POETRY

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Autograph Letter Signed, "Camilla Toulmin", to Samuel Rogers, poet, expressing her admiration and discussing her writings.

Author: 
Camilla Toulmin, author [Samuel Rogers, poet].
Publication details: 
Ferdinand Cottage, Hampstead Road, 20 April1846.
£80.00

Four pages, 12mo, small closed tear, darkened edges, text clear and complete. She apologises for bothering him with "the accompanying little volume" ["Poems" published this year, 1846] , explaining that Rogers was a friend of her "dear & lamented" father's youth.

[Pamphlet; Inscribed by Author] Discours d'Ouverture et Raport sul La Pouesio Occitano

Author: 
[Jean-Marie Vinas] Douctou Vinas
Publication details: 
Société Archéologique, Scientifique & Littéraire de Baziers (Herault) Beziers: Imprimerie Générale, Barthe, Soueix. Bourdou et Rul..., 1911.
£80.00

28pp., 8vo, green printed paper wraps, sunned, chipped, contents good condition. "Séance Publique pour la Distribution des Prix des Concours de l'année 1911 | Présidence de M. le Docteur Vinas." INSCRIBED BY AUTHOR apparently in Basque. WorldCat lists only one copy (a Beziers collection).

Autograph Letter Signed from the poet Robin Skelton to the British Labour MP Tom Driberg, with an inscribed copy of Skelton's book 'Begging the Dialect', and a covering Typed Letter Signed from John Dekker, President, University of Manchester Union.

Author: 
Robin Skelton (1925-1997), Anglo-Canadian poet, academic and practitioner of the Wiccan religion [Tom Driberg [Thomas Edward Neil Driberg] (1905-1976), Baron Bradwell, journalist and Labour MP]
Publication details: 
Skelton's Letter: On lettheread of the University of Manchester, 18 May 1960. Book: London: Oxford University Press, 1960, with inscription dated May 1960. Dekker's Letter: On letterhead of University of Manchester Union. 19 May 1960.
£90.00

Book: [xii] + 95 pp., 8vo. In fair condition, in original green cloth and worn yellow dustwrapper. Inscribed on front free endpaper: 'For Tom Driberg | With Good Wishes | Robin Skelton | May 1960'. With review slip, on the reverse of which Driberg has written: 'Blake | Graves | Frost | Plomer'. Skelton's Letter: 2pp., 12mo. 20 lines. Good, on lightly-aged paper. Regarding the book he writes that he has 'added a note to the preface to the 2 Ballads of the Muse', which he hopes 'doesn't too much spoil the layout'. He thanks Driberg for his interest in his work.

Autograph Letter Signed ('Southesk') from the Scottish nobleman and poet James Carnegie, 9th Earl of Southesk [Sir James Carnegie of Kinnaird and of Pitcarrow], dealing cannily with the autograph hunter John J. Baron of Blackburn.

Author: 
James Carnegie (1827-1905), 9th Earl of Southesk [Sir James Carnegie of Kinnaird and of Pitcarrow], Scottish nobleman and poet
Publication details: 
Hotel des Princes, Biarritz, France. On his monogrammed letterhead. 21 January 1883.
£120.00

3pp., 12mo. Bifolium. Good, on lightly-aged paper. In original envelope, with stamp, three postmarks and red wax seal, addressed by Southesk to 'John J. Baron Esq. | 48 Griffin Street | Wilton | Blackburn | England.' Unaware that Baron is a barefaced autograph hunter, he expresses regret that, having no copies of his own works to hand, he is 'unable to accede to the very gratifying request of the lady referred to by you, as desirous to have two verses of my poems, in my own handwriting'.

Autograph Letter Signed ('M. Hewlett') from the novelist and poet Maurice Hewlett, complaining that he has been underpaid for two pieces of writing.

Author: 
Maurice Hewlett [Maurice Henry Hewlett] (1861-1923), novelist and poet
Publication details: 
On letterhead of Broad Chalke, Salisbury. 5 December 1922.
£45.00

1p., 16mo. Fair, on aged paper, laid down on piece of card. '1349' in blue pencil at head of page. The letter reads: 'Thank you for the cheque. He ought to have paid for two, as both appeared in November. | - | Yes, I have another copy of . | - | [signed] M. Hewlett'.

Printed Victorian handbill poem in Yorkshire dialect, titled 'On the Wing. By John Lawton.', speculating in a humorous style on the effects of successful transport by air.

Author: 
John Lawton, Victorian Yorkshire dialect poet [aircraft; air transport; aeroplanes; fixed-wing flying; manned flight; ballooning]
Publication details: 
Without place or date. [Yorkshire, 1850s?]
£160.00

1p., 12mo. Fair, on aged paper, with slight wear and loss at head. The leaf has been trimmed down to 21 x 16 cm., with rounded corners, around the poem's decorative border. The poem consists of 96 lines, in twelve eight-line stanzas; it is arranged in two columns beneath the title: 'ON THE WING. | BY JOHN LAWTON.' First stanza reads: 'I wor thinkin one neet wol sit i mi cheer, | Wot thowts enter sum people's pates; | Wot useful invenshuns they'n plan'd everywheer | To benefit people un states.

[Printed pamphlet of Portuguese poems.] 'Biographia instantanea e cinematographica do illustre Cidadão. Ah! Ah! de Barros (Moça de recados dos Snrs. de Tres LLL) por Chicote (A. Vieira Mendes) No. 1'.

Author: 
'Chicote', pseudonym of A. Vieira Mendes [José da Fonseca Lage]
Publication details: 
'Composto e impresso na Typ. da Agencia de Publicidade, Rua de Passos Manuel, 198 - PORTO | Proprietario e editor - A. Vieira Mendes'. 1909.
£180.00

37+ [iii] pp., 8vo. Stapled, in red printed wraps. Fair, on aged high-acidity paper, in worn and chipped wraps. Containing nine poems, preceded by an introduction (pp.5-7) from José da Fonseca Lage, dated from Lisbon, May 1909, beginning 'A presente publicação parece mais uma phantasia d'um genio irrequieto, que a realidade d'um desforço de quem se vê roubado, escarnecido e ultrajado!, and followed by 'Esclarecimento imprescindivel' (pp.33-37). The 37pp. of text are followed by a page of 'Erratas', by another listing thirty 'Obras do mesmo auctor' and by a last headed 'No Prélo'.

Engraving titled 'A Curious Piece of Antiquity, On the Crucifixion of Our Saviour and the Two Thieves.' Consisting of a piece of pattern poetry around three crucifixes.

Author: 
John Fenley, Bristol bookseller [pattern poetry]
Publication details: 
'Bristol: Printed for and Sold by J. Fenley, 20, Broad-Mead. (Typ. Brookman.)' No date.
£85.00

Printed on one side of a piece of unwatermarked wove paper, 18 x 20cm. Aged and worn, with a number of closed tears. The poem crosses horizontally and verically through three crucifxes, beginning: 'Behold, O God! INRI vers of my Tears'. The poem was first published around 1765 by W. Bailey, 28 Great Tower-street, London, and was reprinted by several other publishers, with an American version as late as the 1850s. No copy of this edition is present on COPAC. According to BBTI John Fenley was active in Bristol from around 1785 to 1811.

Autograph Letter Signed "Edward George Lytton Bulwer", to [Barbarina Lady Dacre], about her Poems (published 1821).

Author: 
Edward Bulwer Lytton, novelist
Publication details: 
Knebworth, Saturday morning [n.d. - pre-1844 when he became Bulwer-Lytton].
£180.00

One page, 8vo, laid down on another paper, fold marks and slightly crumpled, trimmed with loss of part of "K" of "Knebworth" only, otherwise text clear and complete. "It is with many thanks that Ireturn your Ladyship's Poems [...] I must differ from your Ladyship in the remark that 'Tragedy is not the field for female powers- I cannot help particualrly admiring the nobleness of the characters you have described, & the sentiments they atter are such as Man should utter.

[Printed Georgian pamphlet of song lyrics, not in ESTC.] The Gentleman's Concert. Being A Choice Collection of Favourite Songs. Containing, [twenty numbered song titles, including '15. I am a poor black, it is true.'

Author: 
[Georgian song book; Cluer Dicey & Co., London publishers; 'George Seghious'; 'The Black's Lamentation'; slavery]
Publication details: 
Publication details and date not give. [London: Cluer Dicey & Co. 1770s?]
£280.00

The full drophead title, beneath a headpiece of three lions in folliage, reads: The Gentleman's CONCERT. | BEING | A Choice Collection of Favourite SONGS. | Containing, | [following 10 lines in left-hand of two columns] 1. Where's my swain so blyth and clever | 2. To an arbour of woodbines. | 3. The flame of love sincere I felt. | 4. When all the Attic fire was fled. | 5. Cupid, god of pleasing anguish. | 6. As I walk'd forth, &c. | 7. O give me leave to love you dearly. | 8. When Fanny I saw as she trip'd, [sic] &c | 9. Bumpers 'Squire Jones. | 10. Sweet Annie.

Holograph Poem (signed 'Henry van Dyke') by the American author and educator Henry Jackson van Dyke, a sonnet titled 'Richard Watson Gilder'.

Author: 
Henry van Dyke [Henry Jackson van Dyke] (1852-1933), American author, educator and clergyman [Richard Watson Gilder (1844-1909) of New York City, poet and editor of 'The Century Magazine']
Publication details: 
Without place or date [written on Gilder's death in 1909].
£280.00

1p., 4to. A fair copy, on a piece of aged high-acidity paper, with chipping and loss to edges (not affecting text). Signed at foot. The poem begins: 'Heart of a hero in a poet's frame, / Soul of a soldier in a body frail, - / Thine was the courage clear that did not quail / Before the giant champions of shame'. Gilder is praised as a 'poet, patriot, friend', the poem concluding: 'Thou leavest two great gifts that will not die, - / Amid the city's noise, thy lyric cry!

Two Typed Letters Signed from the Czech sound and concrete poet Ladislav Nov

Author: 
Ladislav Nov
Publication details: 
Both from 44 Nezvalova, Treb
£350.00

Both items are in good condition, on lightly-aged paper. Each is in its original envelope, with typed address to Cobbing at 262 Randolph Avenue, London. First Letter: 1p., 8vo. He does not 'object to the publication of "Descartes metamorphosis': 'I am looking forward to the record and some other news. What will be the price of were [sic] not high, I should buy another specimen for my friends from my royalties.' Striking bold 13 x 16 cm design in black at foot of page, somewhat like a melted anthropomorphic letter H. Letter Two: 1p., folio (42 x 21 cm).

ALS, TLS and ACS, all in French, from the Czech writer Ladislav Nov

Author: 
Ladislav Nov
Publication details: 
All from Trebic. TLS: 19 May 1973. ACS: 17 April 1973. ALS: 20 March 1974.
£280.00

All three in good condition, on lightly-aged paper. The ALS is accompanied by its stamped and postmarked envelope, addresed by Nov

[Printed order of service.] Westminster Abbey. The Funeral Service of the late Thomas Hardy, O.M. Monday, January 16th, 1928. 2 p.m.

Author: 
[Funeral service of Thomas Hardy, 1928]
Publication details: 
Vacher & Sons, Ltd, Westminster House, S.W.1.
£120.00

9pp., 12mo. Unbound pamphlet of five leaves. Fair, on aged paper, with rust to staple. Gives the two pieces played 'Before the Service', 'The Sentences', 'The Lesson', 'Hymn', 'The Nunc Dimittis' and 'The Blessing'. Scarce: the only copy on COPAC at the British Library, with a further four copies on WorldCat.

[Printed Verse] The Welcome to Ilkley

Author: 
Anon.
Publication details: 
Burley, 4th Sept.1834
£180.00
Welcome to Ilkley. Printed poem.

One page, 12mo,green paper, bifiolium (rest blank), 3 verses, 14 lines each (total 42 lines), preceded by the statement "Written for the Charity Bazaar") and 6 line quotation from Cowper ("Here stay thy foot; - how copious and how clear ... from an Eternal source"). Verses start "Welcome to Ikley! Lady fair ... That God hath bless'd the spring!". No other copy traced (none on COPAC etc). See scan on website inventory.

[Printed pamphlet.] An Address to Bachelors. By a Bird at Bromsgrove.

Author: 
'A Bird at Bromsgrove' [pseudonym of John Crane of Bromsgrove] [Grafton & Reddell, printers, Birmingham]
Publication details: 
The Seventh Edition, with Additions. Birmingham: Printed by Grafton & Reddell; for the Author. 1801.
£120.00
 An Address to Bachelors. By a Bird at Bromsgrove.

36pp., 18mo. With frontispiece (preceding half-title) of 'I. CRANE / BROMSGROVE', showing a crane and a carriage lamp, within a circular border reading 'To make the Watch go faster turn the Regulator to the right & Slower the Contrary'. Side stitched in original pink printed wraps. In fair condition, in worn and lightly-stained wraps. Nicely printed on wove paper with 'LLOYD 1795' watermark. Poem titled 'Introduction' on p.5, followed by the title poem on pp.7-36. No copy of this attractive edtion on either COPAC or WorldCat, nor of any other printed by Grafton & Reddell.

Printed keepsake, with 'An Old-Time Greeting' and a large swastika on the cover, containing a poem by 'J. S. M.' titled 'The Rune of the Swastika.'

Author: 
'J. S. M.' [swastika; gammadion; Fascism; the Nazis; Nazism]
Publication details: 
Without place or date. [Early twentieth-century.]
£120.00

On a 12mo bifolium of laid paper with 'DUNEDIN NOTE' watermark. Good, on lightly-aged paper. On the cover are a large black swastika and the words 'An Old-Time Greeting.' The poem, titled 'The Rune of the Swastika.' and signed in type 'J. S. M.', is on the recto of the second leaf.

Autograph Card Signed ('R Bridges') from the Poet Laureate Robert Bridges to the Rev. P. O'Toole.

Author: 
Robert Bridges [Robert Seymour Bridges] (1844-1930), Poet Laureate
Publication details: 
18 Merton Street, Oxford. Postmarked 18 April 1917.
£56.00

On blue card, with stamp and postmark. Bridges's message is complete, but the postcard has been trimmed to 14 x 5 cm, with the lower part of the card, carrying O'Toole's address, missing. Otherwise good, on lightly-aged paper. The message reads: '14. Merton St. | Dear Sir. I am writing to apologise for never having answered your letter of Feb. 29th. I have been too much engaged to be able to attend to my correspondents. I beg that you will excuse me. Yours truly | [signed] R Bridges.'

Leaf from an early edition of John Dryden's translation of Plutarch's Lives, marked up with autograph emendations for a revised edition by the Victorian poet Arthur Hugh Clough, with leaf carrying longer emendation's in Clough's hand.

Author: 
Arthur Hugh Clough (1819-1861), English poet, critic, translator and educationalist [John Dryden's translation of Plutarch]
Publication details: 
Undated [early 1850s?]
£1,200.00
Arthur Hugh Clough (1819-1861), English poet

The two leaves were evidently disbound from a copy of an edition of Dryden's Plutarch, in which the grey 4to leaf of writing paper following the 12mo printed leaf was one of those that interleaved the volume. In fair conditon, on lightly-aged paper. The two leaves are tipped in onto a larger leaf removed from an album. The printed leaf is 12mo, from volume 5 of Dryden's translation, with the pages numbered 511 and 612 [sic]. The two sides of the leaf carry a total of approximately 25 emendations and deletions.

Autograph Letter Signed from the poet Laurence Binyon to 'Miss [Alice] Warrender', regarding his duties as one of the judges of the 1925 Hawthornden Prize, with reference to Aldous Huxley, J. R. Ackerley and Sean O'Casey.

Author: 
Laurence Binyon (1869-1943), English poet [Alice Helen Warrender (1857-1947), founder in 1919 of the Hawthornden Prize]
Publication details: 
On letterhead of the Department of Prints and Drawings, British Museum. 15 December [1925].
£95.00

2pp., 12mo. Good, on lightly-aged paper. Docketed in a neat hand at head of second page. Binyon writes that he cannot be with her on the Friday, as he has to 'go down to Winchester on business. And I am so driven I don't know where to turn.' He has 'had Huxley's Barren Leaves in the house for days', but hasn't 'had one moment to look at it'. He has 'managed to read [J. R.

[Printed handbill poem.] A la Garde Nationale de Honfleur. Choeur des Républicains. Air du Chœur des Girondins.

Author: 
'Achille de Naguet Desportes, Propriétaire à Equemauville, près Honfleur' (d.1879) [La Garde Nationale de Honfleur; E. Dupray, printer]
Publication details: 
'Honfleur. Typographie ve E. Dupray.' Undated [1840s].
£150.00

1p., 8vo. On wove paper. Lightly worn and aged. Text in two columns within ornate decorative border. Author's details at foot, above printer's slug. Thirty-five line poem, in five seven-line stanzas. First stanza: 'O! toi, ma France bien-aimée, | Pour toi, nous faison tous des voeux, | Oh! sois à jamais vénérée, | Élevons nos voix vers les cieux. | Oh! France, ma patrie!

Autograph Letter Signed ('De Tabley') from the poet John Byrne Leicester Warren, Baron De Tabley [Lord De Tabley], to Mrs Kate A. Wright of Birmingham, giving her permission to include five of his poems in an anthology.

Author: 
John Byrne Leicester Warren, 3rd Baron De Tabley [Lord De Tabley] (1835-1895), English poet, numismatist, botanist and authority on bookplates
Publication details: 
62 Elm Park Rd, Chelsea. 20 June 1893.
£80.00

1p., 12mo. Fair, on lightly-aged paper. In envelope addressed by De Tabley to 'Mrs. Kate. A. Wright. | Monona House | Small Heath | Birmingham.' In reply to her letter of 18 June, he states that he will have pleasure in permitting her to 'insert the five pieces' which she enumerates in her 'forthcoming Collection of Poems and Ballads of the Nineteenth Century'. Kate A. Wright's 'Dainty Poems of the Nineteenth Century' was published in Birmingham in 1895. The titles of the five poems are given in another contemporary hand [Mrs Wright's?] on the reverse of the second leaf.

Autograph Manuscript of the poem 'The Thunder Storm', in the autograph of its author William Bourne Oliver Peabody.

Author: 
Rev. William Bourne Oliver Peabody (1799-1847), pastor of the Unitarian church in Springfield, Massachusetts, educated at Harvard and Cambridge Divinity School
Publication details: 
Place and date not stated.
£235.00

2pp., 12mo. Fair, on aged paper. In pencil at head: 'Autograph of the Rev W. B. O. Peabody'. In ink in a contemporary hand, between the title and body of text: 'Autograph of Mr Peabody '. Twenty-four lines, arranged in three eight-line stanzas. The text presented here differs in certain respects from that printed in A. P. Putnam's 'Singers and Songs of the Liberal Faith' (1875). In the present version the first stanza reads: 'Black the heaven is overcast! | Breathless is the sultry blast.?>

Autograph Letter Signed ('C S. Calverley.') from the poet Charles Stuart Calverley [C. S. Calverley] to 'Mr. Stocker', with a description of the 'Johnian System of Marking' [St John's College, Cambridge?], and his use of it at Cheltenham College.

Author: 
Charles Stuart Calverley [C. S. Calverley] [born Blayds] (1831-1884), poet and lawyer [St John's College, Cambridge; Cheltenham College]
Publication details: 
17 Devonshire Terrace. 10 January 1884.
£65.00

Both letter and description on the same bifolium. Letter: 1p., 12mo. On recto of first leaf. Description (headed 'Johnian System of Marking'): lengthwise across the verso of the first leaf and recto of the second, and thus making 1p., 8vo. Very good, on lightly-aged paper. Calverley begins by wondering whether he has 'made the Johnian System [...] intelligible' in his description.

Typed Poem Signed ('Theodosia Garrison') from the American poet Theodosia Pickering Garrison (Mrs. Frederick J. Faulks), titled 'Pessimism'.

Author: 
Theodosia Pickering Garrison [Mrs. Frederick J. Faulks] (1874-1944)
Publication details: 
'Theodosia Pickering Garrison, | 32 Nassau Street, New York City.' Undated [1909 or before].
£125.00

1p., landscape 12mo. Good, on aged paper. Garrison's name and address are typed in the top left-hand corner. Her signature is written boldly beneath the poem, which is eight lines long, in two stanzas. It reads 'Because I snatched a pebble from the way, | And thought it priceless till that day my eyes | Filled with a clearer light, and knew my prize | Was worthless, poorer than the common clay; | Because of this shall I go clamouring, | "Behold, there are no diamonds!" and say, | "Look as ye will, ye find but pebbles"? Nay!

Holograph poem by the Harvard-educated lawyer George Stillman Hillard, Attorney General of Massachusetts, titled 'To the Friday Club'. With engraved portrait of Hillard.

Author: 
George Stillman Hillard (1808-1879), Harvard-educated lawyer, in partnership with Charles Sumner, writer on the law, United States Attorney for the District of Massachusetts [The Friday Club, Boston]
Publication details: 
Signed 'Geo. S. Hillard | April 1. 1859.'
£200.00

3pp., 12mo. A fair copy. Very good, on lightly-aged paper. The twenty-eight-line poem is arranged in seven four-line stanzas, with Hillard's firm signature and the date at the end. The poem begins with unintentional, but no less curious, sexual overtones: 'The rod of Aaron, severed long | From its ancestral bowers, | Felt in its veins the sap of youth, | And shone with buds of flowers. | The rigid staff, smoothworn and dry, | In living green was dressed.

Holograph Latin poem by the Rev. John Keate, Master of Eton College, written while a student at King's College, Cambridge.

Author: 
Rev. John Keate (1773-1852), DD, Headmaster of Eton College [King's College, Cambridge]
Publication details: 
Without date or place [Cambridge. Written between 1791 and 1797.]
£180.00

2pp., 12mo. On a leaf of wove paper with Britannia watermark. In fair condition, on aged paper with slight wear to extremities. In pencil at head 'Rev. J. Keate | Head Master of Eton'. Tipped in at the head is a slip of paper with an entry from a Victorian manuscripts catalogue describing the item, reading: 'KEATE (The Rev. John, D.D.). Head Master of Eton.

Autograph Manuscript Signed, an untitled holograph poem by the Scottish writer and artist James Ballantine, beginning 'Confide ye aye in Providence, for Providence is Kind'.

Author: 
James Ballantine (c.1807-1877), Scottish writer and artist in stained glass
Publication details: 
Edinburgh; 16 August 1856.
£500.00

1p., landscape 8vo. On the first leaf of a bifolium. Very good, on lightly-aged paper. Well presented, with the second blank leaf neatly inserted into a windowpane border. The poem is sixteen lines long, arranged in four stanzas, neatly written out on a piece of wove paper. The first stanza reads 'Confide ye aye in Providence, for Providence is Kind | And bear ye a' lifes changes, wi a calm an' tranquil mind | Though pressed an' hemmed on every side, hae faith, an' ye'll win through | For ilka blade o grass keeps its ain drap o dew'.

Autograph Letter Signed from the poet Jean Ingelow to 'Mrs Oliver' [Hannah Oliver, wife of Professor Daniel Oliver].

Author: 
Jean Ingelow ['Orris'] (1820-1897), poet and writer [Hannah Oliver (1833-1919), wife of Daniel Oliver (1830-1916), Professor of Botany, University College, London]
Publication details: 
On letterhead of 8 Holland Villas Road, Kensington, W.; 'Thursday' [no date].
£56.00

4pp., 12mo. Good, on lightly-aged paper. Ingelow begins by asking Mrs Oliver to thank 'the Professor' for her. 'I am much interested in his singular reproduction of the curious relics of ornament'. She would like to lunch with the Olivers, but 'We have some cousins coming to stay with us next Monday till the end of the week & I do not see how it can be done as they will like me to go about, with them to the exhibitions &c They live not many miles from Kew [where Professor Oliver was Keeper of the Herbarium and Library] & it would not interest them to go there again'.

Autograph Letter Signed from the poet Jean Ingelow to the playwright James Robinson Planch

Author: 
Jean Ingelow ['Orris'] (1820-1897), poet and writer [James Robinson Planch
Publication details: 
15 Holland Street, Church Street, Kensington; undated, but after 1868.
£56.00

3pp., 12mo. Fair, on aged paper with slight wear to extremities. She begins: 'Dear Mr Planch

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