Search results
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[BYRON, Pseudo-.]
Don Leon, a Poem by Lord Byron … forming Part of the private Journal of his Lordship, supposed have...
London, The Fortune Press, [1934].
No. 3 of 1000 copies printed (many subsequently destroyed) of a famous Byron forgery. Don Leon, not by Byron, though written by someone familiar with his life and exploits, was an important early plea for the toleration of homosexuality.
£500
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[CHANSONS.]
Manuscript collection of arias, chansons, and romances, including pieces by Bianchi, Bruni, Paisiello, Beauvarlet-Charpentier...
[France (Nantes?), c. 1795.]
A fascinating manuscript collection of French songs, both operatic and popular, compiled in the years after the Thermidorean Reaction and the execution of Robespierre.
£2400
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WALRAS, Auguste.
Théorie de la richesse sociale ou résumé des principes fondamentaux de l’économie politique.
Paris, Guillaumin et C.ie, 1849.
Three first editions, including the first appearance of the work which strongly influenced the work of French mathematical economist Léon Walras (1834–1910): his father Auguste’s Theory of Social Wealth.
£1750
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[HERVEY, Elizabeth.]
The Mourtray Family. A Novel …
London: Printed by Millar Ritchie … for R. Faulder … 1800.
First edition of the penultimate novel by Elizabeth Hervey (c. 1748–1820), elder half-sister of the writer William Beckford – her father, Francis Marsh, had died and her mother Maria (née Hamilton) remarried another Jamaica plantation owner, William Beckford senior, who also died...
£2500
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ESSER, [Karl?] Michael, Ritter von.
Sei Quartetti per due violini viola, e basso composti espressamente per una Società...
[Venice, Marescalchi e Canobbio, 1774?]
First edition, very rare, of a complete set of quartet part-books published in Venice by the composer–publishers Marescalchi and Canobbio.
£1750
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HUISH, Robert.
Fatherless Rosa; or, the Dangers of the Female Life. Expressly written as a Companion to Fatherless Fanny …
London, Published by T. Kaygill … for William Emans …, 1820.
First edition. Like the best-selling Fatherless Fanny (1811, possibly by Clara Reeve), Fatherless Rosa, set in the middle of the eighteenth century, pleads ‘the cause of virtue and morality’, but with characters exhibiting ‘a greater degree of vice’ than Fanny, the little...
£750
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FERRI, Giovanni.
Discours sur les principes de l’education lycéenne, prononcé à l’inauguration du Lycée d’Angers, par...
Angers, Frères Mame, 1806.
Only edition, rare, of this speech by the Italian writer and educationalist Giovanni Ferri de St. Constant (1755–1830), on the inauguration of the Lycée at Angers.
£225
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LAWRENCE, James Henry.
A Picture of Verdun, or the English Detained in France … from the Portfolio of a Detenu.
London, T. Hookham junior & E.T. Hookham, 1810.
First edition of this remarkable account of life among the British prisoners in Napoleonic Verdun, following the mass arrest of English residents in and visitors to France.
£600
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KERBY, Joseph, editor.
Joseph and his Brethren, a poem, in four books. Originally written by a Lady. Abridged and corrected...
Lewes, Sussex Press, Printed for the Editor and Sold by J. Baxter, 1818.
First and only edition, very rare, of a poetic retelling of the life of Joseph from Genesis 37–50, ‘originally written by a Lady’, provincially printed in Lewes, and seemingly owned by a subscriber, Sarah Jenner.
£450
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[MAGRATH, Cornelius.]
‘Ein Irländer Riss …’
Nuremberg, 1756.
A delightful promotional image for the Continental tour of ‘The Irish Giant’ Cornelius Magrath (1736/7–1760), ‘To be seen in Nuremberg in the month of July 1756’.
£3000
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LEIGH, Samuel Egerton, Sir.
Munster Abbey, a Romance; interspersed with Reflections on Virtue and Morality … in three...
Edinburgh, Printed by John Moir … for W. Creech, Cross, and S. Cheyne … [and] for Hookham & Carpentar … Vernor & Hood … London, 1797.
First edition. Despite its ‘gothic’ title this is a novel of contemporary high life in England and on the Grand Tour, avoiding ‘extravagant descriptions of supernatural scenes and events’. Munster Abbey in Devon is the seat of the hero, Mr. Belford, a bachelor ‘happily possessed of...
£1250
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PEACOCK, Thomas Love.
Rhododaphne: or the Thessalian Spell. A Poem.
London, Printed for T. Hookham, Jun. … and Baldwin, Cradock, and Joy … 1818.
First edition. A mythological narrative set in ancient Thessaly, Rhododaphne tells the story of the shepherd boy Anthemion, in love with the mortal girl Calliroë, and of the nymph Rhododaphne, who carries him off to her enchanted palace. When Rhododaphne is destroyed by Heavenly or Uranian...
£1000
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[OVERINGTON.]
Overington family pedigree.
Kirdford, c. 1620–1674.
A manuscript pedigree on vellum tracing the line of descent of the Overington family of Kirdford in West Sussex from 1620 to 1674, recording family baptisms, dates and times of birth, and deaths.
£500
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[STANHOPE, Hester Lucy, Lady.] [MERYON, Charles Lewis, editor.]
Memoirs of the Lady Hester Stanhope, as related by...
London, [Frederick Shoberl for] Henry Colburn … 1845.
First edition, the entertaining memoirs of the Middle East traveller Lady Hester Stanhope (1776–1839). Having looked after her uncle, William Pitt, during most of her youth and run his household while he was Prime Minister for the second time, Stanhope left for the Levant in 1810. She took with...
£650
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HAYLEY, William, and William BLAKE (illustrator).
Ballads … founded on Anecdotes relating to Animals, with Prints...
Chichester, J. Seagrave, for London, Richard Phillips, 1805.
First edition of William Hayley’s sixteen Ballads illustrated by William Blake, with a fine provenance, plates I–III in the first state.
£3500
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[ARCHCONFRATERNITY OF THE MOST HOLY CRUCIFIX.]
Distinta descrizione della machina, luminari, ed ordinanza nella solenne processione...
Rome, per il Casaletti, 1775.
Rare record of a procession made by members of the Archconfraternity of the Most Holy Crucifix from the church of San Marcello in Rome to Saint Peter’s Basilica in the Vatican in the jubilee year of 1775.
£250
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[SHEFFIELD, John, Earl of Mulgrave, afterwards Duke of Buckingham.]
An Essay on Poetry.
London, Printed for Joseph Hindmarsh … 1682.
First edition, a verse satire in imitation of Horace’s Ars Poetica. There are indirect attacks on Rochester (‘Bawdry barefac’d, that poor pretence to Wit’), and Cowley, who has poetic fury but ‘ill expression’, while Sheffield reserves praise for Dryden, who took the blame for...
£1200
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RAMSAY, Allan.
The Gentle Shepherd, a Scotch Pastoral … attempted in English by Margaret Turner.
London, Printed for the Author, by T. Bensley; and sold by G. Nicol … and by Mrs. Turner … 1790.
First edition of this parallel-text translation of Ramsay’s Scots verse drama, a subscriber’s copy from the library of Mary, Lady Vincent, née Chiswell, wife of Sir Francis Vincent (1747–1793), resident consul at Venice.
£600
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[MARLBOROUGH, John Churchill, Duke of.]
Tract volume of five rare works (three not in the British Library) relating to the...
London, 1695–1706.
The Hero of the Age, published December 1704 by the otherwise unknown Jasper Robins, is one of the rarest literary contributions to the national outpouring that accompanied the martial success of John Churchill, first Duke of Marlborough, in the early years of the eighteenth century. It comprises...
£3850
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[COTTLE, Joseph.]
Poems, containing John the Baptist. Sir Malcolm and Alla, a Tale, shewing to all the World what Woman’s Love...
Bristol, Printed by Bulgin and Rosser, for J. Cottle, Bookseller … and G. G. and J. Robinson … London, 1795.
First edition. The Bristol bookseller Joseph Cottle (1770-1853) had been introduced to Coleridge and Southey by Robert Lovell in 1794 when the two poets ‘were in Bristol courting the Fricker sisters and preparing for Pantisocracy (as they called their scheme to marry and set up a community on...
£6000