BIBLIO-GIFTABLES

Nero Lives!

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•  Henryk Sienkiewicz's novel about the last years of the reign of Nero Caesar appeared in 1896. This work, along with his trilogy on the 17th-century wars between the Russians, Turks, Swedes, and his native Poland, was first translated into English by the multilingual Jeremiah Curtin, who first came across Siekiewicz's writings by peering over the shoulder of a man reading a Polish newspaper in a Washington streetcar; that translation appears here. Sienkiewicz won the Nobel Prize in 1905, and spent the remainder of his life aiding Poles who suffered during the German invasion in World War I. He died in 1916.

Harold Lamb wrote the introduction. Of the author's attention to the minutiae of daily life in the Rome of A.D. 63–66 he writes, “The city itself appears in exact historical detail. Praetorians idling at their posts pass the time with their favorite dice games; girl attendants at Petronius' bath finish their duties punctiliously and break away to their own diversions as soon as the door curtain falls behind the master. Sienkiewicz knows how the dishes, including blackbirds, were prepared for a nobleman's feast; he knows what the oriental dancers wore on their heads and what the priests of Cybele carried in their hands, and what you see when you round a corner of the Vicus Sceleratus.”

Salvatore Fiume created the 35 drawings which were reproduced in three-tone process and mounted by hand. Giovanni Madersteig designed this edition, which is limited to 1500 copies, choosing a monotype Old Face font; the composition and printing of the text and illustrations was done by Madersteing at the Officina Bodoni in Verona.

The binding is full natural linen printed, in grey-blue, with an overall pattern derived from an old wood engraving. The signatures of Salvatore Fiume and Giovanni Madersteig appear on the colophon.

•  Limited Editions Club, Bibliography of the Fine Books Published by The Limited Editions Club, 1929–1985, 302.   In the original slipcase, spine sunned with a long closed crack to paper and paper cracked/chipped; case good overall. Book with spine lightly faded and rear pastedown with small gold bookseller's label; volume in the original dust jacket (spine sunned to darker than sides are); near fine.  (22293)

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Abalone to Zwieback — History, Opinions, & Anecdotes

•  Revised edition of this classic reference work, illustrated with line drawings and color plates.

•  Publisher's red cloth in color-printed dust wrapper; minor shelfwear to corners and spine extremities, otherwise clean and fresh.  (23194)

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First Edition — Limited Edition

•  First edition. Copy 232 of 520, signed by the author. Printed at the Windmill Press.

•  Publisher's cloth with marbled cloth sides; without the dust jacket. Top edge gilt.

Hand-ColoredWood Engravings — 15 Children's Tales

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•  First edition of this uncommon children's book: Brief little amusements for juvenile readers, illustrated with16 hand-colored wood engravings and a title-page vignette. The contents are: “The Skating Party,” “The Arrest,” “The Soldiers,” “The Depot,” “The Postmaster,” “The Funeral,” “The Scissors Grinder,” “Haymaking,” “Mischievous Harry,” “Snow-Balling,” “The Rescue,” “Burial of Poor Kitty,” “Blind Man's Bluff,” “The Magnetic Swan,” and “The Studious and Idle Boy."

•  Publisher's blind-stamped textured green cloth, spine with title in reverse gilt-stamping; corners, spine extremities, and spine gilt rubbed, covers with small spots of light discoloration. Faint gift inscription dated 1867 on front free endpaper. Pages age-toned, with scattered light spotting. A nice copy.  (25500)

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“Easy” Einstein?

•  “A discussion of the more intelligible features of the theory of relativity.” Early printing, following the first edition of 1920.

•  Publisher's tan cloth, front cover and spine stamped in black; binding a bit sprung with light wear to lower edges. Pages age-toned but clean. (16724)

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A Catholic School Prize Copy:  “High Sanctity Attained in an Indian Wigwam”

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•  Early edition: Life of Louise Sighouin, a Catholic convert, followed by an account of the Cœur d'Alêne tribe, “A vocabulary of the Skalzi, or Koetenay tribe,” and a “Short Indian catechism, in use among the Flatheads, Kalispels, Pends d'Oreilles, and other Rocky Mountain Indians.” De Smet, a Jesuit missionary among the Native Americans of North America, was famed as a peacemaker and intermediary between Indians and whites. He first published the New Indian Sketches in 1863; this edition is undated but presumably appeared between the dated printings of 1865 and 1877. The steel-engraved frontispiece depicts the baptism of a young Indian girl in the wilderness.

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)

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COMFORT in the Hospitals & on the Battlefields

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•  Second edition, following the first of the previous year, which had been published without the index here and under the title, Incidents among Shot and Shell: The Only Authentic Work Extant Giving the Many Tragic and Touching Incidents that Came under the Notice of the United States Christian Commission During the Long Years of the Civil War. This is a collection of affecting anecdotes compiled by the Rev. Smith, Field Secretary of the relief organization formed by the Young Men's Christian Association in response to the suffering following the First Battle of Bull Run.

The volume is illustrated with an additional engraved title-page and eight other steel-engraved plates, as well as several in-text engravings of dramatic moments in soldiers' lives.

•  Sabin 82457.   Publisher's dark red/plum cloth, covers blind-stamped, spine with gilt-stamped title; spine sunned, corners and spine extremities moderately rubbed. Ex–social club library; front fly-leaf with inked numerals covered over with paper, rubber-stamps on frontispiece recto, title-page, and several other pages. Paper slightly embrittled; occasional short edge tears. Title-page and five plates with very faintest waterstaining in lower margins, other pages seemingly untouched.  (26273)

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Arctic Explorations

•  "Being detailed accounts of the several expeditions to the North Seas, both English and American, conducted by Ross, Parry, Back, Franklin, M'Clure and others. Including the first Grinnell expedition ... "

•  Sabin 85145. Publisher's cloth, covers stamped in blind, spine with gilt-stamped title and ship vignette; spine sunned, with gilt dimmed, cloth showing a touch of rubbing at corners and spine extremities, and a small insect hole to the back joint. A few pages with mild foxing, generally a nice, clean copy. (18404)

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TheScience of Soap

(Soapmaking Scrapbook).

•  Florilegium of late 19th– and early 20th–century science pertaining to soapmaking, composed of both hand-inscribed material and clippings from various periodicals. In addition to such articles as “The Specific Heat of Glycerin Waste Lyes and Crude Glycerin,” the volume contains an advertisement for a patented soap frame, chemical analyses of various soap-related commercial products, information on running a boiler room efficiently, and statistics regarding the fat yield of a steer; also present are occasional motivational pieces entirely unrelated to soap.

•  Pebbled cloth, lightly worn. Leaves with minor cockling, some staining and offsetting. Some pages with portions excised; one leaf excised entirely.

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Quaker Life inDutchess County, NY — 1779

•  Woolly Whale printing of the minutes from a Dutchess County, New York Quaker meeting, in which the construction of the Millbrook meeting house is discussed. Long, breathless, run-on sentences make the expected Quaker standards of behavior, in this place and time, quite clear.

•  Sewn in publisher’s color-flecked paper wrappers. A crisp, clean copy.

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Inventions et Decouvertes

•  Not in Von Hunersdorff, Coffee. Publisher's embossed gilt-paper binding, moderately worn with the spine and board edges a bit darkened; still a very attractive, unusual binding. Front pastedown with small bookseller's ticket and with remnants of a school prize bookplate. Pages mostly clean, with scattered hints of light foxing. (10592)

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Sousa & theDevil's Music

•  First edition: The famed composer's first published novel, a Faustian fable about a violinist, the woman of his dreams, and a cursed instrument. Illustrated by Howard Chandler Christy, this includes a faux concert playbill and six striking images featuring a “Gibson Girl” type. Click the images for enlargements.

Binding: Publisher's olive cloth, Art Nouveau binding signed “P”; front cover pictorially stamped in gilt and orange, spine with gilt-stamped title.

•  Binding a bit cocked with corners and spine extremities rubbed; spine with two small faintly discolored areas from now-absent labels. Light spotting to pages surrounding plates.  (25993)

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“A Haven of Peace in a Distracted World”

•  This edition is limited to150 copies; our caption quotation appears on p. 1. With a list of members on pp. 23–37.

•  Publisher's cloth, lettered in gilt on the front. Near fine.  (26702)

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His Lyrics

•  Woodcut title-page, head- and tailpieces in the art nouveau style; engraved portrait of Spenser as the frontispiece.

•  Very good. Green publisher's cloth, spine and front cover amply gilt in the art nouveau style. Edges and joints rubbed, small abrasion to front cover. Pages untrimmed and partially uncut. Top edge gilt. (3142)

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“Take 500 Protestations . . . ”

•  Spofford's third almanac. Predictions for 1818; alsohow to compose a “modern” love letter plus a (truly) humorous description of marriage.  Two states of gathering C noted. In the second, a note has been added at foot of p. [34], correcting information given in the calendar pages about a solar eclipse on April 24th. This is a copy in the state without the correction.

•  Drake 3819; Shaw & Shoemaker 43108.   Uncut copy; old stitching. A very good copy.  (9622)

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Omens & Charms — Signs & Dreams

•  At head of title: An astronomical diary for 1832. Vol. 2. No. 8. Whole no. 16. Title vignette. Poetry, anecdotes, “omens, charms, and divination”; also, “signs, dreams, &c.” Last page contains a stationers’ advertisement by the publishers. Click the image for an enlargement.

•  Drake 4017.   Uncut, stitched, partly unopened.  (21434)

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Period Interest & a Cool Cover (for $22.50)

•  At head of title: An astronomical diary for 1842. Vol. 4. No. 2. Whole no. 26. Title vignette is hand-colored. Pages [34-36] contain stationer’s and publisher’s advertisements by Thomas Groom & Co. Contains much poetry and many jocular stories or outright jokes. Click the image for an enlargement.

•  Drake 4251.   Stitching renewed. Some loss of paper and small amount of text on first four leaves to hungry rodent. Waterstains.  (21375)

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A Word-Book for Children — A Bright & Clean Copy

•  First edition of a juvenile reference book “specifically designed to supply the help for beginning writers which the conventional dictionary is too cumbersome to give.”

•  Publisher's green cloth, front cover and spine stamped in black and orange. A clean, crisp copy.  (23630)

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Magic Mallet

Dick Merriwell's polo team.

•  Reprint. No. 132 in the Merriwell series, this dime novel was also published with the subtitle "The rattlers of the roller rink."

•  Publisher's printed paper wrappers, edges chipped and corners lost. Being a "pulp" novel, this is on pulp paper — pages therefore age-toned, brittle, and breaking off where the corners are sharply dog-eared. (12422)

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“Have You aTamerlaine in Your Attic?”

•  First edition, second printing (stated) of this classic compilation of engaging anecdotes about book hunting, selling, collecting, binding, etc., written by the Toronto-born and Chicago-based novelist, newspaperman, Baker Street Irregular, and famed bibliophile, Vincent Starrett. Articles are well illustrated.

A difficult book to find in its dust jacket.

•  Publisher's green cloth, in publisher's printed paper dust wrapper; jacket slightly darkened, taped to boards, chipped at back upper edge, and nicked at corners and spine extremities; very neatly applied pen and ink call number on spine of jacket. Front (inside) hinge tender; front pastedown with institutional bookplate. Offsetting to endpapers from cover tape, otherwise clean internally.  (24656)

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WISCONSIN

•  1877–79 edition of what was generally an annual report, commenced in 1855. Topics covered include “Ancient Copper Mines of Lake Superior,” “Indian Wars of Wisconsin,” and “Early Times at Fort Winnebago”; the volume is illustrated with representations of cave designs from La Crosse Valley. Click the images for enlargements.

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.

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GREEK–AMERICANA

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•  First edition: Political humor and cartoons, almost entirely in Greek, for the Greek emigre community in the U.S. Includes a list of subscribers.

•  Publisher's brown cloth, spine with gilt-stamped title; cloth very slightly rubbed at corners and spine extremities. Otherwise clean and unworn — a nice copy. (20034)

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Designed by Eric Gill — Etchings by Tegetmeier — Signed by Both

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•  Illustrated with etchings by Denis Tegetmeier, this Limited Editions Club production was designed by Eric Gill (with a new typeface created by him), printed by Hague & Gill of England, and bound by the latter company in tan buckram stamped in blue and red, with a gilt-stamped spine title. This is copy no. 103 of 1500 printed, and is signed by both Gill and Tegetmeier at the colophon.

•  Bibliography of the Fine Books Published by the Limited Editions Club 1929-1985, 81. Binding as above, upper edges and lower back corner lightly stained (not affecting interior), in original blue cloth-covered slipcase with printed paper label; slipcase spine and label sunned with label printing much faded. Pages clean; in fact, a good-looking copy.

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The Best-KnownShort Story in English Literature?

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•  First edition: The famous “unsolved human dilemma,” as Johnson describes the classic title story, and eleven other short stories from one of the most popular writers of the 19th century. In addition to “The Lady, or the Tiger?,” the volume contains “The Transferred Ghost,” “The Spectral Mortgage,” “Our Archery Club,” “That Same Old 'Coon,” “His Wife's Deceased Sister,” “Our Story,” “Mr. Tolman,” “On the Training of Parents,” “Our Fire-Screen,” “A Piece of Red Calico,” and “Every Man His Own Letter-Writer.” BAL notes that only 1500 copies were printed.

Binding:  Publisher's quarter “tiger-striped” orange-brown cloth with gray cloth sides, front cover with gilt-stamped title and black-stamped door, spine with gilt-stamped title.

•  BAL 18880; Johnson, High Spots of American Literature, 69; Wright, III, 5242.   Binding as above; minor rubbing, spine gilt dimmed. Front hinge (inside) tender. Ex–social club library: call number in 19th-century hand on front free endpaper, rubber-stamp on half-title and title-page, no other markings. A very clean, nice copy.  (26250)

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“What are the Correct Questions, I Kept Asking . . .”

•  Carol Z. Rothkopf selected the essays and edited them; Stephen Weissman provides the preface. Must reading for all bibliophiles. By one of the towering figures of the library/book world of the last 50 years.

•  New.

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The LadyNever Having Been There “SEES!” NYC & Other Places

•  Second edition, with additions; first edition published the same year, the letter describing a blind young woman who had demonstrated clairvoyant powers while in a trance-like state. Brackett, whose sight and speech had been lost from a near fatal blow to the head by an iron weight, was able to speak normally and discern certain objects and light from darkness following treatment by Dr. George Capron of Providence, Rhode Island, using animal magnetism. She also describes the scenery along walks in places she has never visited, and paintings in homes she has never entered . . . Click the images for enlargements.

The second edition's “Postscript” promises “additional facts connected with this interesting subject, equally wonderful,” or even “more so.”

William Leete Stone (1792–1844) was a journalist, editor of the “Commercial Advertiser,” advocate of slave emancipation and Greek independence, historian of colonial New York and New England, and first superintendent of public schools in New York City.

Very scarce.

•  NSTC 2S41964; Sabin 92135. See: Dicitonary of American Biography for much on Stone.   Removed from a nonce volume; mildest foxing to first and final leaves with crescent of lost paper to foremargin (only) of one leaf not nearing text. A very good copy.  (11023)

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Presentation Copy — Sole Edition — A Philadelphianum
[Olney's Not Too Far From Here]

•  Sole edition; this is a presentation copy, warmly inscribed with Christmas greetings from the poet, dated from Olney, Philadelphia, 1909. Also laid in is a newspaper offprint from the Boston transcript of one of Struthers's poems, signed by the poet

•  Clean, crisp copy in publisher's red cloth, slightly darkened, gilt-stamping on front cover still bright. Front free endpaper with number stamped in upper right corner, also with author's gift inscription as described above; pages clean. (4898)

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Introduction to theStudy of Modern History

•  First edition of this broad survey of world history, a sequel to the author's Historical Sketches, which had been published in 1833 as the first part of a contemplated general history; Sullivan died before completing the planned third part (cf. Mass. Hist. Soc. Proceedings, 1835–55). The New York Review bestowed rather extravagant praise on the present volume, calling it “the best digest of history . . . extant in our language,” and noting that it was “written in the same simple and beautiful style which has marked all [Sullivan's] works” (vol. III, pp. 229–30).

Binding:  Publisher's ribbon-embossed brown cloth with flower and acanthus leaf design (Krupp's style ft1), spine with gilt-stamped title.

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•  American Imprints 53164; Adams, Manual of Historical Literature, 168. On the binding, see: Krupp, Bookcloth in England & America, 1823–1850, ft1.   Binding as above; corners rubbed and small rubbed spot on front cover, spine extremities chipped, spine head with small lightly discolored area from now-absent label. Ex–social club library: bookplate and early inked call number on front pastedown, title-page pressure- and (faintly) rubber-stamped. No other markings. Front hinge (inside) partially reinforced with paper some time ago. Scattered light staining. A nice book.  (26289)

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Fred's Book — Scarce!

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•  First U.S. edition of this Illustrated children's book, the first part being an alphabet book, with stories. The second part is a collection of prayers and didactic verse entitled, “Little Poems for Little Readers.” The charming engraved initials run A to Z, and the full-page engravings are included in the pagination. Spine title: “Learning with Pleasure.”

Binding:  Publisher's terra cotta colored cloth, stamped in black on front cover, spine stamped with gilt lettering and decorations. Center of front cover bears a full-color paper on-lay picturing a dancing boy (possibly, Irish?) playing an accordion.

Provenance:  In ink, on fly-leaf, “Fred from Aunty Bertha.” In pencil, “Frederic Wade Hitching, father of Elizabeth.”

Scarce, OCLC listing only one copy with this imprint.

•  Binding slightly cocked/loose, stained, lightly rubbed over joints, and with cloth tearing a bit at head and foot of spine; paper cover onlay with one corner chipped. Lacks front free endpaper. Presentation inscription and note as above. Good+.  (7481)

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Dürer — Rembrandt

•  In Sweetser's series, Artist-biographies. The biographies were issued separately in 15 volumes, then gathered in 5 volumes with three biographies per volume. This is vol. 4 in the gathered series. It must be noted that none of the volumes in the either series indicates it is part of a "set." That is, each volume truly is (and looks like) a stand-alone.

•  Publisher's deep blue cloth stamped in black and gold. Slight fraying to top and bottom of spine. A very good copy.

TO Part XXIV . . .

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