The letter begins: Dear Pinutoyi Istsimokan: Your letter of January 24, about Joe Butch (Henkel). Yes, he is an old timer, but terribly unreliable.” (Unreliable though Henkel may have been, he, too, had a mountain named for him.)

Schultz goes on to tell Grinnell that he is currently writing a story “whenever a lessening of neuritis pain permits.” There are two paragraphs about Eli Guardipee, a Métis, who has been with him for a month helping him with the Blackfeet language. He writes, “I gave him a very pleasant time of it, good room and meals, plenty of good beer, and sent him to a motion picture show nearly every evening. . . . He knows the Blackfeet language better than any mixed blood or white man I ever knew, and loves to dig into the real meaning of its words and expressions.” Other topics include his study of Nahwatosis (or Blackfeet tobacco) and his desire to be called before a Congressional Committee investigating the Indian Bureau.

Grinnell was an anthropologist, naturalist, and significant writer/editor as to the American West; he actually discovered the Montana glacier that bears his name.

•  As it was sent, with some later folds; slight chipping at edges.  (24631)

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Binding:  Publisher's brown cloth, front cover with black-stamped hunting scene and title framed in gilt, spine with gilt-stamped title.

•  Binding as above, corners and spine head lightly rubbed. Ex–social club library: call number on endpaper, rubber-stamp on title-page, no other markings. Pages clean.  (27113)

Provenance:  Front pastedown with presentation bookplate of a Catholic Sunday School in Virginia, dated 1880; front free endpaper with recipient's ownership inscription.

•  Sabin 82267; Pilling, Proof-sheets, 3631; Wagner-Camp 395; Howes D285.   Publisher's green cloth blind-stamped in diapered pattern containing crosses (not in Krupp), spine with elaborate gilt-stamped title and decorations; binding cocked and rubbed, sides with spots of discoloration. Front pastedown and free endpaper as above. Back hinge (inside) reinforced with cloth tape. Pages age-toned, with scattered spotting.  (26581)

“The American Indians,”

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Binding: Publisher's horizontally gilt-striped brown textured cloth, front cover with gilt-stamped fairy vignette and back one with similar vignette in blind; spine with gilt title and gilt-stamped decorations top to bottom. All edges gilt.

•  Sabin 82525.   Binding with corners mildly rubbed, spine extremities and cloth of rear joint chipped; gilt vignette on front cover partly oxidized, very attractively. Frontispiece, additional title-page, and title-page a bit darkened; very occasional light spotting only, elsewhere. A sweet little book.  (26611)

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Provenance: Title-page with affixed presentation slip from the State Historical Society; front free endpaper with affixed envelope flap addressed to the Rev. E.A. Dalrymple of Baltimore, MD.

•  Publisher’s cloth, spine with gilt-stamped title. Binding sturdy but with portion of spine cloth missing, exposing underlying material; corners bumped, extremities very lightly rubbed. Front pastedown with institutional stamp. Pages slightly age-toned, else clean.

treaties with the Cherokees

Provenance:  Old signature, “Hall Harrison,” on title-page.

•  Evans 32952, 34688, & 36479; ESTC W11750; Sabin 15502, 15503, & 15504. Contemporary treed calf, rebacked with calf, spine with gilt-stamped bands and gilt-stamped leather title and publication labels; leather of boards (but not spine) crackled, chipped/chipping, and discolored from a fire, with rear board most affected and with one corner lost (3/4" up and across from the point, this showing in our extra photograph). Front pastedown with old institutional bookplate; title-page with early inked ownership inscription as above and old institutional rubber-stamp. Offsetting from binding at beginning and end, intermittent mild offsetting and faint spotting generally, a few leaves towards the back browned, with pages otherwise clean; the fire that affected the boards did not reach the interior, here.  (25667)

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mouse-over, for an enlargement.

At the end of this highly important and extremely rare grammar are found a comprehensive index, a short catechism, and instructions on the commandments and the sacraments of the Catholic Church, beingall in Nahuatl. Part One of the text expresses Vetancurt's important insight that Nebrija's classical, early-16th-century paradigm for the study of European languages, specifically Latin and Spanish, had its shortcomings when applied to the major New World language under scrutiny—though in the end he resigns himself to using that five-part organization, which was the one most familiar to his readers.

We note that virtually all bibliographies have failed to state that leaf E1 is misfolioed as 14 (it should be 15 and the error is not corrected subsequently), and that leaf H4 is misfolioed as 19 (that error not affecting the subsequent numbering).

Provenance: Marca de fuego of an unidentified Mexican conventual library.

•  Viñaza 204 (failing to note error in foliation, as do all bibliographies except Graff); Medina, Mexico, 1103; Newberry Library, Indian Linguistics in the Edward E. Ayer Collection, Nahuatl 237; García Icazbalceta, Lenguas, 80; León-Portilla, Tepuztlahcuilolli, 2816; Sabin 99385; Pilling 4002. Graff 4475 (this copy; giving correct collation). On the marcas de fuego, see: Sala, Marcas de fuego, pp. 28 and 39. On Vetancurt, see: Archivo biográfico de España, Portugal, e Iberoamérica, fiche 118, frames 17–36 and 73–74. Contemporary limp vellum, shrunken and cockled, missing pieces along fore-edge of front cover and at base of spine. Some burn holes at tops of some pages resulting from embers’ straying during the branding of the book. Inner margins with expanded openings and occasional tearing around the sewing stations (i.e., paper has suffered from tight binding). Lacks two preliminary leaves containing approbations. Some foxing; last leaf (only) with foremargin insect-eaten. Text of the grammar complete. A significant work seldom acquirable.

Although touted as “Primera parte” on the title-page, there were no further parts; this Historia is complete, “all published.”

•  Palau 366681; Medina, Biblioteca hispano-americana, 2051; Sabin 99643; Leclerc 1546; Salvá 3422; Heredia 3407; Alden & Landis, European Americana, 701/262. On Villagutierre, see: Archivo biográfico de España, Portugal, e Iberoamérica, fiche 1019, frames 213–16. 19th-century Spanish sheep (“pasta española”), covers abraded and with pinhole-type worming to spine; loss of lower inch of spine leather to insects. Browning to text due to impurities in water during paper manufacture. Small insect damage to margins of first four leaves, not touching any text; similar small damage in inner margins of last four leaves. Over all, a decent copy of a scarce work.

•  Palau 95528. Original printed wrappers with a little tattering and a small chip from the base of the spine. Light waterstaining in the outside margins of some leaves and title-page with some staining in the inside margin, not affecting printed area. In fact, in very good condition.

Appended to Xerez's account (fols. [43v] to [55r]) is a translation of Miguel de Estete's account of Pizarro's army's journey from Cajamarca to Pachacamac and then to Jauja. Estete too was present at Cajamarca and is said to have been the first Spaniard to lay hands on Atahuallpa.