least - induced the Book Society to recommend The Seals [...] I want people to feel something of the tragic futility, the truly terrible ever present threat of the irrational in our consciousness, and how it threatens not merely us but our children. In this sense then the book is propoganda [sic] and deliberate propoganda [sic]"

One, Stansfield; 3 May 1922. Thanking RL for his praise of his new poetry book. 'I have as you may know been away on a tramp steamer [...] I am as yet a barbarian, unregenerate in literary matters, or I feel I should have much else from your pen to thank you for'. Two, Stansfield nr Clare, Suffolk; 1 July 'not 1916!' [i.e. 1922] Referring to 'the award & its lucky receiver' (i.e. Blunden). Three, Stansfield; 5 July 1922. Announcing the completion of a 'paper on Shelley' mentioned in the first letter. Four, Hawstead nr Bury St Edmunds; 19 June 1930.

For more on Nicholson, see his entry by James Ogden in the Oxford DNB. LETTER: 1p., 12mo. In fair condition, on lightly aged and creased paper. At foot of page: 'An acrostic Written for Mr Lupton Esqre | Septr 20th 1828 | John Nicholson'. The poem, the first letter of whose lines spell out 'LUPTON' (the engraver Thomas Goff Lupton?), reads: 'Love thy father Love thy God | unto him Give honor who the seas has trod | Pray to him upon thy Knees | To him who form'd the world the seas | Order'd Creation made Eternity | Nature is but a shade compard to Thee'. PORTRAIT: Lithographic engraving.

On the reverse of the half-title leaf (only) of her book 'Records of Woman: with other Poems'. In fair condition, lightly aged and worn. Reads: 'Miss Chorley. With | Felicia Heman's kindest regards.' A nice association: Henry Fothergill Chorley edited the 'Memorials of Mrs Hemans' (1836).

3pp., 12mo. Originally a bifolium, but with the two leaves now separated. In fair condition, on aged and worn paper watermarked 'S S | 1817'. The reverse of the second leaf is addressed to 'Mr. Falconer, | Newcastle on Tyne.' He begins by thanking Falconer for the 'nice little collection of Poems [...] The "Wreath" will often amuse my solitary hours'. After some pieties he states: 'I gladly subjoin a few verses for your amusement, and that of Miss Falconer [...] How glad I should be to see you and her again at Ednam!