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LIST 216 - RECENT ACQUISITIONS.
1 ADAM, Victor. Les Accidents de Voitures. [Paris, Lemercier for H. Gache, c. 1862].£ 385
Oblong 4to, pp. [2], 24 lithographic plates; occasional foxing; original flexible morocco-backed cloth-covered boards, spine lettered in gilt, front cover with title in gilt Restez chez vous pour eviter les accidents des voitures, lightly spotted, extremities a little worn.
This album of caricatures - several to each plate - deals with all sorts of carriages, carts, and even hot air balloons and accidents possible with these contraptions. The lively and dramatic scenes capture a variety of mishaps connected with transport, horses and high speed. Victor Adam (1801-1865) was a Parisian painter, illustrator and caricaturist, who commented on the upheavals of politics and society that shook the city from the early 1830s to the Second Empire.
OCLC locates a single copy at Yale; not in COPAC; nor found in KVK.
2 [ANON]. Anecdotes du Dixhuitieme Siecle. Premier Volume [-Second]. A Londres. 1783.£ 285
FIRST EDITION. Two volumes, 8vo, pp.[iv], 272; 275, [1] blank; apart from a few minor marks, a clean copy throughout; in contemporary mottled calf, spines gilt with contrasting red and brown morocco labels lettered in gilt, minor worming to upper joint of vol. II, and some light rubbing to extremities, nevertheless, a handsome and appealing set.
First separate edition of this collection of anecdotes of the principal characters of the eighteenth century, according to the “avertissement” taken from “Les mémoires secrets pour servir à l’histoire de la République des Lettres”.
The collection consists of songs, epitaphs, letters, portraits, obituaries, and anecdotes on and by authors as diverse as Dorat, Voltaire, Rousseau, Turgot, Buffon, Necker, Terrai, and many others. It is notable for the number of anecdotes relating to the theatre and to music, and seems to have reappeared under the title Anecdotes secrètes du XVIIIe siècle … Par P.J.B.N. [Nougaret] in 1808.
OCLC records copies at Quebec, UC San Diego, Yale, Indiana and the New York Public in North America, with further copies at the National Library of Sweden, Cambridge (UK) and Melbourne.
3 [ARITHMETIC]. Rechnen-Lotto. Neues lehrreiches Aufgabenspiel aus dem Ein mal Eins. Zur nützlichen Unterhaltung für Kinder und Erwachsene. Verlags-Eigenthum G.M. [c.1850].£ 2,150
The game includes 72 hand coloured lithograph cards, consisting 8 ‘result’ cards measuring 92 ×110 mm, and 64 varnished ‘multiplication cards’ measuring 23 × 55 (three in facsimile), all laid in a ‘tray-and-lid’ card box fitted with 9 sections (i.e. 1 × 8 sections dividing the cards into groups of 8). the box measuring 215 ×135 × 15 mm; the lid overlaid with a hand coloured lithograph vignette showing a mother and three children around a table to the right a vista towards a moonlit arboretum, to their left a statue of the goddess Fortuna holding a cornucopia and perched on an ever revolving ball indicative of fickleness before a pomegranate tree emblematic of abundance; above and below the title of the game in German, English, French, and Italian.
This superb arithmetical game is, as far as we are aware, the only surviving example, although a work with a similar title but produced in London also survives.
The games consists of 64 slips, each with a multiplication problem at one end and its solution at the other, and, between these, a quarter of a person, engraved and handcoloured. In addition to these, there are eight large ‘result’ cards, each with eight numbers, on which the slip with the corresponding solution is placed. When all the slips are in place, the result is two complete figures on each result card, sixteen in total, mainly depicting an activity or a trade.
Three of the slips are here present in facsimile, although they are of such quality that it is difficult to tell with the naked eye; with a magnifying glass, however, it can be seen that the lithographic lines are in fact painted and not printed.
OCLC records only a similar item, printed in London, of which a copy is held by Yale; no copies of this particular game recorded.
The Boy Scout Movement
4 BADEN-POWELL, Robert Stephenson Smyth. Scouting for Boys. A Handbook for Instruction in Good Citizenship. Complete Edition, Revised and Illustrated. London: C. Arthur Pearson Ltd, Henrietta Street. 1908.£ 385
COMPLETE EDITION, Fifth Impression. 8vo, pp. xii, 288, [4]; with numerous illustrations in the text throughout; lightly browned throughout due to paper stock, otherwise clean; in the original cloth backed printed publisher’s boards, rather rubbed and dustsoiled, nevertheless still a very good copy of this scarce early issue.
Rare early issue of Baden-Powell’s Scouting for Boys, the first book on the Scout movement and the fourth bestselling book of the 20th century.
Baden-Powell’s Scouting for Boys is essentially a rewrite of his earlier military books Reconnaissance and Scouting (1884) and Aids to Scouting for NCO’s and Men (1899). These earlier books were military manuals used by the British Army to train its scouts. At Mafeking, Baden-Powell recruited and trained boys aged 12-15 as postmen, messengers, and later on to carry the wounded, to free up the men for the actual fighting. Upon his return to England, immediately following the Boer War, Baden-Powell learned that some British schools had been using his books to teach boys lessons on observation and deduction. He decided to revise his military publications into a book for boys. Several friends supported Baden-Powell in this idea, including Sir William Alexander Smith, founder of the Boys’ Brigade, and Cyril Arthur Pearson, who owned several newspapers and printing presses. In 1906 and 1907 Baden-Powell spent a lot of his time writing Scouting for Boys and advancing his ideas about the Boy Scouts Scheme. These were tested in a camp on Brownsea Island in the summer of 1907, where Pearson’s literary editor Percy Everett assisted.
Subsequently, Scouting for Boys was first published in six fortnightly instalments of approximately 70 pages each, from January to March 1908. They were produced by Pearson’s printer, Horace Cox. ‘Before the series of fortnightly parts was half completed, troops were being formed all over the country. Thus, instead of revamping the Boy’s Brigade, Baden-Powell started a new organization, which entirely eclipsed the Brigade’ (PMM).
The present ‘complete edition’, by Pearson, appeared in the same year as the first edition, the first issue appearing in May 1908. Due to the huge demand for the work each issue sold out almost immediately and it is likely that this fifth impression appeared in June/July 1908.
‘By 1910 the movement had grown to such a size (over one hundred thousand) that Baden-Powell left the army to devote himself exclusively to the Boy Scouts; and in 1929, on the occasion of the third international ‘Jamboree’, as he called his Boy Scout rallies, Baden-Powell was raised to the peerage. The organization became world-wide and has been extensively copied’(PMM), and the book translated into many languages; even in 1948 the book was still selling over 50000 copies annually.
Printing & the Mind of Man 398; OCLC records copies at Springfield College and Wake Forest University in North America, State Library of Queensland in Australia and Cambridge University in the UK, although no issue us alluded to.
5 BADIA, Marco Antonio. Compendio della guerra nata per confini in America tra la Francia e l’Inghilterra, poi accesa ed intrapresa da moltiprincipi in Europa … In Amsterdam, 1763.£ 350
FIRST EDITION. 8vo, pp. xvi, 168; with engraved frontispiece portrait; apart from a few minor marks, a clean copy throughout; in contemporary calf backed marbled boards, spine ruled in gilt with contrasting green and blue labels, the lettered lettered in gilt, lightly rubbed, but still a very good copy.
First edition of this uncommon study of the Franco-British war in America, and the ways in which it affected the conflicts of the past decade in Europe, published in the year of the Treaty of Paris by Marco Antonio Badia.
Badia’s aim, as stated in the introduction, is to understand the reasons which had led to “i funesti disordini, che hanno afflitta la Christianità in tutte le parti del Mondo, fatalmente scielta per Teatro di sanguinose imprese da tante Nazioni diverse”. Through an account of the causes and events of the wars of the preceding decades, he seeks to show the ways in which the conflicts fought between France and England in the New World spilt over into the Seven Years War in Europe, describing in great detail the events and players in both continents from 1748 until the time of publication.
OCLC: 1680383.
6 [BANDETTINI, Teresa]. Polidoro Tragedia d’Amarilli Etrusca. Lucca, presso Francesco Bonsignori, 1794.£ 450
FIRST EDITION. 8vo, pp. 115, [1] blank, [1] errata, [1] blank; apart from a few minor marks, a clean fresh copy throughout; in recent patterned wraps, to style.
Rare first edition of the first play by the Lucca poet and Arcadian, Teresa Bandettini. Dedicated to “Immortale Angelica” (the painter Angelica Kauffman), the play takes its theme from Euripides Hecuba.
This is one of only two plays by Bandettini; she also wrote Rosamunda in Ravenna in 1827.
Teresa Bandettini (1763-1837) was born in Lucca, and entered into the Arcadia under the name Amarilli Etrusca. A noted critic of the romantic movement, she was one of most important improvisatory poets of her time, greatly esteemed by the likes of Mascheroni, Bettinelli and Alfieri.
OCLC records just one copy only, at the University of Toronto.
Anatomical Poetry - Dedicated to Teresa Bandettini
7 [BANDETTINI, Teresa]. BERTINI, Gio. Luigi. Del Cuore e della Circolazione del Sangue Canti III. Umiliati alla Nobile Virtuosissima Sig. Benedetta Ottolini Orsetti da Gio. Luigi Bertini, Dottore di Medicina … Lucca, Presso Giuseppe Rocchi, 1795.£ 350
FIRST EDITION. 8vo, pp. 40; apart from a few minor marks, a clean copy throughout; stitched as issued with the original front wrapper, lower wrapper missing but supplied in expert facsimile using old paper, some discoloration and wear to original wrapper, nevertheless, still an appealing copy.
First and only edition of this rare poem, in three canti, on the subject of the heart and the circulation of the blood, dedicated and addressed to the Lucca poet Teresa Bandettini, by the Italian physician, and member of the Oscuri di Lucca, Giovanni Luigi Bertini.
The poem is accompanied by a printer’s preface in praise of Bandettini, and several explanatory notes at the end, explaining the physical theories that underpin the poem, and citing Harvey, Boerhaave, and others.
OCLC records just one copy, at the National Library of Medicine.
8 [BANDETTINI, Teresa]. LUCCHESINI, Cesare. Atti Della Reale Accademia Lucchese in Morte del Marchese Cesare Lucchesini. Lucca, dalla Ducale Tipografia Bertini. 1832.£ 285
FIRST EDITION. 4to, pp. 84, [1] index, [3] blank; with engraved frontispiece of Lucchesini; minor light foxing in places, otherwise clean and crisp throughout; uncut in the original green printed publisher’s wraps, light marking, but not detracting from this being a handsome and appealing copy.
A good copy of this collection of poems and essays commemorating the life of the literary historian and writer Cesare Lucchesini (1756-1832).
Among the contributors are Antonio Mazzarosa, Luigia Vannucci, Cesare Lucchesini, Teresa Bandettini, and Eufronia Massoni.
Not in OCLC.
9 [BANDETTINI, Teresa]. Temistocle SOLERA & Giuseppina POGGIOLINI. Two Contemporary Obituary Notices Written on the Death of Teresa Bandettini. Removed from unidentified journals. [April, 1837].£ 95
4to, pp. 311-327 and I-V; each with engraved portrait of Bandettini by Angelica Kauffman; minor stain to foot of Poggiolini article, otherwise apart from very light foxing, clean copies; in twentieth century mottled wraps.
Rare survival of two lengthy and informative obituaries written on the death of Teresa Bandettini on the 5th April 1837. Attractively, both are accompanied by versions of the famous portrait of Bandettini by Angelica Kauffman.
Not in OCLC.
Memorizing without Mnemonics
10 BARBIER-VÉMARS, Joseph Nicolas. Le Souffleur Français, ou moyen éprouvé de faire retenir a la memoire la plus ingrate des milliers de vers fançais, sans aucune espece de procédé mnemonique ni d’étude préliminaire … Paris, De l’Imprimerie D’Aug. Delalain, Libraire-Editeur, rue des Mathurins-St.-Jacques, 1831.£ 225
FIRST EDITION. 8vo, pp. viii, [86]; apart from a few marks, a clean copy throughout; uncut and largely unopened in the original publisher’s wraps, spine with rather worn printed label, spine split at foot (but holding firm), some rubbing and chipping to extremities, and light sunning to wraps, but still a very good copy.
The retired professor Barbier-Vémars introduces a method of learning thousands of pieces of French poetry and literature in rhymes, without mnemonics, as he points out. His method is based on giving the rhyming words of the verses in tables, and using them to memorize the entire verses of the classical canon of French literature, beginning with La Fontaine, over Racine and Boileau to Voltaire’s Henriade. ‘The procedure is so simple that anyone who can read can make use of it. A mother can effortlessly develop the memory of her child, and develop to a high degree within a few months’ (translated from p. v).
The philologist Barbier-Vémars (born 1775) was conservateur at the Bibliothèque Nationale, published a periodical of poetry, in classical and neo-Latin, and edited the 55-volume Annales des arts et manufactures from 1807 to 1814.
Not in OCLC.
Newton’s Apostle in Italy
11 [BASSI, Laura]. [FANTUZZI, Giovanni]. Elogio della Dottoressa Laura Maria Caterina Bassi Verati, Scritto da Giovanni Fantuzzi aggiungesi un’ orazione del Dottor Matteo Bazzani detta in occasione di conferire alla medesima la laurea dottorale. [Colophon: Bologna, Dalla stamperia di S. Tommaso d’Aquino, 1778].£ 285
FIRST EDITION. 8vo, pp. 41, [3]; with one leaf folding; minor worming in upper margin of final gathering (unobtrusive and not affecting the text), otherwise a clean crisp copy throughout; in recent pattered wraps.
First edition of this rare work in praise of the distinguished woman physicist Laura Bassi (1711-1778), by Giovanni Fantuzzi (1718-1799)
Bassi, on her appointment to teach at the University of Bologna at the age of 21, was the first woman to join the faculty of a European university, and only the second to be awarded a doctorate of philosophy, assuming the chair of Philosophy in 1733. However, her importance goes beyond her part in women’s history: her work was also central to the spread and development of Newtonian thinking in Italy, and she was also one of the leading Italian critics of Descartes and Cartesianism in the first half of the eighteenth century.
The present work appeared in the year of Bassi’s death, and includes Matteo Bazzani’s oration on the occasion of the awarding of her doctorate. Fantuzzi wrote a number of works on the notable residents of Bologna.
OCLC records two copies, at Cornell and Anhalt.
12 BEAURIEU, Gaspard Guillard de. Le Porte-Feuille François, ou Choix nouveau et intéressant de différentes Piéces de Prose & de Poësie … En France, se vend à Paris, Chez Durand, Neveu, rue Saint Jacques, à la Sagesse. Rozet, rue Saint Severin, à la Rose d’or., 1766.£ 385
FIRST EDITION. 12mo, pp. [iv], xxi, [iii] advertisements, A1 (blank) removed, as usual; paper fault in gutter of N1 (not affecting the text), otherwise, apart from a few minor marks, a clean copy throughout; in contemporary calf, spine tooled in gilt with morocco label lettered in gilt, some surface wear and rubbing to extremities, nevertheless, still a handsome and appealing copy.
First edition of this collection of poems, essays, and stories, assembled, edited, and in some cases translated by the prolific French littérateur Gaspard Guillard de Beaurieu (1728-1795)
Among the aphorisms and poems, there are letters to Mirabeau, an essay on the question of whether lying or truthfulness is more useful to society, a discourse on the philosophical spirit, an ode on the immortality of the soul, and a translation of Catullus 5. Also included is a “Dictionnaire portatif” compiled by a young soldier “qui s’amuse à réfléchir les matins, n’ayant rien de mieux à faire”, and a brief essay on the origins of card games.
Beaurieu was the author and editor of numerous novels, compilations, and educational works, including a Cours d’histoire naturelle (1770), and L’Élève de la nature (1763).
OCLC records just two copies, at the Taylor Institute in Oxford and the Forschungsbibliothek Erfurt Gotha.
13 [BERNY DE NOGENT, Pierre Jean Paul]. Soirées Amusantes avec des Réflexions Morales Par l’auteur du Livre de la guerre, dédié au Duc Ferdinand de Brunswic &c. Imprimee a Aix-la-Chapelle [Aachen]. Avec Approbation. 1773.£ 300
FIRST EDITION. Two parts bound in one volume, 12mo, pp. 208; 176, title within typographical border, a few Rococo head- and tailpieces in the text; apart from some minor browning and a few marks in places, a clean copy throughout; in contemporary sheep, spine gilt with red morocco label lettered in gilt, short split to head of upper joint, corners rubbed, some surface wear, nevertheless, still a very good copy, title page with contemporary ms. alteration to the imprint, the date appearing to read 1774, rather than 1773.
The anonymous author Berny de Nogent (1722-1779) was the oldest of his mother’s 28 children and embarked on a military career. He produced his first calligraphic masterpieces in 1751, which together with his talent for portraiture endeared him to several members of the European nobility. He continued working as a military administrator, however, found enough time to write a couple of books (some of which remained manuscripts) on warfare, government and politics.
This work of causeries, entertaining and moral, is dedicated the Duke Ferdinand of Braunschweig, who served Frederick II of Prussia as one of the most talented military commanders of the Seven-Years-War. He shared Berny de Nogent’s masonic interests. The scope of texts in this volume is wide, from love madrigals to essays on the Union entre les hommes, reflections on love and marriage, human reason, female beauty, aphorisms, historical anecdotes, dance compared with painting, education of princes, the description of a utopian egalitarian society, based on masonic principles and other reformist projects.
OCLC records two copies, at the Bibliotheek Universiteit van Amsterdam, and in Weimar.
The Lisbon Earthquake - a sign of Divine Providence
14 BERTRAND, Elie. La Consideration Salutaire des Malheurs Publics, ou Sermon Prononce a Berne dans l’Eglise Francoise, e 30 Novembre, 1755. Apres la nouvelle de la deplorable catastrophe arrivee a Lisbonne le premier de meme mois … A Geneve, chez Pierre Pellet, Imprimeur. 1755.£ 450
FIRST EDITION. 8vo, pp. 15, [1] blank, 15, [1] blank; worming at head throughout, affecting the occasional letter, but with no loss of sentence gist, lightly browned throughout due to paper stock; in contemporary sprinkled sheep, spine tooled in gilt, chipping to head and tail, and lower board with some surface loss, nevertheless, still an appealing copy.
Very rare first edition of the first of four sermons delivered by the Swiss pastor and geologist Elie Bertrand in Bern on the subject of the Lisbon earthquake of November 1, 1755.
Bertrand (1713-1797) was a correspondent of Voltaire, and contributor to the Encyclopédie of Diderot and d’Alembert, and his sermons on the Lisbon earthquake are one of the first published responses to an event to which philosophers and theologians of all stripes were to attach so much significance. Bertrand’s inclination was to see the earthquake as a sign of divine providence, and in his later correspondence with Voltaire, he criticised Voltaire’s pessimistic tone in his Poème on the subject, encouraging him into a number of revisions.
Bertrand, who had earlier published theoretical works on earthquakes, preached three further sermons over the next few months, inspired also by the Valais earthquake that struck nine days after the present sermon was given. All four were collected in his Mémoire sur les tremblemens de terre of 1756.
Not in OCLC.
Scholasticism tempered with Cartesianism
15 BERTRAND, Jacques. Tertia philio pars quae est physica moderante P. Bertrand Soc. Jesu. [Cahors?], 1696.£ 3,850
MANUSCRIPT IN INK. 8vo, pp. [461], [1] blank, with engraved title and six leaves with mounted engraved illustrations of the apostles and other clergy; leaves numbered in pencil; with some 39 illustrations in the text, and four pages illustrating geometrical forms; aside from some marginal staining, clean and fresh throughout; in contemporary calf, spine tooled in gilt in compartments, with label lettered in gilt; some wear to boards, and joints split, but still an appealing item.
A fine manuscript, written in a highly legible cursive hand on laid paper, and attractively illustrated, of a lecture course from the Jesuit seminary of Cahors, where Bertrand (1669-1743) taught humanities, grammar, rhetoric and philosophy. This is the third part of the philosophy course, dealing with physics (the other two parts having traditionally been devoted to rhetoric and metaphysics). The introduction is Aristotelian; however, this is followed by a less traditional combination of scientific, experimental and dogmatic approaches to physical phenomena. Classical and contemporary theories are illuminated; Epicurus, Gassendi (on six leaves), Democritus, Descartes (nine leaves), Anaxagoras and Fabri (thirteen leaves) are introduced to the students. This is followed by a close examination of the motion of bodies (gravitation, movement of liquids, rotation, free fall, circular and pendular motion), whereby the abstract concepts of the scholastic method are scrutinized, illustrated with drawings and underpinned with references to Riccioli and Mersenne. Bertrand then moves on to optics, dealing with the properties of light and colour, acoustics, the senses of smell and taste, heat and cold, as well as humidity.
The importance for the history of science of the present manuscript lies in the fact that Cartesianism featured in the lectures, although even the discussion of Descartes’ teachings had been declared a heresy by the Jesuits in 1663. However, the examinations and disputes over Cartesianism had furthered inevitably the permeation of the scientific debate not only amongst Jesuits with the incriminating teachings. How distanced from scholastic teachings this manuscript is becomes evident by comparing the chapters on motion with the corresponding chapters in Jacques Rohault’s Traité de Physique of 1671. The similarities between these Jesuit lectures and Descartes’ follower are striking, despite the strong opposition Rohault was met with from traditional scientists and even more so from the Jesuits. The manuscript further indicates that physical experiments were indeed carried out and used in physics lectures of the seminary.
This volume is promising and unpublished source material for a study on the history of science and science teaching.
A Woman’s Place is in the Home!
16 BRANTHWAITE, H. Manuscript Lecture entitled “Woman” Given at a number of locations. 22nd February - 4th December 1871.£ 1,250
Notebook. Small 4to, pp. 71; Page 2, figures for attendance written in pencil (Gent 40 38 [amended] 31 [amended] Ladies 32 68 ---); tipped in posters and handbills with some tears and dust-soiling, but still generally in a very good original state; soft full black leather, spine damaged, hinge strains; housed in a custom made blue cloth folder, with silk ties; a desirable item.
Fascinating original anti-suffrage lecture, simply entitled “WOMAN”, given at a number of locations throughout 1871, complete with posters and handbills at the venues where it was given.
The writer Mr. H. Branthwaite, makes it clear that he is not there to discuss “Women’s Rights”, alluding to the current “examination of its merits”. He would however claim that women might occupy positions “which would extend their influence for the benefit of humanity” BUT not Parliament ot the Law or Medicine “which would draw her into rivalry or antagonism with Man!” He acknowledges that women have fine qualities telling the stories (and drawing out heroic characteristics) of Jeanie Deans (Scott’s Heart of Midlothian), Grace Darling, Christina of Sweden, two Covenanting girl martyrs. He goes on the Woman as Philanthropist (Elizabeth Fry at length, and the Countess of Coventry, presumably Godiva), quoting apposite poetry. But he doesn’t attempt to reconcile the achievements of heroic women with his dominating viewpoint that Woman’s place is in the home.
“But after all it is in the Domestic relations of life that Woman finds her true Sphere and mission - the influence she is intended to exert is to be felt rather than seen - not binding with chains but restraining the action by gaining the heart - If a Mother, she governs by Love - If a Wife she conquers by submission- The reign of the Amazons is over - Women may not be warriors - but their influence is great and powerful - weaving around the heart a mystic chain forged by love and cemented by affection”.
He discusses homemaking, the importance of education, particularly in the mysteries of sanitation to combat disease-ridden environments: “We want our Young Women who are to be the future Wives and Mothers of England to be taught how to make Home Happy”. They should learn sanitation as well as knitting - and have a thorough grounding in religion. Her mission is the training of the young and tending to the aged parents. These duties are not “servile” but “ennobling”. He gives examples of domestic worth - the mother of John Wesley (“Sussannah” (sic), the Duchess of Kent, Queen Victoria herself. He raises the question of those some call “superfluous women” (2.5 million women who are unmarried according to the census), introducing his only joke by telling the story of the Maori chief whose solution to the problem is to eat the “superfluous” wife.
He “dismisses” the question as demanding too much time, but glances at the employment market where jobs are scarce (for governesses) and there are men to do women’s jobs such as hairdressing. He quotes: ‘It is natural that Women should suffer, but it is sad indeed when Men have to endure privation. In conclusion then I would with Florence Nightingale ask you all “My Sisters” - Keep clear of the jargon about “Women’s Rights” which would urge them to do all that men do . … “Women of England on you depends the future of England’s greatness - resolve to do your duty and God will show you what he will have you do -”‘. He finally gives classical and biblical examples of female self-sacrifice.
Original posters and handbills from the lecture tour are tipped in, as follows:
1. (Front) Poster, 12.5” (w) x 18” (l), complete but torn along folds, advertising the lecture at the Wesleyan Chapel, Wing (Buckinghamshire), 2 March 1871, collection to be taken in “Aid of the Fund for Relieving the Peasants in France” (Franco-Prussian War]. Printed by J. Jones, Leighton Buzzard, Bedfordshire. Text: WAR!!/ A LECTURE/…/Subject/ “WOMAN”…
2. (Front) two handbills, 5” (w) x 7.5” (l). announcing the same lecture for the Assembly Room, Leighton Buzzard, on 22 and 27 Feb. [1871] respectively. Collection as above. Printed by A.P. Muddiman, Leighton Buzzard.
3. (Back) Poster as above for Wesleyan Chapel, Heath [Beds?], 23 March 1871. Printed by J. Jones, Leighton.
4. (Back) Poster, 15” (w) x 10” (l), announcement of the lecture for the Wesleyan Chapel Anniversary, Stoke Hammond, on Monday evening, Dec. 4th, 1871. Printed by Partridge, Leighton Buzzard.
5. (Back) Poster, 15” (w) x 19” (l), one tear along a fold, announcement of the lecture for the Wesleyan Chapel, Cheddington [Bucks], Thursday, November 23rd, 1871. Printed by W. Richardson, Leighton Buzzard.
With a Chapter on the Dangers to Factory Girls
17 BREWSTER, Margaret Maria. Sunbeams in the Cottage or What Women May Do. A Narrative chiefly addressed to the Working Classes … Edinburgh: Thomas Constable and Co., 1854.£ 450
FIRST EDITION. 8vo, pp. [viii], 220, [4] advertisements; half-title lightly foxed, otherwise a clean fresh copy throughout; in the original blue publisher’s cloth, spine lettered in gilt, light rubbing to extremities, but otherwise a fine and desirable copy.
Scarce first edition of this novel set around Mary Graham and her parlour presenting an edifying collection of essays for young ladies intended to instil in them their virtues and benefits in society. Strongly reflecting Victorian moral attitudes of the day, the various chapters include ‘Woman’s Influence’, ‘Cookery and Household Work’ (with a few recipes including ‘Eel broth for invalids), ‘Failures’ and ‘Going out to Service’. Of particular note is the lengthy chapter on the ‘Factory girl’:
‘Factory life, like every other, has its good and its bad side. The regular and moderate hours, the good wages, the easy work, and the instruction for the young now provided and enforced, present very great advantages, and when a mill girl possesses the additional ones of living in her father’s house, under the eye of her mother, learning from her, and assisting her in the house, and putting part of her earnings into the common store, thus increasing the comfort and respectability of the household, there can scarcely be a more prosperous condition for a young woman. This is, however, the brightest, and not the most common side of the picture’ (p. 104).
We have been unable to find little on the author Margaret Maria Brewster Gordon (b. 1823), although the internet yielded a salt print done of her by Hill & Adamson, c. 1845.
OCLC records just two copies only, at Cambridge and the National Library of Scotland.
18 [BRIENNE, Marguerite de]. Poème sur la Grâce, selon les sentimens de saint Augustin, expliquez par monsieur Le Moyne, composé par L. M. D. L. V. R. D. S. T A Paris, chez Edme Martin, 1654.
£ 1,250
FIRST EDITION. Small 4to, pp. [iv], 140, [2] blank; a minor stain at foot in places (not affecting the text), otherwise, apart from some minor foxing, a clean copy throughout; in contemporary sheep, boards ruled in gilt, expertly rebacked retaining the original spine (gilt ruling renewed) and recornered; a very desirable copy with the mss. ownership inscription ‘De la Bibliothèque du Calre du Marais’ on verso of title.
Rare first edition of this extended poem on divine Grace, published under the name of La Mère de la Vierge Religieuse de St-Thomas, which was, according to the Sorbonne catalogue, the religious name of Marguerite de Brienne (1613-1663, whose only work this appears to be.
After a verse preface in praise of the Virgin, and a prelude, de Brienne divides her poem into three parts, the first discussing the infirmity of human nature and the necessity of Grace, the second describing the nature of Grace, and the third describing its effects. Edited with printed marginal annotations by the poet Pierre Lemoyne (1602-1672), this copy also features numerous manuscript corrections, possibly in the author’s own hand. It has come from the library of the Calvaire du Marais, a Paris convent founded in 1635 with Richelieu’s help.
OCLC records two copies only, at Cornell and Cincinnati.
19 BYRON, George Gordon. Profezia di Dante Alighieri, scritta da Lord Byron e tradotta dall’inglese … Parigi, appresso Barrois Ainé, Librajo … 1821.£ 185
ONE OF TWO ITALIAN TRANSLATIONS IN THE YEAR OF THE FIRST EDITION. 8vo, pp. 55, [1] advertisement; foxing in places only, otherwise clean throughout; in nineteenth century yellow waste wrappers; a very good copy.
Uncommon Paris-printed Italian translation of Byron’s Prophecy of Dante. Another translation, by Mozart’s librettist Lorenzo da Ponte, had come out in the same year in New York, published by Bartow (of which we could only trace the British Library copy). The anonymous translator of the present edition reports that several experts of the the English language helped him to translate the more difficult images and allusions in Byron’s poem, which is both on Renaissance Italy and Regency England, as well ambiguously about himself and Dante Alighieri.
OCLC records copies at UCLA, Harvard, Notre Dame, Cornell, NYPL and Pennsylvannia.
Early Bronze of Byron
20 BYRON, George Gordon, Lord. Miniature Bronze Bust of Lord Byron. [No place, signature or founder’s mark, c. 1820-1830.£ 1,000
Height (from plinth): 87 mm, total width 49 mm (35mm at base); a few old small dents; otherwise well preserved with rich and dark patina.
A nice example of this rare early bronze bust of Lord Byron, after the marble original by Edward Hodges Baily RA in c.1826.
Famously described by Lady Caroline Lamb as being mad, bad and dangerous to know, Byron (1788-1824) was an icon of his age and much admired for his extraordinary beauty of appearance as well as his poetic genius. The present bronze differs from the marble original in that Byron is depicted in classical costume. If anything this seems to be an improvement and certainly captures the very essence of Byron.
We have been unable to find any further examples and believe only a small number of examples were cast. The base indicates that it was perhaps once mounted on a second plinth.
Edward Hodges Baily RA FRS (1788-1867) was an English sculptor who was born in Bristol. Some of his descendants still live in Bristol today and a sculpture of ‘Eve at the Fountain’ can be found in the Bristol City Museum and Art Gallery.
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