Book Trade History

12mo (18 x 11 cm): 1 p. 15 lines of text. On aged paper with one light stain at centre. Corner on reverse tipped in onto card mount. No signature. Introducing 'Miss Napier who has just returned from the Cape of Good Hope - She has one or two M.SS which she wishes to submit to your notice [...] you will kindly assist the lady in her literary efforts'. Miss Napier's address is given as '4 Beech View Villas, South Penge Park | Penge Surrey SE.' It is perhaps significant that Sir George Thomas Napier (1784-1855) was Governor of the Cape of Good Hope from 1837 to 1843.

On one side of piece of laid paper roughly 16 x 19.5 cm. Good, though lightly aged, and with a few small pin holes in one corner (not affecting text). 12 lines. Headed 'imprime pour le Citoyen Duprat, par Crapelet, 9 Nivose an 9e'. The first of four entries reads 'Memoire sur la reunion de l'artillerie & du Genie [published in Paris in 1800 by Duprat], contenant cinq feuilles & demie in-8o. Cicero, tirees a 500 exempl. a raison de 24th la feuille'. Second entry gives cost of 'Remaniement de toutes les feuilles & corrections extraordinaires'.

Two pages, 12mo, good condition, blank bifolium sl. damaged. "I have got out to day for the first time, and hope soon to be more fit for work. I see no objection to the advertisment - but it might be as well to leave the subsequent editions - without all - as you cannot wish to appear to make my allusion to [Pitts?] Ed | Though I send you only scraps, I read Spencer Anecdotes by Singer in a day - not choosing to trust to the Index, though Allan Cunningham had assistance from his son, and writes well as to style he has made many random [assertions?].

Octavo: 28 pp. Stabbed. In original blue printed wraps. Advertisements on back. On browning high-acidity paper, in chipped and worn wraps with damp staining to edges at rear. 298 items. Items 95-141: 'Signers of the Declaration of Independence and Presidents of the United States.' Scarce: no copy on COPAC, which does record one copy of a catalogue of a sale of Morrell's books by the same firm in 1866, and two copies of a catalogue of a further sale in 1869.

(Letters) Total thirteen pages (13), 8vo; (List) Total five (5) pages, 4to.

64pp., 8vo, grey printed wraps, title in red and black, edges of wraps sunned, mainly good condition. Highlights include: Aretino, Goldsmith, Handel, Keats, and so on.

Octavo: 52 pp. Stitched and unbound. Good, if a tad grubby. In alphabetical order from Queen Adelaide to the Duchess of York, but lotted 236 to 553. Tastefully printed, and including letters of Charles I, Coleridge, Dr Johnson, Samuel Richardson, Rossini, Sir Walter Scott, Laurence Sterne and Horace Walpole.

154pp., 4to, folding plates (facsimiles), grey printed wraps, slightly chipped and worn, title in red and black, some foxing, contents mainly good. Note inserted: war-time paper restrictions compel "very brief descriptions" but typewritten full descriptions may be requested.

Catalogue nos. 248, 267 and 268, printed wraps, one chipped and partially detached, but all in good condition otherwise, 32; 28; 24 pp. respectively (including wraps), 8vo. Manuscript material occupies a few pages of each catalogue, and might be described as interesting rather than "extraordinarily important" (as Michelmore below)..

Quarto: ii + 234 pp. In original grey boards and cloth spine, with chipped white label. Unopened. Good, with slightly discoloured endpapers. Extensive transcriptions from the Countess of Blessington's correspondence, the writers ranging from Mrs Abell ('Napoleon's pet English child at St. Helena') to Nathaniel Parker Willis.

[viii] 237 pp., fol.m, original grey and red printed wraps, numerous plates and illustrations in text, some staining of cover around spine, a few pencil markings, top of spine damaged, mainly good condition. It includes Cortes, "Carta de Relacion" (1522), other important Americana, and the first edition of "Don Quixote".

Folio: iv + 237 pp. In original grey and red printed wraps. Numerous plates and illustrations in text. Grubby and spotted, in heavily-worn wraps. One plate slit along fold and repaired with tape. Presentation copy, inscribed 'With Compliments from E U Maggs'. Covetable items, accurately described, from a complete set of Addison and Steele's 'Spectator' (£105) to the first edition of both volumes of Wordsworth's 'Lyrical Ballads' (£185). Contains 'twenty-four autograph letters signed [by Charles Dickens] on "The Village Coquettes" to John P. Hullah, the musical composer' (£650).

One page, 12mo. Very good with light creasing. She thanks him for the list of autographs, out of which she is interested in four: those of Macready, Gordon Craig, Henry Irving and Ellen Terry. '[T]he signature you could not decipher is "Alma Tadema" '.

53pp., 8vo, red cloth, spine gilt, original printed wraps bound in,orners bumped, minor defects, mainly good condition. (Sotheby's) "Catalogue of Autograph Letters and Historical Documents", 14 & 15 March 1912. Priced with the names of buyers. With bookplate "Bibliotheca Lindesiana". The binding is similar to those of the Broadley Collection (See xxxx) and was part of the same lot purchased by the cataloguer. However it could well be the standard binding provided by the Sotheby's service providing marked catalogues.

Printed postcard with manuscript additions, minor defects. The printed heading describes him as ""The Autograph King. Unchallenged. Owner of the largest collection of Modern Autographs in the World", lists the Exhibitions at which he has displayed his stock, and adds his address and a request to the recipient to write their autograph ("Request Register No. [17861]". The recipient of this was Philip Yale Drew who added "Young Buffalo" to his full clear signature on the reverse. In this same year, 1929, Drew had been arrested as a suspect in the the murder of tobacconist, Alfred Oliver.

Octavo: 53 pp. Stitched and unbound. Complete in itself, in alphabetical order, but lotted 554 to 846. Good, though grubby, and with the outer leaves somewhat creased. Includes letters and documents by Burns, Charles I and II, Maria Edgeworth, Frederick the Great, Garrick, Lady Hamilton, Handel, Dr Johnson, Southey, Wordsworth. The high spot is a letter from Thomas Jefferson to the Earl of Buchan, described over one page.

8pp., 8vo, not bound, fold mark, minor foxing and marks, mainly good condition. Scott, p.[1], initially discusses autograph-collecting - why it is becoming more popular, sense of the past, historical value, and so on. He concludes with a caveat about the need for a professional to guide collectors through forgeries and copies. His seven-page catalogue of autographs for sale includes William Bligh (12s), Christina Queen of Sweden (£2 2s), Ferdinand and Isabella (£9 9s), Benjamin Franklin (£6), S. Pepys (15s), Alexander Pope (£25), "Shelley (Mrs. M.W.) Wife of the Poet" (7-12s).

One page. Dimensions of paper roughly six and a half inches by eight wide. Spotted, aged and creased, and with some closed tears. Addressed to Wreden at 'Box 56, Palo Alto, Cal., U.S.A.' For '3 reg'd bookpost parcels', and headed 'Hodgson's Sale 25th Nov. 1954'. Lots 204 and 205 purchased for a total of £27 9s 9d, including an apparent commission of 15% on an item under ten pounds, and 10% on one over that sum. Items ('French Documents & Autograph Letters' and 'Autograph Letters from Lord Brougham and contemporaries') described in nine lines.

One page, 4to, closed tears, slightly stained, text complete, a list enclosed in a gold border. Two variants, one headed, "For the Inspection of Her Majesty the Queen, His Royal Highness the Prince Consort, and the two Princesses, on the Occasion of their Visit to Leeds, Sept. 6, 1858" and with footnotes acknowledging the loan of items from "John Young, Esq., Vanburgh Honse [sic], Blackheath" and "the Collection of William Tite, Esq." The other copy has no such information.

Quarto: xii + 168 pp. In original grey printed wraps. Numerous facsimiles. Printed order slip loosely inserted. Good, with grubby prelims and creasing to last few leaves at rear. Including a twenty-four page description of an 'extensive collection of Washington letters and documents [covering] every phase of his eventful life'. Participants named in the title: 'Cotton Mather, George Washington, William Penn, Benjamin Franklin, Signers of the Declaration of Independence, Generals of the American Revolution, Thomas Jefferson, Andrew Jackson, Robert Fulton'.

Quarto: 40 pp. In original printed wraps, decorated with various facsimiles. Facsimiles in text, and portrait of Beethoven on rear inner wrap. Good, on browned paper. Sections on painters, writers, poets, architects, sculptors, musicians. Nods towards the American market, with some entries in English and Dollar conversions. Together with Nebehay's attractive bifoliate trade card, carrying a photograph of his premises.

Quarto: 50 + [2] pp. Fold-out frontispiece giving eighteen examples of handwriting from items in the catalogue. In original orange printed wraps. Good, though a tad dusty, and in worn and faded wraps with some glue staining to back and wear to spine. Well printed, with lengthy extracts from most items. A scrap of paper which acts as a bookmark has the words "Listed Walpole entries to W.S. Lewis || Nov 1953" in Winifeed Myers [?] hand (from her reference library). The first item is 'A Series of Pencil Sketches by George Cattermole, illustrating Dickens' Works' (£60).

Quarto: 65 pp. Numerous plates. In original grey printed wraps. Internally good, with a little spotting and creasing to the ruckled edges; wraps worn and stained. A beautifully printed item, on thick laid paper. Among the printed matter are books of hours, breviaries, psalters, and letters (with facsimile plates) by Byron, Keats, Johnson and Sterne; and manuscripts of Fielding and Horace Walpole.

135pp., printed wraps, soiled and chipped, contents good. It commences with "The Famous Manuscript Account of the Voyages of Columbus Written by Andres Bernaldez . . ."

152pp., sm. fol., printed wraps, worn, chipped, slightly creased and somewhat dingy, contents lightly foxed, contents marginally damp-affected, slight hinge strain, numerous plates, some folding, 200 numbered items and descriptions of three major collections - Le Sage, Voltaire, and Fenelon Collections. With the bookplate of a "Marshall Laird", the faint stamp of the College of Physicians, and a tipped in ANS "[CMGM?]" on Foreign Office notepaper headed with a blind stamp and the address "1 Carlton House Terrace", concluding "The items do not interest me".

[58]pp., 4to, printed wraps, three errata slips (one ascribing errors - mainly omission of prices - to Davey's illness during the catalogue's preparation), some prices absent from printed text and errata leaves added in pencil, spine damaged, edges of covers dusted, corners bumped, slight hinge strain, contents mainly good. Highlights include Henry VIII, Elizabeth I, Marie Antoinette, Thomas Chatterton, "A Unique Collection of Letters from Frederick the Great to Voltaire", and "a Collection of Distinguished American Names".

Octavo: ii + 174 pp. Stitched. In original grey printed wraps. Internally clean and tight, in grubby and worn wraps. A first class catalogue, with excellent entries on items including letters and documents by Byron, Carlyle, Dickens, Disraeli, Edward Fitzgerald, Garibaldi, Pitt the Younger, Sir Walter Scott, Tennyson, Horace Walpole, George Washington. Fifteen books from the library of Mrs Piozzi.

8vo, 1 p. Good, on aged paper, with staple holes to top left-hand corner. Docketed in blue ink. He thanks the Secretary for his 'invitation for me to take the Chair on Wednesday, 23 April, which I am most happy to accept'.

The letter, two pages, 12mo; and the note one page, 12mo. Both on grubby, aged paper. The letter with small spike hole at head. LETTER: '[...] The only other things I go in for are Early English Furniture and Early MS. letters. If by any chance you come across any of these I should be very grateful indeed if you would let me know'. NOTE: 'Many thanks | I enclose 12/- for the two plates.'

Invoice, one page, 4to, minor defects, seeks payment for "Sorting & arranging a Collection of Autographs & Letters, by an Expert, with very great care . . . [£8.8s] Mounting & Guarding nearly 400 Letters, as arranged, Paper for Mounting & carefully guarding the same | Binding the collection in 9 vols 4to. & impl. 4to. in large morocco lettered [£12.12]." Bernard Quaritch has signed the receipt. With a printed receipt completed in manuscript, signed "Bernard Quaritch" (printed), one page, 8vo, good condition, acknowledging the receipt of £5.9.0 from "Mrs Madeleine Dale.