SATIRIST

Printed in black on one side of a 12.5 x 16.5 cm piece of card. A charming image, framed within the drawn curtains of a theatre stage, showing four snowmen, dressed as toff in top hat, flat-capped figure with spade, lady with shawl and umbrella, and bowler-hatted figure with muffler and broom. At head of image 'A Merry Christmas', and at foot, 'from E. V. & Mary Knox'. In blue ink in border at foot of page: '110 Frognal. N.W.3.' and 'Hampstead 7330.' Mary Knox's father E. H. Shepard was the illustrator of the Winnie the Pooh books.

2 pp, 4to. Forty lines. Text clear and complete. Good, on lightly-aged paper, with minor traces of mount adhering to blank areas of the reverse of the leaf. A playful, jaunty letter containing valuable personal and family information. He was pleased to learn from 'Mr Shaw of Lees (who desires his complimts)' that the recipient is 'not only in the land of the living, but in the business of the Excise, and still raps at the ends of Barrels, and takes dimensions of bungs & diameters as usual'. Asks after his wife, and 'how long you had been a Cheshire man'.

52 pages, 8vo. In original blue printed wraps, which are folded around endpapers, the rear of which bears publisher's advertisements. In poor condition: paper browning and spotting with age, binding loose and wraps frayed and worn, especially at spine. The front wrap has a long closed tear at head, and the indentation of a paper-clip, which attaches the typewritten letter (1 page, 8vo, discoloured and worn at extremities), headed 'Room 102, | Surrey Street. | 7.4.52', from 'Christine' to 'Ita'.

Dimensions of card roughly two and three-quarter inches by four inches wide. Good, with light creasing to corners. Clear signature reads 'Yours very sincerely | Max O'Rell | 18 March 1895'.