This archive seems destined to be used not only by historians of Italian-American history but by historians of immigration generally, émigré culture at the beginning of the 20th century, fashion, self-help, education, advertising, and entrepreneurship, to mention but a few obvious areas of social research.

•  A few items quite worn, but overall generally only minor wear. Some items are on poor-quality paper of the era and thus brittle. A gathering fully ready to be worked with, and by multiple sorts of scholars.  (39404)

Evidence of Readership: An early reader has underlined and added some marks of emphasis and words in an early hand to seven leaves of text, all excerpts taken from the Gospel of John.

Provenance:  Two ownership and one duplicate release rubber-stamps appear on the title-page verso, the first from the Universitätsbibliothek München dated between 1800 and 1826; most recently in the library of American collector Albert A. Howard, small booklabel (“AHA”) at rear.

•  VD16 E 4570. Not in Adams; not in Index Aurel.   Bound as above, rubbed and cracked with losses of leather and board extremities; bands and sewing tabs visible. No pastedowns; front free endpaper creased, front fly-leaf with pencilled note. Light age-toning with marginal and gutter waterstaining of varying darkness throughout; a few chipped edges, creased corners, or uneven edges; one short marginal tear. Provenance and readership indicia as above, else clean. Well used and in fact the more interesting for that.  (38914)

The volume is printed with the original language and spelling preserved, and is illustrated with a woodcut frontispiece of a fisherman taken from de Worde's 1518 edition that is cited as the earliest known depiction of an angler fishing with a rod, as well as with six woodcuts (provided at the back of the volume in the form of four plates) showing types of poles, hooks, etc. The title-page proclaims this as printed with the types of John Baskerville, making it one of the last such printings done in England, and most cataloguing follows suit; but Kelly identifies the font used as the elegant "Fry" Baskerville variant developed by typefounder Isaac More.

Evidence of Readership:  A later hand has helpfully added pencilled marginalia clarifying archaic or obscure terms and suggesting subject headers.

•  NSTC 2B20037; Keynes, Pickering, 42; Kelly, Checklist of Books Published by William Pickering, 1827.1 (p. 21).  Later half calf and marbled paper–covered sides, spine with gilt-stamped leather title-label, gilt-decorated raised bands, and gilt-stamped fishing creel devices in compartments; spine label with small edge chips and mild rubbing to paper. Pencilled annotations as above, pages and plates otherwise pleasingly clean.  (28566)

Binding:  Contemporary calf, round spine, gilt spine extra, handsome metal and leather closures with gilt tooling on the leather; very pretty, simple single gilt-roll border on each board. German floral paste-decorated endpapers and all edges red.

Provenance:  Ownership signatures of I. Duvarus (1774); J.G. Drunnburg (1822) Johann O. Nordendam (1830) on front fly-leaf.

•  Darlow & Moule 8966; Graesse 103.   Leather “shellacked” and shiny; volume now solid with front board reattached using the long-fiber method and areas of spine similarly improved. A sophisticated copy: four leaves of the prefactory matter (b1–4) are inserted from a small copy (possibly even a different edition). Some early underscoring; overallvery decent as a text and very attractive on shelf or in hand.  (36974)

Binding:  Black morocco, spine lettered and tooled in gilt using six different rolls and a single and a triple rule; two compartments stamped in blind. Covers single-ruled in gilt around a frame of blind-stamped flowers with a blind-embossed “chipped” diamond design at center that incorporates two different texturings and a central circle-and-swirls motif; board edges and turn-ins gilt in zig-zag patterns. Marbled endpapers and all edges marbled in an identical design. Green ribbon place marker still attached.

Provenance:  Presentation label noting “To Angelo C. Hayter, from his affectionate father, Sir George Hayter. 1864" on front pastedown; title-pages with barely legible rubber-stamp from St. Michele's in Bologna. George Hayter (1792–1871) was a noted English painter who served as Queen Victoria's Principal Painter in Ordinary. Most recently in the library of American collector Albert A. Howard (sans indicia).

•  Bound as above, gently rubbed, tailband partially detached; provenance evidence as above, four examples of a chipped margin, trimmed corner, or tremoin. Light to moderate age-toning with a handful of spots. A clean and handsome copy.  (37740)

Binding:  19th-century calf, spine with gilt-stamped title, raised bands, and small circular gilt-stamped decorations in compartments; board edges and turn-ins with gilt rolls and covers framed and panelled in blind with gilt-stamped corner fleurons. All page edges stained red, red silk placemarker present and attached. Binding done by Koehler (with his stamp on front free endpaper).

Provenance:  From the library of American collector Albert A. Howard (sans indicia).

•  Brunet, I, 1701-02; Index aurel. 134.656; Moreau, Editions parisiennes du XVI siecle, III, 1158. This ed. not in Adams or Mortimer, French 16th-Century Books.   Bound as above, spine and edges rubbed, sides scuffed. Endpapers with pencilled annotations and with binder's small rubber-stamp as above; title-page with date faintly inked in an early hand. Final leaf (printer's vignette) in facsimile, title-page with lower outer corner with small loss of paper in blank area repaired via excellent leaf-casting, and a similar excellent leaf-cast repair to two inner areas of last text leaf with a few letters supplied in pen and ink facsimile. One leaf with small printing flaw affecting a handful of words without loss of sense; three leaves at back with small semi-circulr areas of worming touching a few letters, also without loss of sense. Pages very clean and type very clear. A scarce and desirable volume.  (37747)

Provenance:  From the children's book collection of Albert A. Howard, small booklabel (“AHA”) at rear.

All four editions are scarce; of this fourth one, NUC and WorldCat find only four U.S. libraries reporting ownership (UC San Diego, Yale, Princeton, and Brown).

•  Gumuchian 2206; Moon, John Harris's Books for Youth, 799(3).   Publisher's printed and illustrated off-white paper over light boards, darkened to a light taupe; later oversewing; binding shows wear and soiling. Occasional spotting in margins of text with creasing variously across leaves; one small bit of one margin taken at edge. A good copy, with its colors as fresh as the day.  (38810)

The sheets are printed on Plover Fineweave paper with the text set in Sabon Antiqua. At the head of each is a print of a nicely rendered pen-and-ink drawing of the Hamady farm (where “Mother Father & Daughter are well and thriving”), done by Jack Beal (“Laura's Uncle Jack”).

•  Not in Two Decades of Hamady & the Perishable Press.   Sheets laid into a manila envelope labelled in Hamady's handwriting. Clean and crisp; some pages with markings as above.  (31364)

Binding:  Early 19th-century speckled calf, spine compartments gilt-stamped and one with a gilt red leather label; covers with gilt double rules, board edges and turn-ins with gilt single rules, all edges gilt. Signed with stamp by Roger de Coverly, an apprentice of Zaehnsdorf. A very pretty “container” for some very un-pretty history.

Provenance: Armorial bookplate of the Marquess of Bute's Cardiff Castle on front pastedown; most recently in the library of American collector Albert A. Howard (sans indicia).

A rather uncommon edition, with searches of WorldCat, NUC, and COPAC revealing only one U.S. copy (Huntington Library).

•  ESTC S104240; STC 13845.   Bound as above, gentle rubbing, leather a little flaking, joints refurbished and covers solidly attached. Bookplate as above; title-page dust-soiled with one small inked word, a faded ownership signature, one small pencil mark. Light pencilling and some chipping to endpapers, general light to moderate age-toning with an occasional spot and some pages unevenly trimmed; one gathering with very light, limited waterstain to lower margin. An important work in an unusual edition and an attractive copy.  (37745)

Printed largely in black letter and each act preceded by its own title-page.

•  ESTC T193918.   Near-contemporary brown calf, rebacked in caramel-colored calf with a red leather gilt title-label; modestly tooled in gilt on covers with a double-rule and a center rope rectangle with flower corner devices, gilt rolls on board edges. Some cockling of paper and discoloration of endpapers (from the tannin of the turn-ins, and occasional marginal thumb- or other soil from use.  (34488)

The paper is of an extremely high quality, and near-vellum-like in its feel; the title-page and several others are given touches of red; every page bears a beautiful border of swooping vines printed in blue.

•  Bradbury 32.   Publisher's limp vellum, spine with blue-stamped title; slightly (and unsurprisingly) sprung. A clean, crisp copy.  (35731)

Ridge's poems were collected posthumously and are here published by his widow, with a mounted albumen photograph of the author for the frontispiece; the preface includes a detailed account of the assassination of his father, John Ridge. The book was printed by Edward Bosqui & Co., considered San Francisco’s finest 19th-century printer.

Binding:  Chestnut-brown morocco presentation binding with bevelled edges, covers framed in black rules, with author and title in gilt in nice frames on each board (gilt stamping the same as seen on the cloth binding). Binding by Bosqui, with that firm’s ticket.

•  Cowan p. 533; Graff 3504; Kurutz, California Books Illustrated with Original Photographs 1856–1890, 43; Miles & Reese, Creating America, 122; Norris 3270.   Binding as above; rebacked, original spine somewhat unartfully reapplied, sides scuffed. Scratched markings on pastedowns; title-page and a few others with old stains. A very decent copy, with the presentation binding copies being rare.  (39603)

Saint-Exupéry (1900–44) published Vol de nuit in 1931, based on his experiences as an airmail pilot and director of the Aeroposta Argentina airline. It was an instant bestseller and Stuart Gilbert's translation into English quickly followed in 1932. Here that translation carries a preface by André Gide, in the first Black Sun Press edition.

Cyril Connolly's The Modern Movement: One Hundred Key Books from England, France, and America 1880–1950 included Night Flight as one of four books for 1931.

•  Publisher's printed wrappers. A very good copy.  (37910)

•  Publisher's three-quarters green cloth, front cover with color-printed floral bouquet design on white paper, front cover and spine with gilt-stamped title. Very slight traces of wear to lower front edge, otherwise a crisp, clean copy.  (34436)

WorldCat locates only four U.S. libraries reporting ownership (UCLA, Yale, Dartmouth, Free Library of Philadelphia).

•  Not in American Imprints. Not in Osborne Collection, nor Rosenbach, Children's, both of which only list “principal countries of the world.”   Contemporary half red roan in imitation of morocco with marbled paper sides, modest gilt ruling on leather on boards, spine gilt extra; binding slightly faded and rubbed, small area at base of spine pulled with loss of leather. Interior with the usual spotting and browning found in virtually all of the Juvenile Emporium books. A delightful little work.  (38526)

Willems is not fond of this book, saying of it “L'ouvrage est assez peu recherché, et n'a qu'une valeur médiocre.” Its “middling value” in his day may have been due to its typography: Daniel Elzevir had the book printed in the shop of the heirs of Jan Elzevir in Leyden. Our copy is attractive, however, and the work is certainly an important one that was read, loved, and cited in its day with enormous enthusiasm.

With a particularly engaging engraved title-page, and with woodcut ornamental initials and head- and tailpieces.

Provenance:  20th-century bookplate of Elizabeth Wade White (1906–1994), an American poet, activist in progressive causes, and author of The Life of Anne Bradstreet: The Tenth Muse. In 1938 she had a brief affair with Valentine Ackland (1906–69, born Mary Kathleen Macrory Ackland, the English modernist poet). In 1939 White met Evelyn Virginia Holahan (1905–85) who became her life partner. With White's pencil note “August 1929. Bought at the Hague for 22 guilders.”

Binding:  18th-century crushed green morocco, spine with raised bands and a red leather spine-label; covers and spine-compartments double-framed in gilt, the latter with center devices. Gilt inner dentelles, all edges gilt, silk marker.

•  Willems 1464; Copinger 4882; Goldsmiths'-Kress 01963.   Binding as above, rubbed at joints (outside) and with spine rather attractively sunned to olive. Lacks the index leaves for De prodigiis; still, a text-complete handsome volume with a very interesting provenance.  (39815)

This is a stunning printing of Washington's famous message.  The text is printed in gold ink in four-column format within an elaborate engraved border printed in silver on bright white calendered paper. The firm of “Wright & Durand” is listed in the 1834–35 New York city directory as specializing in “specimens of xylographic engraving and printing in colours” and seems to have done a good business in labels for drug store bottles. An earlier incarnation of the firm “A.B.C. Durand, Wright & Co.” had specialized in banknote engraving as early as 1825, and certainly the border here is of that style and quality.

The firm was renamed in the 1835–35 city directory to “Wright & Prentiss.”

Searches of NUC, WorldCat, and the OPACs of the American Antiquarian Society and the Library of Congressfail to locate any other copies.

•  Date attribution based on admiring notice in an 1834 trade journal. Minor indications at some edges of the item having been pinned or tacked for display; faint instances of old staining at edges, in one case slightly into border.An excellent copy of an important and absolutely lovely production.  (33580)