No one here was sent to what came to be the “far” West — it wasn't yet time for that — but concerned as these young women surely were about unsaved frontier folk and “papal ascendancy,” they clearly felt themselves to be off on real adventures in places that were not, well, New England . . .

Apparently the last annual report was in 1852.

•  Sabin 38542.   Disbound. Clean.  (38336)

The document is addressed to the fourth provincial council, called by Archbishop Lorenzana, and is a plea on behalf of the nuns to not change how things are done and administered in the nunnery, to not introduce innovations.

Guatemalan by birth, Guevara (d. 1804) studied civil and canonical jurisprudence at the Tridentine Seminary in Mexico, where he graduated from the university and became a lawyer at the royal court. One ofthe leading lawyers in Mexico, he ascended quickly to high office, and was appointed governor in absence of the viceroy four times; according to Beristain, he was called the “American Ulpian” (after the Roman jurist) by at least one contemporary.

•  Palau 129542; Medina, Mexico, 5451; Beristain, II, p. 61.   Recent marbled paper over boards, title and author gilt on green leather spine label, new endpapers. Short, shallow instance of insect gnawing at fore-edge of first ten leaves and very limited, minor worming throughout along with mild to moderate mostly marginal speckles of foxing; light waterstaining at fore-edge of some pages and occasional inkstains or smudges; one corner of textblock bumped or “creased across” (with no tearing) and another corner just bumped. A copy not “fine” but definitely worth having.  (31197)

Lake was “chaplain and tutor to the princesses Mary and Anne, daughters of James, duke of York” and originally wrote this “devotional manual . . . for his royal pupils” (ODNB).

Provenance: On front free endpaper in an 18th-century hand; “Wm. A. Put Bo[ugh]t of Nau Winkle & Co.”

•  ESTC T134200.   Contemporary acid-stained calf, round spine, no raised bands, gilt double-rules creating spine compartments, one with a red leather gilt title-label; front cover reattached using the long-fiber method. Light age-toning. A very nice copy.  (33142)

The work is now uncommon: Searches of WorldCat locateonly three U.S. institutions reporting ownership (the Universities of Kansas and Illinois and the Bridwell Library) and only a handful of additional European locations. This is an untrimmed copy, in contemporary wrappers.

•  Brooks 1297.   Contemporary plain paper wrappers, sunned with edges worn. Title-page with light foxing.  (40204)

Of particular interest are Lambert’s poems describing the sorrows of the post–Civil War South from a personal, intimate perspective and, without regard to race, the poems sympathetic to “fallen” or sinful women. Heavily held in institutions, especially those specializing in American poetry of the 19th century, her volume Poems is scarce in commerce.

•  Recent mottled calf, spine with gilt-stamped leather title and publication labels. Two portraits (of the author and her sister) lacking; guard leaf from latter portrait remains, with ghostly offset imprint of image. Occasional small edge nicks; most pages clean, with the last few signatures moderately browned. An intriguing volume, and writer.  (27813)

One of the last stories in the volume is Landon's spoof of Byron: “Experiments; Or, the Lover from Ennui,” which opens with the line “Cecil Forrester was heir to many misfortunes, being handsome, rich, high-born, and clever.”

These entertaining pieces areillustrated with an engraved title-page and 18 plates depicting female characters. Three of these were engraved after paintings by Louisa Sharpe and one by Eliza Sharpe, two out of four sisters who all became artists.

Binding:  Publisher's very dark blue-green morocco, covers framed in blind roll with gilt-stamped decorative corner pieces, spine gilt extra. All edges gilt.

Provenance:  Front free endpaper with “Emma Dietz 1833" in pencil and “Ben Lindo” beneath; front fly-leaf with inscription reading “Presented to Miss Emma Dietz by Mr. B.E. Lindo 1833"; title-page with early inked “Emma” in upper margin and “B.E.L.” pencilled beneath. Benjamin E. Lindo (1794–1854), a cousin of Benjamin Disraeli, was a London banker who served as director of the Union Bank of Australia ca. 1842.

•  Faxon, Literary Annuals & Gift Books, 1383; NSTC 2L3428.   Binding as above; joints and extremities mildly rubbed. Front pastedown with small ticket of F. Westley, binder; inscriptions as above. Sewing starting to loosen, back hinge (inside) cracked but holding; outer (closed) page edges with ink spatter not visible on open pages, scattered spots of foxing. Attractive, interesting, and in its own way a little landmark. (40344)

The front page bears two vignettes of brunette beauties, one in the process of applying tonic and one with an impeccably arranged hairstyle.

•  Folded as issued, back page with upper outer corner bent and small nick to upper edge. Gently age-toned.  (29194)

Uncommon: WorldCat and NUC Pre-1956 locate only two U.S. institutional holdings of this 1671 edition, one of which was deaccessioned and is in fact this copy.

•  Contemporary mottled sheep framed in blind double fillets, recently rebacked with complementary calf, spine with raised bands and blind-tooled compartment decorations; edges and extremities rubbed, sides with old scuffs. Title-page and first text page with institutional perforation-stamp, title-page also with pencilled annotation as above, first text page with rubber-stamped numerals in lower margin, no other markings. Pages clean.  (31049)

The volume is illustrated witha frontispiece and eight engraved plates done by several different hands after artists including Tissot, Millais, Tenniel, Keene and others, with the frontispiece and title-page vignettes being particularly nice steel engravings done by Charles Henry Jeens from Tissot designs.

Provenance:  From the library of American collector Albert A. Howard, small booklabel (“AHA”) at rear.

•  Publisher's brick-colored textured cloth, front cover with gilt-stamped vignette of a medieval lancer framed in gilt triple fillets, spine with gilt-stamped title; slightly cocked with front hinge a bit tender, edges and extremities rubbed, spine gently darkened. Top edge gilt. Binder's ticket of Burn & Co. on back pastedown. Pages and plates clean. An outstanding example of a quintessentially Victorian-era perspective on Celtic lore.  (38052)

Considerations on Slavery

Elizabeth Webb, "an acknowledged minister among the people called Quakers," first encountered Prince George of Denmark's chaplain Boehm while on a visit to Great Britain; the missive with which she opened her subsequent correspondence with him, here, greatly inspired him and a number of his friends.

Provenance: With inscription reading "Miss Hannah Amelia Moore / Book a Present from her worthy / Friend Ruth Patton / 1789."

•  Law: ESTC W32233; Evans 16817; Hildeburn 3987. Webb: ESTC W13440; Evans 18295; Hildeburn 4409. Benezet: ESTC W6416; Evans 18355. Contemporary quarter sheep over paper-covered sides, the whole worn and abraded but the little volume quite sound. Light age-toning, occasional darker spots. Small chip in bottom margin of title-page; one leaf with paper flaw in lower corner, resulting in the loss of a very few letters.  (10951)

The work is a classic in the field of early European accounts of China, of missions to and in China, and of travel in general. Thomas Jefferson owned a copy of the first edition and may have done so for the work's sections on education.

•  ESTC T140502; Goldsmiths'-Kress 3379?; DeBacker-Sommervogel, II, 1356; Cordier, Bibliotheca Sinica, I, 40-41.   Recent quarter calf, round spine, raised bands, gilt ruling above and below each band; gilt center devices in four spine compartments. Marbled paper sides. Light age-toning to title-page; apart from an old touch of inkstaining at the tips of pages in one section, a very few stray stains only. A very nice copy.  (40384)

This is the third English-language edition, following the first of 1576 and the second of 1581, and it was also the last until the work was reprinted in 1881. The translation into English is by Thomas Newton (1543?–1607), the rector of Little Ilford, Essex.

Provenance:   17th- or early 18th-century signature of Simon Tar(r)ver on verso of title-page and again in lower margin of leaf opposite p 1. On blank recto of dedication page, four lines and a few letters and numbers in a large hand, overall not quite intelligible to us but with “An Bensen” and the date(?) 1764 among the elements certain. 19th-century signature of Joseph Gardner in lower area of the verso of the last printed leaf.

A collector friend who is far more accomplished with English 17th-century hand than I (DMS), wrote me about Simon Tar(r)ver and his writing and jottings: “It is a fascinating example of someone who I would guess is barely able to write and almost certainly self-taught.” For example he uses “Rote” for “Wrote” in association with one of his signatures and penned “Ingold land is my nashion” next to his name in another.

WorldCat and ESTC combine to locate 13 U.S. libraries reporting ownership; however, the copy reported at Claremont Colleges seems to be a microform and the Countway copy is incomplete (lacking leaves 65–88).

It should be noted that several of the reported copies give the book as “printed by E[dward] A[llde] for Michael Sparke,” which is impossible as Edward died in 1628. Rather, “E.A.” is his widowElizabeth Allde.

•  STC (rev. ed.)15458; ESTC E108477; Hunter & Macalpine, Three hundred years of psychiatry 1535-1860.   Contemporary calf with plain boards (blind-ruled borders), rebacked in the 20th century with a small area of the front board's leather replaced at lower outside corner; new, plain endpapers with a collector's pencilled notes and old cataloguing of another copy taped to rear pastedown; archival tape repairs to two upper margins. General age-toning and limited instances of staining from water, ink, and dust; a good to very good copy withpotentially quite interesting provenance.  (36988)

•  Folded as issued. Very good condition.  (26013)

Evidence of Readership: An early hand has corrected some of the errors in pagination, and one outer margin bears an 18th-century inscription.

Provenance:  Title-page with early inked ownership inscription of Samuel Tennant.

•  Wing (rev. ed.) L2215; ESTC R4033. Not in Coumont, not in Caillet.   Recent period-style quarter speckled brown calf with marbled paper–covered sides, spine with green leather title and author labels, gilt-ruled raised bands, and gilt-stamped fleuron decorations in compartments; small binder's ticket on back pastedown. Frontispiece lacking and final four leaves (index) supplied in facsimile; title-age with inner margin and short tears to lower portion repaired, several other leaves with margins repaired, and two contents leaves with outer margins trimmed very closely; otherwise, general browning, old staining, and occasional short tears or small holes — this book was used. Title-page with inscription as above and with small inked annotation in lower margin. A landmark of astrological thought, in a copy priced to reflect its history of use and its mishaps more than its allure. (40587)

Provenance:  On front pastedown, a bookplate of The Pierpont Morgan Library; small note of deaccession (with librarian's initials) on verso of a front blank. Most recently in the library of American collector Albert A. Howard, small booklabel (“AHA”) at rear.

•  Not in Good; not in Osborne.   Bound as above; bands, joints, and extremities rubbed and gilt bright, narrow discoloration to endpapers from turn-ins. Provenance marks as above. Signature(?) cut from above the title on first page with paper subsequently repaired; some soiling to leaves and original wrappers, a non-fragile crease across a corner of the front wrapper, and a light pencil doodle on the blank side of one leaf outlining the image of the woman's dog. A silly story with still-brilliant color, well-preserved in a sturdy and modestly elegant binding.  (39668)

OCLC locates only one U.S. institutional holding of this novel.

•  Manne, Nouveau dictionnaire des ouvrages anonymes, 162; Le Mayeur, Les Belges, 340.   Contemporary plain paper-covered boards, spine with hand-inked volume label; binding stained, spine rubbed with small insect hole. Vol. I only. Inner margin of title-page repaired with loss of first letter of publisher's information line. Faint spotting and staining; trimmed closely, often shaving pagination and signatures. As interesting to see how this was produced, as it is frustrating to be unable to finish the story!  (26937)

Evidence of Readership/Use: The space at the back for additional items has been used for pencilled recipes for “Mrs. Beaver pan cake” and nine other desserts.

WorldCat findsno institutional holdings, and this is unlisted by Brown. Our supplied date is based on information in the ads, as well as an advance notice of voting primaries to be held in 1927.

•  Not in Brown, Culinary Americana.   In original wrappers, stapled as issued; wrappers with edges chipped and spots of minor discoloration, front wrapper splitting along front joint and all but separated. Two pages with offsetting from now-absent laid-in item; pages evenly and gently age-toned with occasional small spots, otherwise clean and (despite those noted manuscript additions) showing no signs of kitchen use.  (38140)

•  Paperback. Very good.  (38022)

•  Sometime bound in a nonce volume (removed).

•  Removed from a nonce volume. Wanting final leaf of advertisements. Light foxing and traces of soiling. Closely trimmed by the binder, with loss of last letters of lines on a few pages, but without loss of sense.  (9216)

adds a preliminary volume of background information on England's politics and economy during the 15 years prior to the start of the main history

•  NSTC 2M17389.   Publisher's textured brown cloth, spines with gilt-stamped title; vols. III and IV with spine heads chipped. Ex–social club library: paper shelving label on each spine head, call number on endpapers, title-pages and a few others rubber-stamped, no other markings. Light waterstaining to upper and lower inner portions of vols. I and II, upper only of vol. III; pages otherwise clean save for very faint age-toning. Paper a bit embrittled, with occasional short edge tears or corner chips, but the set quite suitable for use with reasonable care.  (28336)

Connie King writing in the Library Company of Philadelphia's Winter 2010 newsletter, New & Noteworthy, says of this work: “What makes this . . . tawdry book . . . [extra interesting] is its extra roles as a mail order catalog for condoms and as an advertisement for abortion services. By mailing 'Dr. Mauriceau' five dollars, one might buy a dozen condoms, and have them sent to 'any part of the United States' (p. 144). Only slightly more delicately does he offer his [or Ann Lohman's] services 'to effect miscarriage' at his office at 129 Liberty Street in New York City.”

•  Original publisher's fine grain dark blue cloth, covers stamped in blind, no lettering, spine sunned. A very nice copy of a famous “under the counter book.”  (40370)

•  Very good; light wear with some chipping around board edges. Hinges slightly tender. A few pages with small ink stains. Ownership inscription in pencil to front flyleaf. (1923)

Following the Omaggio poetico is the first appearance of Valperga di Caluso's Libellus carminum, 15 poems in Latin including one to his friend Alfieri, published (as was the former item) under the pseudonym the author preferred for his literary works.

According to Renouard's 1794 catalogue of Bodoni imprints, the edition of Omaggio poetico was limited to 210 copies; it is now relatively uncommon in the U.S., with the Turin-printed Libellus carminum even more so — a search of WorldCat fails to locateany American institutional holdings of the latter.

Binding:  Contemporary mottled calf; spine gilt-extra, with gilt-stamped red leather title-label, board edges with distinctive gilt roll. Stone pattern marbled paper endpapers; all edges carmine.

•  Brooks 458; De Lama, II, 74; Giani 28 (p. 44).   Bound as above: spine with spots of worming and head chipped, these affecting appearance remarkably little; otherwise light wear, small scuffs. Front and rear free endpapers with pencilled bibliographical annotations. One leaf with paper flaw in outer margin, not touching text. Of interest both for Bodoni's usual elegance in printing and for the contents' connections to some of the most eminent figures of Italian belles-lettres of the day. (40151)

Binding: Signed binding (with Bilbao’s ticket on front pastedown) of oxblood morocco, front and back covers framed in a wide gilt roll surrounding gilt-stamped coat of arms of Francesco de Assisi de Bourbon, Duc de Cadiz (consort to Isabella II of Spain); spine with four raised bands, compartments gilt extra, with author, title, and date gilt-stamped. Board edges and turn-ins with gilt rolls; all page edges gilt; blue moiré endpapers.

Provenance: Front pastedown with bookplate of Maria Christina, Queen of Spain.

•  Palau 350495. Binding as above, showing light wear, spine slightly faded; pastedowns with some offsetting, endpapers with spots of foxing. Rare and attractive.  (5876)

•  Publisher's tan linen shelf-back with rust-colored boards. Boards lightly chipped. A very good copy.  (36591)

An extremely popular work (it went through 25 editions after its first appearance in 1771), the work describes the adventures of an unnamed man, who, after engaging in a heated discussion with a philosopher friend about the injustices of Paris, falls asleep and finds himself in a Paris of the future.

Though condemned by French and Spanish authorities andforbidden by the Inquisition, the work was nonetheless a roaring success in Europe, going through numerous editions in multiple languages — and serving as a groundbreaking, genre-defining example of a futuristic paradise set in a real-world location. The present example is an unidentified imprint of the greatly expanded three-volume text of 1786, followed by Mercier's allegorical L'homme de fer. Wilkie suggests that this “nouvelle édition avec figures" was printed by Changuion in Amsterdam; each of the three books of the main work opens with its own tipped-in engraved plate, making thisone of the earliest illustrated editions.

•  Wilkie, Mercier's L'An 2440, 1787. Not in Brunet, not in Graesse.   Contemporary mottled sheep, spine with raised bands, gilt-stamped leather title-label, and gilt-tooled compartment decorations; spine and edges much rubbed, with spine extremities chipped. Front and back pastedowns with traces of red wax adhesions; endpapers with offsetting from turn-ins. Minor age-toning throughout; one page with early inked annotation. Though battered, a solid, early, nicely illustrated example of this landmark work.  (38525)

WorldCat lists only three institutions reporting ownership this issue of this work (Kansas State University, Harvard-Schlesinger, Nicollete Country Historical). One was printed for the Ladies Circle of the Washington Street Baptist Church of Dover, NH, and the other for the Congregational Church of Granite Falls, MN.

•  Cook, America's Charitable Cooks, 233 (for PA edition only, not describing this MA printing). Not in Brown, Culinary Americana.   Original printed paper wrappers, detached and chipped, with spots of staining. Pages stained but very readable. A production that reflects an interesting point of development and the increasing professionalization of the originally amateurish charitable cookbook genre — with all regional variations of this item now being rather uncommon.  (38119)

250 recipes making use of slow cooking

•  Bitting 326 (for 1909 & 1911 eds.); Brown, Culinary Americana, 2637 (first ed. only). Not in Cagle & Stafford.   Publisher's dark green cloth, front cover and spine stamped in black with title and images of fireless cookers; mild rubbing to extremities, very faint scratches to back cover. Front hinge (inside) with small area of insect damage near head. A clean, solid copy.  (30292)

A newspaper clipping of a portrait of Hannah More taken from an engraving after the painting by H. W. Pickersgill, lies loose inside first volume.

•  Contemporary half red sheep in imitation of morocco over marbled cloth-covered boards, spines with gilt-accented raised bands, gilt lettering on spines. All edges marbled. Leather rubbed and scraped with some chips on spine, joints, and edges; pp. 421–34 of vol. VI have some shallow tears and chips from being bumped, fore-edge of one leaf folded back, without affecting text. Front joint of vol. VII starting from top edge. Some foxing throughout. Clean and complete.  (21439)

Each lithographed vessel for a beauty productdisplays a witty moral maxim behind a moveable flap (a concept that the Murrays may have adapted from the original 1821 London edition of The Toilet), providing the book's manipulator with emblematic instruction on true beauty, so that “A Wash to Smooth Wrinkles” is revealed as Contentment; “A Universal Beautifier” as Good Humor; “A Solution to Prevent Eruptions” as Moderation; and “An Elastic Girdle” as Benevolence — well, that's a stretch!

Each virtue is further described by rhyming couplet or two at the bottom of the page.

Provenance:  From the library of American collector Albert A. Howard, small booklabel (“AHA”) at rear.

•  Shaw & Shoemaker 29838 (2nd ed.); Rosenbach, Early American Children's Books, 683 (n.d., ca. 1825).   In olive marbled wrappers; general rubbing, and small split to rear joint. Lacking one moveable flap (revealing Humility as “The Enchanting Mirror”); interior age-toned, foxing to endpapers, variable spots of staining to leaves, one corner turned in, hole to rear free endpaper. A modestly delightful example of a ladies' emblem book.  (39687)