Uncommon: WorldCat and NUC Pre-1956 locate only three U.S. institutional holdings. There seems to have been a 36-page variant of the same year, which is also uncommon.

•  Martin & Walter, II, 15045.   Never bound, simply sewn as issued. Title-page with affixed paper shelving label in lower inner corner (not touching text) and with pencilled monogram in upper outer corner. Signatures unopened, page edges untrimmed. Pages slightly age-toned and/or dust-soiled, title-page with light spotting.  (30815)

Uncommon: WorldCat locates only one U.S. institutional holding of this 1911 (as per the imprimatur) edition.

Binding:  Cream-colored plasticized boards (with cream cloth intentionally visible at joints), front cover with color-printed overlay of an angel delicately tinted in light blue and pink with gilt backdrop beneath a rose and grapevine motif, turn-ins with gilt roll, moiré silk endpapers. All edges gilt.

•  Binding as above, corners slightly rubbed, minor discoloration to sides and spine head. Lacking pp. 19–30 (though with its not being entirely clear whether these were ever present). Pages age-toned; lower outer corners of first few leaves bumped. A beautiful little prayerbook.  (30391)

Held in most of the expectable libraries but currently uncommon in commerce.

•  Sabin 70769. Recent black moiré cloth, spine with gilt-stamped leather title-label. Title-page and several others rubber-stamped by a now-defunct institution. Pages clean.

•  A copy in lovely condition, imperceptibly rebacked with the original spine retained. Original wrappers bound in. Protected in a crimson morocco-edged slipcase.

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This is numbered copy 801 of 2000 printed, signed at the colophon by the artist. The appropriate Club newsletter is laid in.

•  Bibliography of the Fine Books Published by the Limited Editions Club, 500.   Binding as above, in publisher's green paper-covered slipcase. A handsome copy.  (31987)

numbered copy 80 out of just 100 printed

•  Publisher's Mexican bark paper wrappers bound on cream thongs; front wrapper with small splash of bright red. Pages very clean and crisp.  (31328)

Click the interior image for an enlargement.

•  Publisher's teal cloth, front cover and spine with gilt-stamped title and decorative floral motifs; back cover and corners showing very slight scuffing. Back hinge cracked and front hinge starting; front free endpaper excised. Still, an attractive copy. (18393)

•  Brunet, II, 1656/57; Landwehr 476.   Later quarter mottled calf with marbled paper–covered sides, front cover with gilt-stamped green leather label, spine with gilt-stamped rules and compartment decorations; edges rubbed, corners bumped, spine and front joint scuffed with none of this disfiguring. Front free endpaper with neatly inked abbreviated ownership inscription dated 1845 and pencilled annotation. Pages age-toned with scattered spotting and staining; waterstaining variously along a good many leaves' inner portions, sometimes with waterstaining to lower and outer portions also. Folio 60 lacking. One leaf with stray inked lines in lower portion, touching one letter, with one line extending into image. Several leaves with repairs, most generally not touching text or image; one with remaining signs of tear extending into text without loss; one with tear extending into image, upper portion repaired, small area of loss within image; one with repair to tear just touching one letter. Final two leaves creased and stained, with more significant repairs, one tape repair covering upper left portion of image. Despite wear and accidents, impressive and attractive.  (32639)

•  Shoemaker 24712.   Contemporary speckled sheep, spines with gilt-stamped black leather title-labels, board edges cornered with gilt roll; bindings scuffed and worn overall, partially darkened, gilt mostly lost. Ex–social club library: paper shelving label at spine heads, 19th-century bookplates, call number on fly-leaves with an inked library ownership inscription joining that in vol. II, no other markings. Vol. I: front hinge (inside) tender; one leaf with tear from lower margin, extending into text without loss. A few scattered stains and smudges, pages largely clean.  (29888)

The work isillustrated with a total of 12 engravings, including portraits of the first five presidents and an engraved half-title page.

Provenance:  Ownership signature on two front fly-leaves of Giles Satterthwaite, dated 1824; his note also, “Prise [sic] $1-75.”

•  Sabin 27871; Shoemaker 12704.   Contemporary sheep, spine with gilt-stamped title and compartment decorations; binding worn and abraded, spine leather much chipped and cracked with some fragments carefully reattached in first panel; joints, corners, and headcaps restored. Pagesfoxed and age-toned throughout, loosening in some signatures, torn and chipped in margins and corners of a few pages; inner margin of one front fly-leaf reinforced. Ownership inscriptions as noted.  (5503)

•  Sabin 27904.   Full recent tan cloth with gilt leather spine labels, clean and neat. Ex–social club library with old inked stamps, including to title-pages, no other markings. Otherwise, save between two pages where something once was laid in and in the index where a few leaves show a little soiling, chipping, or tearing to margins and one displays an old repair, only the odd small inkstain or short marginal tear and the gentlest of age-toning. A remarkably clean and fresh set.  (30144)

16 steel-engraved maps

Provenance:  Front free endpaper with early pencilled inscription reading “Mary William own Book Syracuse Newyork [sic].”

•  American Imprints 24673.   Publisher's quarter tan straight-grained sheep and printed paper–covered sides; spine and extremities scuffed, paper darkened with spots of staining. Front free endpaper with inscription as above; back free endpaper excised. Variously foxed. A strong, charming, interesting schoolbook — inside and out.  (30508)

Provenance:  Vol. I title-page with inscription dated 1790, reading “Joseph Russells cost 10s a Vollume [sic]”.

•  ESTC T102429.   Contemporary treed calf, spines with gilt-stamped leather title labels; worn and one cover off. Ex–defunct library with bookplates, a stamp to each title-page and last leaf, old (interestingly make-shift) card pockets. Some instances of offsetting and foxing, generally no more than moderate, with pages otherwise clean.  (8655)

Provenance:  Each volume's front fly-leaf (facing title-page) with inscription dated 1791, reading “John Humphrey, his book 1791 Price 10s”; each volume's pastedown with small bookplate of Richard McIlvain.

•  ESTC N2800.   Contemporary treed calf, spines with gilt-stamped leather title labels; worn, with all front covers and free endpaper of vol. IV detached. Some instances of light offsetting and foxing, with pages generally clean; some leaves chipped or with marginal tears, one tear causing loss of a few letters from a heading.  (14671)

•  Vollkommene: Jantz Collection, 3334. Neither work in Coumont, Demonology and Witchcraft.   Contemporary vellum over paste boards, with slightly yapp edges; all edges red. Text unmarked and untattered. A very nice pair of uncommon books.  (26955)

Over60 large woodcuts illustrate the text, with some images appearing in both sections. The volume concludes with several poems on the themes of life, death, and the afterlife.

Uncommon: We trace only nine copies in the U.S., all but one in libraries east of the Mississippi.

•  Fairfax-Murray, French, 108; Morin, Bibliothèque bleue de Troyes, 435; Nisard, Histoire des Livres Populaires, II, 303. Binding with old, good repairs to head and foot of spine; joints and corners with additional subtly neat repairs and refurbishment. Pages lightly age-toned, with some signature marks and a few bottom lines shaved; a treasure from multiple points of view.

This isnumbered copy 46 of 1000 printed, signed at the colophon by the author/artist. The appropriate newsletter is laid in.

•  Publisher's gray Italian bookcloth with “natural eelskin spines,” each front cover with printed paper label, in a single matching slipcase; slipcase with minor dust-soiling, volumes clean and unworn.  (31524)

Handsomely printed, the volume begins with a fine engraved frontispiece opposite the title in black and red. Engraved head- and tailpieces appear in expected places; each page is heavily laden with printed notes.

•  Brunet 759; Schweiger, II, 328. Contemporary vellum over paste boards with blind-embossed center device on covers; that on front cover slightly loose due to a vandal’s attempt to excise it! Top of spine pulled (uncommon on a vellum-bound book); vellum soiled and binding a little sprung. Bookplate removed and glue residue visible on pastedown. The odd spot or small stain only; some light foxing and dust-soiling.

Elaine Kerrigan selected and wrote the introduction to this group of Graves's poems, illustrated witheight double-page plates by Paul Hogarth reproduced by Meriden Gravure Company from original watercolors. This is copy number 1496 of 2000 designed by Freeman Keith in monotype Bembo and Arrighi, and printed on Curtis cream-toned paper at The Stinehour Press in Lunenberg, VT. BothKeith and Hogarth signed the colophon.

A. Horowitz & Sons designed the binding in quarter brown buckram over black and red patterned tan boards, with author and title gilt on spine and gilt top edge. The appropriate LEC prospectus is laid in.

•  Bibliography of the Fine Books Published by the Limited Editions Club, 517 (200 pp., in error). On Graves, see: ODNB online.   Binding as above, in a matching slipcase with cloth at top and bottom edges and printed spine. Very minor shelfwear on box, else like new.  (31259)

Gray (1716–71) and Walpole were best of friends at Eton (two of the “quadruple alliance” along with Thomas Ashton and Richard West), became estranged when they went off to university, and reconciled as adults with Walpole taking an active role in promoting Gray's career as a poet. The two “Pindaric” odes published here for the first time are “The Progress of Poesy” and “The Bard.” “Progress” came from Gray's study of the history of poetry and was written over the span of 1751 to 1754: It “ traces the spirit of liberty and poetry from ancient Greece to medieval Italy to modern England” (DNB on-line). “The Bard” came from Gray's study of Welsh poetry and was written between 1755 and 1757: It concerns Edward's destruction of the Welsh bards and is appropriately Gothic to align nicely with Walpole's interests in that genre.

Horace Walpole (1717–97), the 4th earl of Orford, is best remembered as the author of the Gothic novel The Castle of Otranto. Among bibliophiles he is also remembered for his private press, variously known as the Officina Arbutana or the Strawberry Hill Press. Walpole's almost fantastic wealth allowed him the connoisseur's luxury of maintaining this noble enterprise, which he operated in the arena of the rebirth of fine printing in Great Britain that was being carried on by the Foulis brothers, Baskerville, and others.

•  Hazen (1973 ed.), Bibliography of the Strawberry Hill Press, 1; ESTC T42023; Northrup 1; Hayward 174; Rothschild 1067.   Modern full speckled calf with modest blind tooling: binding unsigned but defintely by Bernard Middleton. All edges gilt. Without the half-title (as is often the case); title-page lightly dust-soiled and all leaves with indication of having once been folded vertically; held to the light, some leaves show old, excellent repairs along these folds and/or at edges. A lovely copy.  (29670)

•  ESTC T8304. Contemporary full calf, covers framed in blind using double fillets on three sides and a floral roll on the fourth; rebacked and corners redone at some point using lighter calf, gilt-stamped leather title label. Abraded and worn, with front hinge(inside) tender. Pages age-toned, some more so than others; yet the volume almost entirely free of spotting. (Our image is a bit distorted, above right — Nutt & Gosling could print in straight lines, and did!)

•  Wing (rev. ed.) T1879A; ESTC R28265.   Removed from a nonce volume. Very good condition.  (32259)

Click the image for an enlargement.

RLIN and OCLC report only one holding of this item in the U.S.

•  Not in NSTC. Removed from a nonce volume, now in a Mylar folder; title-page and final blank lightly dust-soiled. Sewing mostly gone. Title-page with short tear from inner margin, not touching text; some leaves with small edge chips.

Click the image to the left
for an enlargement.

Uncommon: ESTC locates only four copies, none of which are in the U.S.

•  ESTC T26238; Goldsmiths’-Kress 7877.5. Recent marbled paper–covered boards, spine with gilt-stamped leather title-label. Pages age-toned, with some dustsoiling.

•  NSTC ENG385. Recent paper wrappers. Title-page with rubber-stamped numeral and shadows of now-absent pencilled annotations. Three leaves with upper outer corners torn off and reattached/repaired without loss of sense. A few faint spots of foxing to title-page, otherwise clean. 

ESTC lists no publication prior to this occurring in Newport-Pagnel.

•  ESTC T44132; NCBEL, II, 598.   Uncut copy and stitched as issued. Title-page with rubber-stamped numeral and internal tear touching the first line of title without loss; first and last pages dust-soiled, fore-edges chipped and slightly ragged. Not pristine, but a desirable example of this uncommon piece in its original state.  (29490)

•  Shaw & Shoemaker 31549; Felcone, New Jersey Books 1801-1860, 732.   Stitched into plain brown paper wrappers as issued. Foxing and browning as usual.  (31407)

Click the images for enlargements.

The volume is illustrated with a total of three wood-engraved depictions of New England buildings.

•  Publisher's pebbled terra cotta cloth, front cover and spine with gilt-stamped title; spine darkened and worn with gilt rubbed, sides with small spots of discoloration, cover gilt nice and bright. Some light smudging to margins, pages otherwise clean. All edges gilt.  (27649)

Uncommon: WorldCat and NUC Pre-1956 locate only four U.S. institutional holdings.

•  Folded as issued, never sewn; outermost signature chipped at spine. First page with paper shelving label, not touching text, and with pencilled monogram in upper outer corner. Mild to moderate foxing.  (30820)

Click the image for an enlargement.

•  Removed from a nonce volume. Pages lightly creased but clean.  (27789)

Apparently little held in the U.S. for we trace copies atonly three North American institutions.

•  Not in Palau.   Removed from a nonce volume; nonce spine evident. Clean, even crisp.  (32723)

George Gregory seeks here to champion his brother's cause of educating women to minister medically to women, especially but not exclusively as midwives in the broadest terms. “Does the fact that a man practises medicine give him any right to invade his neighbor's wife . . . ?”

Searches of NUC and WorldCat locate only five U.S. institutions reporting ownership.

•  Removed from a nonce volume, with the two plates (which would have been near-pornographic in their time) torn out and present in laid-in facsimile, thus lowering the price considerably. Lightly age-toned, with a little foxing and spotting only.  (32183)

That said, he does sternly say here that women, black and white, are up to the work and training and will not be held back by distances to be travelled, weather or other inconveniences. His school moved beyond just training midwives to a full medical program for women and granted degrees, at which the Boston medical establishment was not pleased. But Gregory believed that “there are . . .forty-thousand physicians in the United States. Twenty thousand of these ought to give place to this number of women” (p. 36).

•  Not in Sabin but see 24049 for a related work.   Removed from a nonce volume, lacking the wrappers; creased across corners, light age-toning and light foxing/spotting (only).  (32202)

Because the documents in this volume were all transacted using notaries, it is an excellent paleographical teaching tool. It is also a great source for teachingmercantile mathematics of the early 17th century, for there are many pages of cyphering and numerous accounting documents showing costs and expenses.

And, obviously, it isa primary source on the silk trade in the great port city of Seville during a full-decade period.

Binding:  Contemporary red goat nicely tooled in gilt to form two concentric oblong panels, each accented with corner devices and with a gilt central medallion in the middle of each cover. Strong, handsome gilt lettering to front cover. Green and gold silk ties.

•  Binding shows some abrasion and small loss of leather. A volume in good state, entirely legible and solidly bound.  (32637)

Evidence of readership: Present in the text here are one shouldernote and one annotation inked in Cadwallader Colden's hand; a small torn-out scrap of botanically related notes, also in Colden's hand, is laid in.

•  ESTC R030321; Wing (rev. ed.) G1946; Dibner, Heralds of Science, 21; Sparrow, Milestones of Science, 20.   Contemporary speckled sheep framed in blind double fillets, rebacked with similar sheep, spine with gilt-stamped title and gilt-ruled raised bands; original leather showing expectable traceries of cracks but still sturdy, with edges unobtrusively refurbished. Pp. 17–32 lacking, pagination erratic elsewhere. Pages age-toned and browned at edges, with intermittent mild to moderate spotting; first and last few leaves with slightly ragged edges; front free endpaper with outer margin repaired. Plates here are single-page; some other copies report folding plates, but these three include all 29 figures called for by the text, though one is trimmed with a little loss at bottom. Early inked annotations as above, one very slightly shaved. A high spot of science, with a remarkable association.  (32629)

Click the images for enlargements.

•  American Imprints 40-2804; NSTC 2G23438. This ed. not in Amerine & Borg; see entry 1599 for later, 1848 ed.   Publisher's brown cloth, covers blind-stamped, spine with decorative gilt-stamped title; showing only light shelf wear. Ex–social club library: paper shelving label on spine, 19th-century bookplate and presentation plate (bequest of George Fox), call numbers on endpapers, title-page and one other rubber-stamped, no other markings. Pages lightly cockled but clean.  (28182)

• ESTC W28659; Evans 28775; Sabin 28933. 19th-century quarter sheep in imitation of morocco, rubbed and worn; covers pressure-stamped by a now-defunct institution, spine with paper shelving label. Half-title lacking, title-page and a number of others stamped, back free endpaper with pocket. Pages clean save for stamps. (9536)

Both the first and this second edition are little held in the U.S.: We trace three copies of the first and three of the second, one of which has been deaccessioned.

Provenance:  Three 18th-century ownership inscriptions on title-page: Jehoua Portis, Lib. Richbach, and Joh[ann]is Buys. 19th-century pressure-stamps of a Pennsylvania theological library, deaccessioned.

•  Full modern calf old style: Spine with raised bands, accented with gilt beading and blind rules, rules extending onto boards to Vs and ending with trefoils; blind double fillets beyond. Gilt center device in each spine compartment and a green title label lettered in gilt. Waterstaining in inner margins, extending into text on pp. 136–61; otherwise, expectable age-toning only. All edges red.  (25847)

•  This ed. not in Brunet.   Contemporary vellum, spine with early inked title; vellum showing minor spots of discoloration and spine with call number. Front pastedown and bottom page edges with institutional rubber-stamp; back pastedown with stamp of a 19th-century Dutch bookseller; front fly-leaf with early inked annotation. First dedication leaf with inked numeral in lower margin; some instances of early inked underlining and marginalia, confined to early part of volume. First few leaves with light waterstaining to outer portions. First part skips pp. 1/2 (between preface and first text page), with this collation matching that reported online. (19564)

The text is printed in Latin, double-column, with a handful of large woodcut initials, a few tail ornaments, and one letterpress diagram. The title-page, printed in red and black, features Blaeu's large device of an astrolabe flanked by Time and Hercules. An index on the final two pages lists Grotius's correspondents and the corresponding letters, which are arranged chronologically in the text.

•  Meulen, Grotius, 1210; Brunet, II, 1766; Graesse, III, 163.   Contemporary northern-European style vellum over boards ruled in blind, panels with blind-stamped central cartouches, spine with seven raised bands and remnants of later paper labels, red speckled edges; vellum soiled and lightly rubbed at extremities with corners bumped. Ex-library with bookplate on front pastedown and later library marking in pen on second leaf; light foxing, a light waterstain across the lower outer corner of perhaps a dozen leaves, and scattered darker stains, with a few leaves browned; small tear in outer margin of title-leaf and another margin, small hole from natural flaw in outer margin of one leaf and small bit of paper torn away from lower corner of another. Very mild worming in middle of two leaves and final leaf, the latter repaired; additional very minor, “slim” worming mostly to margins at rear.A solid, handsome important book.  (30293)

Grotius saw his book published for the first time in 1625 at Paris: It studies the legality of war and immediately established itself as a foundational work on the topic. Modern scholars regard it asfoundational in international law.

This edition contains added scholarship from Joannes Fredericus Gronovius (1611–71) and Jean Barbeyrac (1674–1744). In addition to De jure belli ac pacis the reader will find two other important Grotius tracts at the rear of the volume: Mare liberum and Libellus singularis de aequitate, indulgentia et facilitate, meaning the volume treats not just of law of war, but natural law, international law, maritime law, and law of the sea.

There are two issues of this edition, the other having “Ex Officina Wetsteniana” on the title-page in place of “Apud Janssonio-Waesbergio.” In both editions the title-page is printed in black and red, and of course, they have the same pagination. The work has side- and shouldernotes, an engraved portrait of Grotius, and an added engraved title-page.

•  Meulen & Diermanse (1950 ed), Grotius, 602.   Modern quarter claret-colored morocco with gilt-accented raised bands; gilt center device in each spine compartment. Marbled paper sides. Library pressure-stamps on title-page, no other markings; light age-toning and occasional spotting or foxing. A very nice copy with all edges decorated — more than “speckled,” not quite “marbled,” definitely attractive.  (26526)

Click the images for enlargements.

•  ESTC N14190.   Contemporary speckled calf, spine with gilt-stamped leather title-label, board edges with gilt roll; joints cracked (sewing holding), extremities rubbed/chipped. Ex–social club library: 19th-century bookplate, call number on paper label to spine and endpaper, no other markings. Early inked ownership inscription on title-page. Title-page and last leaf with offsetting from turn-ins, otherwise occasional light foxing only.  (28342)

Searches of NUC, WorldCat, COPAC, CICLA, and Metabase locate only two copies, both in the U.S. However, we do know of a third copy at Tulane.

•  Not in Valenzuela.   Folded and stitched as issued; minor chipping in lower margins. Scattered faint foxing. A very good copy.  (31053)

•  Wing (rev. ed) E3714 & G2215; ESTC R519; McAlpin, IV, p. 15.   Removed from a nonce volume. Very good condition.  (32254)

Binding: Publisher's brown suede, front cover with embossed Celtic designs, signed by Galwey & Co. of Dublin (with their ticket on the front pastedown).