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Catalogue 263 Recent
Acquisitions |
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Section I: Abrantes y Linares to Burr |
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Papers
on Book Collecting by William S. Reese
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Descendants of Montezuma 1. [Abrantes y Linares, Duque de]: [COLLECTION OF MANUSCRIPTS IN SPANISH FROM THE ARCHIVES OF THE DUKE OF ABRANTES DOCUMENTING HIS FINANCIAL AFFAIRS AND HIS LAWSUIT AGAINST THE CONDE DEL VALLE]. [Mexico. 1781-1783]. Twenty-five documents comprising [55]pp., plus additional contemporary wrapper inscribed "1782 Mejico." 36 folio and 19 quarto pages written in several different hands. In fine condition. In a cloth clamshell case, leather label. A collection of twenty-five manuscripts in Spanish, many relating to a lawsuit over lands in Mexico. These are probably connected to the lengthy and complicated suits brought by the heirs of the last Aztec ruler, Montezuma, over their just inheritance, which dragged on throughout the colonial period. The Dukes of Abrantes, ennobled in the 17th century, were descended through the female line from Montezuma. The Duke’s opponent, the Conde de Valle, was descended from Hernan Cortes, ennobled as the Marques de Valle after the Conquest. This archive consists of letters to and from the Duke of Abrantes, with reference to his financial affairs and his lawsuit against the Conde del Valle, whose "deliberate tricks for the purpose of delaying the proceedings" are sternly censured by the Duke’s counsel. The majority of the documents are dated 1782. References to the Valle case are found amongst the Duke’s correspondence. For instance, the draft of one of his letters contains the following personal commentary on the litigation: "In spite of my administrator’s best efforts and copious documentary evidence, the Count, being well aware of the justice of my claims, seeks to delay the verdict, in which conspiracy he is assisted by his aunt, the Marquesa de Salvatierra, who, I think, has much influence with the ministers, and they are hoping to fleece me of large sums." The documents also concern other matters in which the Duke was directly or indirectly concerned including an estate and the Hospicio de Nuestra Señora de Cobadonga. The collection includes signed letters from the Duke, Pedro Alonso de Alles, Juan Antonio de Elosua Abarratequi, Agustin de Compaxan, Antonio Francisco del Rio, and Fray Antonio Blanco Valdes. An interesting group of manuscripts concerned with financial and legal matters in late 18th-century Mexico. $3750. Signed by Benjamin Franklin 2. [American Philosophical Society]: [McHenry, James]: TO ALL PERSONS TO WHOM THESE PRESENTS SHALL COME, GREETING. THE AMERICAN PHILOSOPHICAL SOCIETY HELD AT PHILADELPHIA FOR PROMOTING USEFUL KNOWLEDGE...HAVE ELECTED THE HONORABLE DOCTOR JAMES H. McHENRY OF BALTIMORE, MARYLAND A MEMBER...[caption title]. Philadelphia. Jan. 20, 1786. [1]p. manuscript document, 9¼ x 15¼ inches, with the original seal of the Society affixed by ribbon. Old folds. Near fine. The original manuscript certificate naming Dr. James McHenry a member of the American Philosophical Society, the first learned society in America, founded in 1743 by Benjamin Franklin and others. The document is notable for being signed in manuscript by Benjamin Franklin as President of the American Philosophical Society. Franklin served in that role from 1769 until his death in 1790, but due to his prolonged absences from America in the 1770s and ’80s, while he was away in Great Britain and France, very few official documents from American organizations he headed or of which he was a member carry his signature. The certificate is additionally signed by three vice-presidents of the Society, as well as four secretaries. James McHenry had garnered fame for his efforts during the Revolution, especially as a surgeon in the early years of the conflict, and it is likely for his medical contributions that he was made a member of the American Philosophical Society. Such original manuscript certificates electing members to the American Philosophical Society are quite rare, those signed by Benjamin Franklin as President are very rare and desirable indeed. James McHenry (1753-1816) was born in Ballymena, County Antrim, Ireland and educated in Dublin. He emigrated to America in 1771 and studied medicine with Dr. Benjamin Rush in Philadelphia. McHenry volunteered for military service on behalf of the colonies when hostilities with England broke out in 1775, and was assigned to a hospital in Cambridge, Massachusetts. In August 1776 he was named surgeon to the 5th Pennsylvania Battalion, and was captured at Fort Washington on Manhattan in November 1776, along with two thousand other American troops. He was paroled two months later, but was effectively under "house arrest" in Philadelphia and Baltimore until he was formally exchanged for British prisoners in March 1778. McHenry was then named senior surgeon of the "Flying Hospital" at Valley Forge, and was quickly made a secretary to George Washington. It was at this time that he forged close friendships with Washington and Alexander Hamilton that lasted for decades. McHenry served as Washington’s assistant for two and a half years, without rank or pay, until he was transferred to Lafayette’s forces as aide-de-camp in August 1780. He was made a major, and was at Yorktown in October 1781 before leaving the army in December of that year. McHenry was a founding member of the Society of the Cincinnati in 1783. McHenry was politically active in his home state of Maryland for much of the 1780s and ’90s. He served intermittently as a local justice of the peace, held a seat in the Maryland State Senate from 1781 to 1786 and again from 1791 to 1796, and in the Maryland Assembly from 1789 to 1791. He represented Maryland in the Confederation Congress in 1783-86, and also at the Constitutional Convention in the summer of 1787, where he kept extensive notes that serve as a valuable record of the debates on the creation of the U.S. Constitution. A staunch Federalist, McHenry was intimately involved in helping George Washington fill political patronage positions, and in 1796 he was selected by Washington as the nation’s third Secretary of War. He worked to reorganize the army in the late 1790s, and Fort McHenry in Baltimore is named for him. Disputes with John Adams led him to resign his post as Secretary of War in 1800, and he retired to his estate, Fayetteville, outside Baltimore. McHenry published a Baltimore directory in 1807. ANB 15, pp.80-82. DAB XII, pp.62-63. $30,000. British Merchants Lobby the Government 3. [American Revolution]: MEMORIAL TO LORD GEORGE GERMAIN OF MESSRS. GREENWOOD, HIGGINSON, CLARK, MILLIGAN & NUTT, DATED LONDON 19th NOVEMB. 1778 [caption title]. London. Nov. 19, 1778. [3]pp. of manuscript on a bifolium sheet, docketed on verso of integral leaf. Olds folds. Tipped to folio sheet measuring 15 x 10½ inches. Bright and legible. Near fine. A manuscript petition on behalf of a British mercantile firm, urging the dispatch of British troops to Georgia and South Carolina to collect debts incurred by southern plantation owners. In his written appeal dated Nov. 19, 1778, John Nutt, from the firm of Greenwood, Higginson, Clark, and Milligan, further petitions Lord Germain, Secretary of State for the colonies, to grant relief from the great burden of debt resulting from the trade blockade by permitting "to Ship for Great Britain only, any Produce of Georgia & South Carolina or other Effects, for the sole purpose of the payment of debts due to your Petitioners & others, and that were contracted in Great Britain before the passing of the Act of Parliament prohibiting the Trade with the Rebellious Colonies." The petition also includes a plea for the forcible reinstatement by British forces of loyalist southern plantation owners, "many of whom, we have good Good ground to believe, would find out the means of conveying their property into the Province of Georgia, in order to make payment of the debts they owe here...," who had been dispossessed of their estates by the nascent rebellious colonial government. After Burgoyne’s failure at Saratoga in 1777, and as Parliament became inundated with merchant claims of monies owed by American merchants in the South, Parliament would soon decide to turn its military focus to establish a foothold in the southern colonies. This petition presages the change in British military strategy which was in fact underway. By the end of the year the British Navy had seized Savannah for the first time, and the focus of the War shifted increasingly to the South after the summer of 1779, when the British gave up Philadelphia and adopted an increasingly southern strategy. This manuscript petition, written in a secretarial hand and marked "Copy," is identical in format to many similar printing "lobbying" petitions. In this case the petitioners saved money and more closely directed their lobbying with a manuscript version. $3250. 4. [Andrews, William]: POOR WILL’S POCKET ALMANACK, FOR THE YEAR 1774; FITTED TO THE USE OF PENNSYLVANIA, AND THE NEIGHBOURING PROVINCES. CONTAINING, A GREAT VARIETY OF USEFUL LISTS AND TABLES. Philadelphia: Printed and Sold by J. Crukshank, [1773]. [36]pp. plus eight blank interleaves. 24mo. Contemporary green decorative wrappers. Spine separating at head. Some faint foxing, early pencil notations on first blank leaf. Very good. An early edition of the popular little almanac attributed by Evans to William Andrews. With lists of roads and distances between Philadelphia and various northeastern cities. DRAKE 9996. EVANS 12650. NAIP w032698. $1500. Arkansas Land Sale Broadside 5. [Arkansas]: EXECUTORS SALE OF VALUABLE REAL ESTATE. GREAT SALE OF ARKANSAS LANDS...[caption title]. [New York. 1844]. Broadside, 21½ x 16¾ inches. Wrinkled. Tears in upper, lower, and right edge, with some minor loss. A few closed tears repaired with tape on verso. About good. A rare broadside advertising the sale of more than 10,000 acres of land in Arkansas. The 1840s were a booming period for Arkansas, and the population rose from less than 100,000 in 1840 to more than 200,000 in 1850. Doubtless large tracts of available land (such as those offered in this broadside) were partially responsible. The land was owned by Joseph Watson (deceased, late of Washington, D.C.), and is described as exceptional for raising cotton, sugar, tobacco, hemp, and native grapes ("equal in quality to the French grape"). The range, township, section, and quarter where each parcel of land is located is given in detail, accompanied by the size of each lot, most of them being 160 acres in size but a few containing 320 acres. Some sixty lots on all were offered for sale. The terms of sale are cash, and the executors would be handing out quit-claim deeds together with the patents for the land to the purchasers. The executors of the Watson estate are identified as N.B. Haswell and A. Ward, and the auction was scheduled for May 15, 1844 at the sale rooms of Anthony Bleeker & Company in New York City. No copies of this broadside are located on OCLC. Very rare. $3500. 6. [Art]: Koehler, S.R., intro: ORIGINAL ETCHINGS BY AMERICAN ARTISTS. New York: Cassell and Co., [1883]. Unpaginated. Twenty etched plates, each with accompanying title and text leaves. Folio. Original brown pebbled cloth, boards and spine gilt, a.e.g. Light wear at spine ends and corners. Inner front hinge starting. Contemporary gift inscription on front free endpaper. Incredibly clean and bright. Overall, a fine copy. A very attractive work, celebrating the then-popular medium of etchings. Contains twenty original etchings, never before published, by some of the pre-eminent American artists of the day, including Thomas Moran, Moran’s wife (Mrs. M. Nimmo Moran), Peter Moran (brother of Thomas), Joseph Pennell, F.S. Church, George Smillie, James Smillie, R. Swain Gifford, and Frederick Dielman. Each etching is accompanied by an appreciative text and biographical information on the artist. $2250. Important Work 7. Ashley, John: MEMOIRS AND CONSIDERATIONS CONCERNING THE TRADE AND REVENUES OF THE BRITISH COLONIES IN AMERICA. WITH PROPOSALS FOR RENDERING THOSE COLONIES MORE BENEFICIAL TO GREAT BRITAIN. [with:] THE SECOND PART.... London. 1740-1743. Two volumes bound in one. vi,154; xii,127pp. General half title for both parts bound in at the front. Contemporary calf boards, ruled in gilt, expertly rebacked in matching style, spine gilt. Boards a bit rubbed and edgeworn, new endpapers. Save for an old stain on the final few leaves of the second part, internally clean and fresh. Very good overall. Both parts of this important work on the West Indies trade, issued three years apart from each other. Ashley, a Barbados planter, published several works to encourage the British West India sugar trade. The present book requests further legislative assistance for the sugar producing colonies. Many of the questions addressed by Ashley center on trade with the British North colonies, whether sugar or rum can be exported directly, whether ships built in North America can be used in the sugar trade, and the like. A supplement to the second part (not present here) was also issued in 1743. European Americana locates eight sets. EUROPEAN AMERICANA 740/19, 743/16. SABIN 2192, 2193. GOLDSMITH 7779, 7979. KRESS 4483. SIMMONS 1740, 3. BELL A337. $2500. A Nice Set of the Second Octavo 8. Audubon, John James, and John Bachman: THE QUADRUPEDS OF NORTH AMERICA. New York. 1856. Three volumes. 383; 334; 348pp. including 155 colored plates. Original elaborately blindstamped morocco. Some wear and rubbing to spines expertly repaired. Internally clean. Very good. The second octavo edition of Audubon’s ...Quadrupeds..., published two years after the completion of the first octavo edition. Its publication was managed entirely by Audubon’s sons, Victor and John. The extant portions of the original manuscript suggest that the work was composed largely by the sons and John Bachman, John James Audubon being nearly senile by the time the work was written. As with the first octavo edition, the last part of this edition includes five plates not found in the folio edition. One of the most important American color plate books. SABIN 2368. WOOD, p.208. REESE, STAMPED WITH A NATIONAL CHARACTER 38 (ref). BENNETT, p.5 (ref). $13,500. Carriage Catalogue 9. Babcock Company, H.H.: [MARVELOUS LATE 19th-CENTURY ILLUSTRATED CATALOGUE OF CARRIAGES, WAGONS, AND RELATED EQUIPMENT MANUFACTURED BY H.H. BABCOCK COMPANY OF WATERTOWN, NEW YORK AND SOLD IN THEIR NEW YORK CITY SHOWROOM]. [Watertown, N.Y.]: H.H. Babcock Company, [nd, but ca. 1890]. [50] leaves with [121] mounted plates on recto and verso. Original gilt calf boards, bound accordion-style, with 50 leaves (each measuring 6 x 8¾ inches) folded and bound accordion-style. Both boards gilt with identifying information: "H. H. Babcock Company, Watertown, N.Y. 408-412 Broome St., New York City." Boards slightly rubbed. Front pastedown with attached small stamped metal plate (1 x 3½ inches) inscribed: "H.H. Babcock Co’s. Happy Thought Wagon. No. 16395. Trade Mark Patented. Pat. Nov. 12 [18]89 – Jan. 26, [18]95." 121 lithographic or wood-engraved plates mounted on recto and verso of leaves consisting of fifty-four large images (approximately 4 x 6 inches) mounted one per leaf and sixty-seven small images (3¼ x 5½ inches) mounted two per leaf. Wood-engraved images signed "Ware Bros. Phila[delphia]." Images printed in dark brown ink except fourteen printed in red ink (one larger image and thirteen smaller images). Each image printed with identifying information for each vehicle or mechanical part. One large image mounted on rear pastedown. A few leaves with image or images only on one side of leaf. Minor soiling of leaves and images (as to be expected for a volume used in a carriage showroom). In very good condition. A marvelous extensively illustrated catalogue of a large selection of carriages and a few examples of related equipment manufactured and sold by the H.H. Babcock Company of Watertown, New York. Apparently used as a sample book in the firm’s showroom on Broome Street in New York City, the front and rear covers of the accordion-style volume identify the firm’s Broome Street address, as do numerous plates. The minor soiling of the images also attests to its use in a commercial venue devoted to the sale (and repair?) of mechanical transportation. The lithographic and wood-engraved illustrations represent a vast variety of vehicles including wagons, buggies, surreys, landaus, broughams, phaetons, cabriolets, buckboards, and carts. The numerous possibilities to be considered include particular models with several possible variants. For example, the "Happy Thought" Wagon could be purchased with one of four different bodies and the firm’s buckboard wagons could be ordered with a variety of seating arrangements for two, four, or six passengers. Almost exclusively devoted to the firm’s vehicles, two of the larger images are detailed images of the company’s "gears," mechanical parts used in the steering mechanism. A wonderful, and extremely rare, example of a late 19th-century transportation catalogue. OCLC records only a single copy at Winterthur of an illustrated eighty-six-page catalogue (60 x 90 mm.) the Babcock Company published in 1893. $4000. 10. Badger, Mrs. C.M.: WILD FLOWERS DRAWN AND COLORED FROM NATURE. New York: Charles Scribner, 1859. vii,44pp. plus twenty-two handcolored lithographic plates. Folio. Modern three-quarter calf and marbled boards, morocco label, a.e.g. Corners lightly worn. A very few light, scattered fox marks. A very handsome copy. A collection of twenty-two lithographed flower plates, each beautifully colored by hand and each accompanied by a poem discussing the flower. Among the flowers portrayed are dogwood, wild geranium, trailing arbutus, wild honeysuckle, yellow lily, wild rose, daisy, buttercup, and more. "The flower prints are very fine lithographs by Donaldson Brothers of New York" – Bennett. Of the Donaldson Brothers, McGrath writes that "they should be remembered for their very fine hand-colored and chromolithographic flower books." Clarissa Badger was an artist with an intuitive feeling for the decorative, amply illustrated in this work and in her Floral Belles. "In 1828 [she] married the Reverend Milton Badger...they lived...in Massachusetts; New York City; and...Connecticut. Though little is known about her life other than the landmark dates of her birth, marriage and death, Mrs. Badger’s fine drawings and talented hand have survived to keep her name alive" – J. Kramer, Women of Flowers (New York, 1996). BENNETT, p.6. McGRATH, p.130. $2000. A Thriller of the Murrell Gang 11. [Bannorris, Amanda]: THE FEMALE LAND PIRATE OR AWFUL, MYSTERIOUS, AND HORRIBLE DISCLOSURES OF AMANDA BANNORRIS, WIFE AND ACCOMPLICE OF RICHARD BANNORRIS, A LEADER IN THAT TERRIBLE BAND OF ROBBERS AND MURDERERS, KNOWN FAR AND WIDE AS THE MURRELL MEN. Cincinnati: E.E. Barclay, 1848. 32pp. including three woodcut illustrations. Modern gray wrappers, later printed title label. Foxing, moderate tanning, first illustrated leaf trimmed at outer margin, affecting a few characters of text and ornamental border, but not the image itself. Very good. "One of the early Barclay thrillers, and a rarity" – Eberstadt. A sensationalist tale of the doomed orphan, Amanda Bannorris, nee Bently who, when spurned by her fiancé at the tender age of sixteen, develops an insatiable thirst for revenge. Duped into a seemingly advantageous marriage, she quickly discovers that her husband is the leader of a the notorious Murrell gang, a band of "counterfeiters, robbers, and murderers," and soon herself becomes an accomplice "in no less than five murders." In retaliation for the murder of her paramour, Bannorris murders her husband, whom she sees as the genesis of her present misfortune. The sad inevitability of her life of crime lands Bannorris in jail for the spousal murder which she describes thusly: "I discharged two barrels into his breast...and naught is now left for me, but to carry my awful design of suicide into execution." A fascinating 19th-century thriller, with woodcut illustrations depicting Bannorris’ criminal history. Adams calls this "Exceedingly rare," but excludes the 1847 edition; OCLC locates only five copies. ADAMS SIX-GUNS 135. EBERSTADT 132:245. MORGAN, OHIO IMPRINTS 7058. OCLC 16001416. $1500. Landmark Color Plate Medical Work 12. [Barnes, Joseph K., ed]: THE MEDICAL AND SURGICAL HISTORY OF THE WAR OF THE REBELLION.... Washington. 1875-1888. Six volumes. Illustrated with dozens of plates, many of which are fine chromolithographs of Civil War wounds. Thick, heavy quarto. Original green cloth, spines gilt. Bindings edgeworn, spine ends frayed. Hinges weak on most volumes, rear hinge broken on Medical volume of first part and front hinge broken on Medical volume of third part. Generally clean internally. A good set. Second issue of the first part, and first issue of the second and third parts. "The horrors of the Civil War provided surgeons with a multitude of complicated cases. This vast work, in six bulky volumes, attempted to quantify the medical knowledge so painfully gained, extensively illustrating case histories with chromolithographic plates. The set marked the first major government subsidy in publishing medical research, the only such official study to rival the expenditure made for exploration surveys of the era" – Reese. Barnes was surgeon general. A landmark in medical illustration. REESE, STAMPED WITH A NATIONAL CHARACTER 80. $2500. 13. Bartholomew, William N.: BARTHOLOMEW’S SKETCHES FROM NATURE. Boston: Woolworth, Ainsworth & Co., [nd, but ca. 1870s]. Titlepage plus twenty lithographic plates. Folio. Original blindstamped cloth. Corners slightly frayed. Light foxing, two illustrations skillfully handcolored by previous owner with two faint red watercolor numerical notations. Ink sketch on verso of plate "Road Scene Dor. Mass." Overall just about very good. Beautiful lithograph plates depicting scenes in Vermont, western Massachusetts, New Hampshire, and elsewhere in New England. Pompanoosic, Deerfield, West Fairlee, Thetford, Groton Peak, Barnet, and Williamstown are all depicted. According to Peters’ America on Stone:
The NUC locates a single copy with a Bradford imprint, another copy is listed as having an 1855 Boston imprint, and three copies are described as having an [187-] imprint published by Woolworth, Ainsworth, of which the present copy is one. DREPPARD, p.812. PETERS, p.90. $1500. 14. Barton, Benjamin Smith: A MEMOIR CONCERNING THE FASCINATING FACULTY WHICH HAS BEEN ASCRIBED TO THE RATTLE-SNAKE, AND OTHER AMERICAN SERPENTS. Philadelphia: Printed, for the Author, by Henry Sweitzer, 1796. 70pp. Original marbled wrappers. Unobtrusive perforated stamp on front wrapper. Contemporary ink gift inscription on titlepage. Very good. In a half morocco clamshell case. The first herpetological work printed in America, printed for private distribution only, and extremely rare. Evans mistakenly calls for six plates, an error corrected by Shipton & Mooney. This copy bears the gift inscription of one Isaac Hays, M.D. to the Franklin Institute in Philadelphia. Hays was a prominent Philadelphia ophthalmologist and a co-editor of the American Journal of Medical Sciences. SABIN 3816. EVANS 30037. $6500. 15. Beale, Richard Lee Tuberville: HISTORY OF THE NINTH VIRGINIA CAVALRY, IN THE WAR BETWEEN THE STATES. Richmond: B.F. Johnson Publishing Company, 1899. 192pp. plus frontispiece portrait. Publisher’s cloth, stamped in gilt. Institutional bookplate of the Military Order of the Loyal Legion of the United States on front pastedown, shelf sticker on foot of backstrip. Accession number neatly inscribed in blue crayon on front pastedown and titlepage. Some soiling, cloth brighter at foot of spine, where library label was evidently removed. Overall very good. An exceptional Confederate regimental, earning rare praise from Nevins: "An excellent and descriptive narrative of cavalry operations in the East; the discerning nature of the book makes it a valuable research tool for all aspects of the war." Beale led the North Virginia Cavalry as brigadier general, and the present narrative was found among his papers after his death in 1893. A roster, an article on the Dahlgren Raid, and an article comparing the "‘Yankee’ and ‘Rebel’ Yells" are appended. COULTER 22. HOWES B274, "aa." NEVINS I, p.56. $2000. 16. Beaumarchais, Pierre-Augustin Caron de: OBSERVATIONS SUR LE MEMOIRE JUSTIFICATIF DE LA COUR DE LONDRES. A Londres, A Philadelphia. 1779. 56pp. Later marbled boards, paper label. Light occasional foxing, else internally bright and clean. Very good. A reply to Edward Gibbon’s Memoire justificatif..., not to be confused with de Rayneval’s response of the same name. "This work by the famous playwright was part of the pamphlet war that flared over French support of the Americans in the Revolution" (Bell). Beaumarchais, who penned The Barber of Seville and The Marriage of Figaro, was an avid supporter of the colonists’ plight and had been instrumental in obtaining and transporting arms and ammunition to the Americans under the firm name of Roderigue Hortalez & Co. Later, however, there was some confusion about whether the supplies were gifts from the French government, and Beaumarchais was never properly compensated. His heirs were finally paid $800,000 in 1835, only a portion of the actual amount owed him. This present pamphlet is a justification of French policy during the American Revolution and an account of French and American grievances against Great Britain. SABIN 4182. HOWES B289, "aa." GOLDSMITHS 11907. BELL B129. $1000. With a Famous Indian Captivity 17. Beers, Andrew: [Johonnet, Jackson]: BEERS’S ALMANAC AND EPHEMERIS...FOR...1793...[containing "THE REMARKABLE ADVENTURES OF JACKSON JOHONNET..."]. Hartford: Printed by Hudson and Goodwin, [1792]. [36]pp. including one in-text woodcut illustration. Original printed self-wrappers, stitched. Light marginal chipping, scattered foxing and toning; two-inch closed tear in pp.31/32, repaired with early stitching. Else very good. In a cloth slipcase, gilt leather label. Andrew Beers’ Hartford almanac for 1793, containing the important Indian captivity narrative, "The Remarkable Adventures of Jackson Johonnet...." Johonnet had recently served under Generals Harmar and St. Clair in the western army’s expeditions against the Indians in the Northwest Territory. He was captured on the banks of the Wabash River in August 1791 by a band of Kickapoo and taken to their camp on the Upper Miami, where he made a dramatic escape after witnessing the torture and deaths of his fellow soldiers. This printing of Johnonnet’s account precedes the separate 1793 issues (Ayer 167), which are generally referred to as the first edition. The Siebert copies of these went for $13,800 (the Providence edition, Siebert Sale 440) and $5750 (the Boston edition, Siebert Sale 441.) The almanac also contain a "Welch [sic] Sermon," the story of a sleep-walker, and several anecdotes and poems, in addition to the calendar, lists, and tables. The anatomical depiction of the zodiac is printed on page [2]. DRAKE 497. EVANS 24083. HOWES J176. TRUMBULL 128. NAIP w027306. $3750. 18. Beers, S.N.; D.J. Lake; and F.W. Beers: GILLETTE’S MAP OF ONEIDA CO. NEW YORK FROM ACTUAL SURVEYS UNDER THE DIRECTION OF J.H. FRENCH. Philadelphia: John H. Gillette, 1858. Wall map, 66½ x 64 inches, in full period color. Expertly restored, backed with modern linen, trimmed in green cloth, on contemporary rollers. Chip at left end of upper roller. Evenly toned, some minor staining in upper portion. Very good. A handsome map of Oneida County, New York, famous in the 1820s and ’30s as a hotbed of religious revivalism, and vitalized by the construction of the Erie Canal. The route of the Erie Canal is shown, as are several railroad lines. The major cities of the county are outlined in color, with Rome and several others tinted a light green. Utica is shown in a large inset map measuring 17 by 27½ inches, giving much detail of the town and buildings, accompanied by an extensive business directory. Rome is also shown in an attractive inset map, with a business directory. More than thirty smaller insets show the towns of Knox Corners, Delta, Trenton Falls, Deerfield Corners, Remsen, Waterville, Durhamville, Vernon, Camden, New Hartford, and Clinton, among others. Seven engravings along the border show prominent homes and buildings in the region, including the Court House in Rome, Utica City Hall, and the residences of Stanton Park in Waterville and Gen. Lyman Curtiss in Camden. Silas N. Beers and Frederick W. Beers were cousins and well-known mapmakers. Along with the young D. Jackson Lake, they produced several important New York county maps. This map of Oneida County is the first project on which they collaborated, under the leadership of the eminent surveyor, J.H. French. Ristow hypothesizes that French used the Oneida project as a "training ground" for the three young talented mapmakers. Not in Rumsey nor in Phillips Maps. Scarce and quite notable. RISTOW, pp.393-94. $3850. 19. Beltrami, J.C.: A PILGRIMAGE IN EUROPE AND AMERICA, LEADING TO THE DISCOVERY OF THE SOURCES OF THE MISSISSIPPI AND BLOODY RIVER; WITH A DESCRIPTION OF THE WHOLE COURSE OF THE FORMER, AND OF THE OHIO. London. 1828. Two volumes. lxxvi,472; [545]pp. (p.545 misnumbered 54) plus three engraved plates, two folding plans, and one folding map. Original boards, printed paper labels. Labels lightly rubbed and chipped. Internally clean and bright. Very good. The English language edition, enlarged, of the author’s La decouverte des sources du Mississippi et de la Riviere Sanglante..., published in 1824. The first volume contains the narrative of Beltrami’s travels through Italy, France, Germany and England. The second volume translates from the original French his adventures in America, including the months, or moons, of the Sioux and Chippewa. "He found his way to the upper reaches of the Mississippi River, where he joined an expedition led by Maj. Stephen Long. The latter wrote of him, ‘an Italian whom we met at Fort St. Anthony, attached himself to the expedition and accompanied us to Pembina.’ Beltrami subsequently traveled down the Mississippi to New Orleans" – Wagner-Camp. The folding map illustrates the routes travelled in America, detailing Beltrami’s view of the geography of the headwaters of the Mississippi. The inclusion of the map is in response to the criticism he received for not providing a map in the first edition of this work. The plates depict Indian ornaments, while the folding plans are of Karlsruhe and the gardens at Schwetzingen. WAGNER-CAMP 26a:2. FIELD 111. HOWES B338, "aa." CLARK II:182. MONAGHAN 178B. PILLING, PROOF-SHEETS 340. SABIN 4605. $1500. 20. Benwell, J[ohn]: AN ENGLISHMAN’S TRAVELS IN AMERICA: HIS OBSERVATIONS OF LIFE AND MANNERS IN THE FREE AND UNITED STATES. London: Binns and Goodwin, [1853]. 231,[21]pp. Color frontis. Original blue gilt pictorial cloth, gilt-stamped spine. Very good. With a remarkable color frontispiece consisting of two images, one showing an African-American who has been tarred and feathered fleeing a mob; and the other an African-American woman, half-naked, being brutally whipped by her master. The author’s tour through the South took him through St. Louis, Memphis, Vicksburg, Natchez, Charleston, Tallahassee, and New Orleans. "He saw only the worst features of slavery and reported that the slaveowners believed that the only way to keep the slaves under control was by means of harsh treatment...However, the descriptions of life in Florida, usually overlooked by travellers of the period, give it a special value" – Clark. SABIN 4788. HOWES B371. CLARK 446. SERVIES 3816. $1250. One of the Greatest American View Books 21. Beyer, Edward: ALBUM OF VIRGINIA; OR, ILLUSTRATION OF THE OLD DOMINION. Richmond [but actually Dresden & Berlin]: Edward Beyer [but printed by Rau & Son of Dresden and W. Loeillot of Berlin], 1858. Lithograph titlepage (with five vignettes) plus forty tinted lithograph plates. Oblong folio. Original gilt cloth boards bound onto larger modern three-quarter morocco and cloth. Titlepage lightly soiled and edgeworn. A few plates with closed marginal tears, expertly repaired; titlepage and each plate backed by tissue. [with:] [Beyer, Edward]: DESCRIPTION OF THE ALBUM OF VIRGINIA: OR THE OLD DOMINION, ILLUSTRATED. VOL. I [all published]. Richmond: Enquirer Book and Job Printing Office, 1857. [79]pp. Original half calf and cloth boards, gilt title on front board. Text volume very clean internally. Overall a very good, handsome copy of a book very difficult to find in clean condition, here with the scarce accompanying text volume. Both volumes housed in folding cloth box. The Beyer album is one of the foremost American view books created in the 19th century. "This is a major outstanding item, the rarity of which is by no means fully appreciated" – Bennett. Edward Beyer was a German artist who visited the United States in the early 1850s. He chose to concentrate his work on Virginia and Kentucky, spending three years in Virginia working on the original drawings for this book. Although the titlepage asserts Richmond was the place of printing, the book was actually produced in Germany, with the plates being prepared in Dresden and the letterpress in Berlin. The superb tinted lithograph views include beautiful natural scenes, Harpers Ferry, White Sulphur Springs, railroad bridges and tunnels (e.g. Highbridge near Farmville), views in Weyer’s Cave, and scenes at many of the fashionable resorts which were nestled amid the mountains of Southwest Virginia. "He was taken by the beauty of the Virginia landscape, particularly by the elegant settings of some of the region’s watering places...Virginians responded warmly to Beyer’s enterprise and often gave him advance access to architectural plans when these could be of help to him. There was probably no Virginia county that Beyer left unvisited in his zeal to present what is, in fact, an affectionate family album of an entire state" – Deak. Deak praises Beyer’s "delicate and precise style" and "characteristic refinement of proportion." It is one of the foremost works of American scenery. This copy of Beyer is notable for being accompanied by the small volume of explanatory text, separately published in Richmond in 1857. This volume is quite rare and almost never found with the album. HOWES B413, "b." SABIN 5125. BENNETT, p.10. DEAK, PICTURING AMERICA 721. $45,000. First Printing of Any Portion 22. [Bible in Delaware]: THE THREE EPISTLES OF THE APOSTLE JOHN.... New-York: Pr. for the American Bible Society, D. Fanshaw, printer, 1818. 21pp., all page numbers duplicated, in parallel English and Delaware on opposite pages. Contemporary half sheep and marbled boards. About half the spine leather is lacking, but binding and text block still solid. 19th-century printed institutional library bookplate on front pastedown. Slight age-toning. A very good copy. Christian Frederick Dencke, a Moravian missionary among the Delaware Indians, had the distinction of seeing his translation of John’s Epistles become the first portion of the Bible to be translated and printed in the Delaware language. His translations of the Gospels of John and Matthew remain in manuscript to this day. The text in Delaware appears on the left-hand page and the English is opposite. DARLOW & MOULE 3247. AYER INDIAN LINGUISTICS (DELAWARE) 2. PILLING, PROOF-SHEETS 1020. SIEBERT SALE 79. $1800. The First American Hebrew Bible 23. [Bible – Old Testament in Hebrew]: SEFER TEHILIM [heading in Hebrew characters] LIBER PSALMORUM HEBRAÏCE CUM NOTIS SELECTIS EX EDITIONE FRANCISCI HARE S.T.P. ESPISCOPI CICESTRENSIS: ET CUM SELECTA LECTIONUM VARIETATE EX ED. VET. TEST. HEB. BENJ. KENNICOTT S.T.P. Cambridge, Ma.: Hilliard and Metcalf, 1809. [2],495pp. Contemporary sheep, spine gilt, gilt leather label. Boards and spine slightly worn. Contemporary ownership inscription ("Richard G. Parker") on front pastedown, additional contemporary inscription on titlepage. Upper half on inner margin of titlepage loose. Occasional foxing. A very good copy. In a half morocco box. The first printing in Hebrew of any book of the Bible in the New World, and the first Hebrew psalter printed in America. "The Hebrew text is above, with the various readings below; under them the Latin translation, and under that the notes in two columns" – O’Callaghan. A highly desired American Judaicum. ROSENBACH AMERICAN JEWISH 152. SHAW & SHOEMAKER 17004. O’CALLAGHAN p.96. $20,000. First American Book with Color Printing 24. Bigelow, Jacob: AMERICAN MEDICAL BOTANY, BEING A COLLECTION OF THE NATIVE MEDICINAL PLANTS OF THE UNITED STATES, CONTAINING THEIR BOTANICAL HISTORY AND CHEMICAL ANALYSIS, AND PROPERTIES AND USES.... Boston: Cummings and Hilliard, 1817-1820. Three volumes. 197,[1]; 199,[1]; 197,[1]pp. and sixty color plates comprising ten handcolored copper engravings and fifty plates printed in colors, probably from an etched stone, some finished by hand. Half title in second and third volumes. Contemporary three-quarter maroon calf and marbled boards, gilt-lettered spines. Minor wear to extremities. Scattered foxing. Bookplates on front pastedowns. Blindstamps on titlepages and some plates. Plates also with some minor foxing. Overall very good. In a half morocco box. The first American book with color-printing, and a foundation work in American botanical studies, notable for its fine plates. Bigelow, a native of Massachusetts, attended medical school at the University of Pennsylvania, where he became keenly interested in botany as a student of Benjamin Smith Barton, then a professor of materia medica as well as the leading botanist in the United States. Following his graduation in 1810 he entered private practice in Boston, and himself became a professor of materia medica, at Harvard Medical School, in 1815. His botanizing had already produced his Florula Bostoniensis in 1814, and once installed at Harvard he began work on this, his best-known publication. According to Bigelow’s own later account, he at first intended to produce the plates for his work by printing engravings and having them hand-colored. He decided that this would be too expensive, since he envisioned an edition of 1000 copies with sixty plates each. Ultimately he printed the plates using aquatint, with the ink applied to the plates "à la poupée," a method by which the different color inks are daubed onto the printing plates with a piece of cloth. Richard Wolfe, in his book on Bigelow, asserts that a process of creating plates by etching stone was used, but recent work by Philip Weimerskirch and others has established that the aquatint process was used, and in fact Bigelow has left us a very specific account of the book’s production. Up to this time no one had printed plates by aquatint in the United States, although within a few years emigrant artists such as John Hill were to take the art to a very high standard. In any case, the medium served well, and the plates are very beautiful indeed. Bigelow originally issued his work in six parts, intended to be bound in three volumes, between the fall of 1817 and the spring of 1821; however, the titlepages are dated 1817, 1818, and 1821. The book received favorable notices as it appeared, and one, Walter Channing’s review in The North American Review, discussed the production of the plates in particular. Channing names William B. Annin and George Girdler Smith as the engravers and printers of the plates. Once they had become skilled in the printing technique, they were able to produce "several hundred" plates a day. At this rate it must have taken the two men about a year of work to produce all of the plates for the book. Annin is also notable for being one of the first American globe-makers. Bigelow took great care over the physical appearance of his book (many commentators have remarked on the beauty of its typography as well as the plates). In writing to European correspondents he was apologetic about its appearance; he was familiar with what was being done in Europe and knew his pioneering American production was not on the same level. He told his friend, James Edward Smith, that he was "ashamed that the low state of the arts in this country does not suffer us to produce better engravings." Despite his misgivings, American Medical Botany is a beautiful and significant work in the history of American botany and color printing. BENNETT, p.11. MEISEL III, p.378. PRITZEL 773. BM (NH) I:162. NISSEN (BOTANICAL) 164. AUSTIN 205. Roylance, AMERICAN GRAPHIC ARTS (Princeton, 1990), p.94. Wolfe, Jacob Bigelow’s American Medical Botany (1979), passim. REESE, STAMPED WITH A NATIONAL CHARACTER 10. $7500. Beautiful Lithograph Scenes of Niagara 25. Blouet, Guillaume Abel: CHUTES DU NIAGARA. DESSINEES D’APRES NATURE EN MARS 1837...NIAGARA FALLS. SKETCHED FROM NATURE IN MARCH 1837... Paris: Delpech, 1838. [2],4pp. plus six handcolored lithograph plates. Map vignette on titlepage (with small colored portion). Text in parallel English and French columns. Folio. Original half cloth and paper boards, printed paper label on front board. New endpapers and pastedowns. Minor rubbing to boards. A bit of light foxing, small abrasion in the center of the final plate. Very good. A beautiful work of six lithograph views of the Falls of Niagara. Each of the six large plates depicts a different scene in the Falls through high quality French lithography. The plates are titled as follow: "View of the Great Horse-Shoe Fall Taken From Goat-Island," "View of the Central Fall Taken From Goat Island," "View of the Schlosser Fall Taken From the New-York Shore," "View of the Schlosser Fall Taken From the Stairs of the Ferry," "View of the Passage Under the Great Horse-Shoe Fall Taken From the Shore on the Canada Side," and "General View of the Falls Taken from the Canada Shore." According to Lane, "Adamson states that these ‘are among the most attractive series of printed images of the Falls to appear before 1850.’" The lithographs were made by C. Remond. Not in Abbey or Deak. OCLC locates only three copies, at the Toronto Public Library (the only copy listed by the NUC), Princeton (sold to them by this firm), and Yale, and no copies have appeared in auction records in the last thirty years. This portfolio is quite rare, and is one of the few works on Niagara produced on the Continent. LANE, IMPRESSIONS OF NIAGARA, p.51. OCLC 63009409, 37140715. $15,000. 26. [Bookseller Catalogue]: Eastburn, James: SUPPLEMENT TO A CATALOGUE OF BOOKS FOR 1818; INCLUDING MANY RARE AND VALUABLE ARTICLES IN ANCIENT AND MODERN LITERATURE, NOW ON SALE BY JAMES EASTBURN & Co. AT THE LITERARY ROOMS, BROADWAY, CORNER OF PINE-STREET, NEW-YORK, AT THE PRICES AFFIXED. New York: Printed by Abraham Paul, March, 1819. [4],[179]-285pp. plus advertisement page. Original printed wrappers. Minor abrasions on wrappers along the spine. Scattered foxing. Overall, about very good, in original condition. A rare early 19th-century American bookseller catalogue, offering a wide range of titles of new and old books. This catalogue is a supplement to a catalogue that James Eastburn had issue in 1818, and continues the pagination and numbering of the earlier offering. Some 2500 titles are listed with prices, descriptions of size, and an occasional note on the scarcity, quality, or contents of the work. A variety of subjects are included, such as history, geography, voyages, travel, biography, classics, sermons, divinity, law, dictionaries and lexicons, novels, "old editions of standard school books," and French, Italian, and Spanish works. Eastburn offered a 1778 edition of Catesby for $120, and mentions that "the plates of this copy were coloured by the author. The work is extremely scarce; but especially a copy like the above is very rarely to be seen." This would seem to be in error on several scores: Catesby was long dead, and the third edition came out in 1776. A forward note and the final ad page solicit orders from libraries and institutions, touting Eastburn’s ability to procure "collections of the most rare and valuable books in every department of literature." Shaw & Shoemaker locate only three copies of this catalogue, at the American Antiquarian Society, the New York State Library, and the Princeton Theological Seminary. No copies are located on OCLC. Rare and informative. SHAW & SHOEMAKER 47869. $2750. 27. [Bookseller’s Catalogue]: Wright, Goodenow, & Stockwell: A CATALOGUE OF BOOKS IN THE VARIOUS BRANCHES OF LITERATURE; TOGETHER WITH STATIONERY & OTHER ARTICLES, FOR SALE BY WRIGHT, GOODENOW, & STOCKWELL, AT THE RENSSELAER BOOK-STORE, IN RIVER-STREET, TROY, N.Y. [Troy, N.Y.]. December 1806. 90pp. 16mo. Gathered signatures, stitched as issued. Early ownership signatures on titlepage. Final leaf torn at bottom portion, costing about five lines of text on both pages. Good. Wright, Goodenow, & Stockwell are best remembered as publishers, but they ran a flourishing bookshop in Troy, New York in the early 19th century. This rare catalogue of their holdings lists hundreds of titles in a wide variety of subjects. They did business under the name of Rensselaer Book-Store, and their advertisement at the front of the catalogue offers accommodating credit and discount terms to "country book-sellers and merchants, library societies, colleges, academies, and persons who wish to purchase in quantities." They also accepted second-hand books in partial payment for new publications. This catalogue is not in Shaw & Shoemaker, nor is it listed on OCLC. Rare. $1250. 28. Bossu, Jean Bernard: TRAVELS THROUGH THAT PART OF NORTH AMERICA FORMERLY CALLED LOUISIANA...ILLUSTRATED WITH NOTES CHIEFLY TO NATURAL HISTORY. TO WHICH IS ADDED BY THE TRANSLATOR A SYSTEMATIC CATALOGUE OF ALL THE KNOWN PLANTS OF ENGLISH NORTH AMERICA.... London. 1771. Two volumes. viii,407; [4],432pp. Half titles. Contemporary calf, spines richly gilt, red and green morocco labels. Joints lightly rubbed. Slight discoloration on endpapers and titlepages, occasional offsetting of text. A handsome set in contemporary calf. Bossu went to Louisiana in 1750 as a captain of the Marines. This narrative is comprised of a series of twenty-one letters to the Marquis de L’Estrade describing Bossu’s life and travels in the vast Louisiana country from 1751 to 1762. Bossu’s ventures ranged from Fort Chartres, in present-day Illinois, to Mobile, and along the Mississippi. His visit to New Orleans took place only thirty years after its founding, and he was able to gather considerable information from the memories of locals. "Bossu wrote well and his letters not only give an interesting picture of life in the Mississippi Valley and the Mobile Country to the east at the beginning of the second half of the eighteenth century, but incorporated also are many sketches of events in preceding years" – Streeter. This is the first English edition, to which Howes assigns the same "b" rating as the suppressed first edition of 1768. "The first volume is almost entirely filled with historical and personal sketches of the Southern Indian Tribes of the present United States" – Field. Almost all of the second volume of this edition is given over to the catalogue of plants, making it an important piece of American natural history. The catalogue, which does not appear in the first edition, was compiled by Johann Reinhold Forster, the well-known German explorer and botanist, based on specimens of North American plants he saw in England, and on his translation of the work of the Swedish botanist, Pehr Lofling, describing the plants he collected in northern South America in 1754-56. CLARK II:5. SABIN 6465. SERVIES I, p.32. STREETER SALE 1518 (ref). HOWES B626, "b." MEISEL III, p.349. TAXONOMIC LITERATURE 1825, 4921. FIELD 157. $12,500. A Rare American Color Plate Book 29. Bourne, Hermon: FLORES POETICI. THE FLORIST’S MANUAL: DESIGNED AS AN INTRODUCTION TO VEGETABLE PHYSIOLOGY AND SYSTEMATIC BOTANY, FOR CULTIVATORS OF FLOWERS. WITH MORE THAN EIGHTY BEAUTIFULLY COLOURED ENGRAVINGS OF POETIC FLOWERS. Boston & New York: Munroe and Francis & Charles S. Francis, 1833. 288pp. including seventy-three handcolored engravings. Contemporary three-quarter morocco and cloth, spine gilt. Boards rubbed, worn at hinges and extremities. Scattered foxing. Very good. A treatise on botany, with interesting early American color plates. In the introduction Bourne states that his purpose is to provide his readers with a text that includes a discussion of the scientific elements of plant botany that will also be accessible to the casual reader. The list that appears under the running title, "Index to Colored Flowers," is misleading. Though 124 plants are noted, many in the same class are represented by a single, general illustration. According to the titlepage, Bourne was editor of the Literary Magazine. Not in Bennett or McGrath. An attractive and rare American botanical with interesting and early color plates. OCLC 5226972. $4500. 30. Bowen, Nathan: MDCCXXVI. THE NEW-ENGLAND DIARY, OR, ALMANACK, FOR THE YEAR OF OUR LORD CHRIST, 1726...FITTED TO THE FAMOUS TOWN OF BOSTON, WHERE THE NORTH POLE IS RAISED, AND THE SOUTH POLE IS DEPRESS’D EQUAL TO AN ANGLE OF 42 GR. 25 M AND A MERIDIAN 4 H. 44 M. WEST OF LONDON. By a Native of New-England. Boston: Printed and sold by B. Green, and sold at the booksellers shops, 1726 [i.e. 1725]. [16]pp. Dbd. Moderately age-toned. Edges worn and slightly chipped. Contemporary inscriptions on titlepage and pp.[10,11,16]. A good copy. An early 18th-century New England almanac by Nathan Bowen, who issued a series of almanacs published in Boston between 1721 and 1737. In addition to the calendar year, this New-England Diary, or, Almanack includes predictions for the movement of the sun and eclipses. The final page are the author’s observations on the movement of planets at important historical and biblical moments. EVANS 2611. DRAKE 3017. NAIP w022680. $1000. 31. Brackenridge, Hugh Henry: INCIDENTS OF THE INSURRECTION IN THE WESTERN PARTS OF PENNSYLVANIA, IN THE YEAR 1794. Philadelphia: John M’Culloch: 1795. Three parts bound in one volume. [2],[5]-124; [5]-84; [5]-154pp. plus [4]pp. of ads at rear for bookseller W. M’Culloch. Contemporary calf, gilt morocco label. Front hinge expertly repaired. Tear in upper outer corner of titlepage, with no loss of text. Some scattered foxing and staining. Very good. A basic history of the Whiskey Rebellion, in which Brackenridge, a west Pennsylvania jurist and political thinker, also explains his views on the insurrection. He had taken the confusing stance of opposing the tax but supporting the federal government, and in the process alienated the leaders of the Republican and Federalist factions, both of which he had supported in the past. Howes notes that the erratic pagination results from the printer having planned originally for a three volume work. HOWES B690, "aa." SABIN 7189. BRADFORD 500. NAIP w020522. EVANS 28332. ANB 3, pp.340-42. $2250. Superb Scenes in the West Indies 32. Bridgens, Richard: WEST INDIA SCENERY, WITH ILLUSTRATIONS OF NEGRO CHARACTER, THE PROCESS OF MAKING SUGAR, &c. FROM SKETCHES TAKEN DURING A VOYAGE TO, AND RESIDENCE OF SEVEN YEARS IN, THE ISLAND OF TRINIDAD. London: Printed by Wm. Davy, published for the Proprietor by Robert Jennings & Co., [nd, but one plate with imprint dated 1836]. Small format advertisement slip facing titlepage. Handcolored lithographic additional title by Bridgens, twenty-six lithographic plates (three handcolored, twenty by and after Bridgens, two by T.S. Cooper after Bridgens, one by G. Hawkins jnr. after Bridgens, one by Picken after Bridgens, two unsigned), printed by A. Ducôté (6), Dûcoté & Stephens (3), Louis Haghe (1) or Day & Haghe (16). Folio. Publisher’s blue morocco-grained cloth, titled "Bridgens’ / West India / Sketches" in gilt on upper cover, yellow endpapers, expertly rebacked to style with neat repairs to extremities. In modern dark blue morocco-backed cloth box, spine lettered in gilt, rebacked to style with neat repairs to extremities. Very rare album of views of Trinidad – no copy is listed as having sold at auction in the past thirty years. One of the rarest and most important of the early visual records of the West Indies: no examples are recorded by OCLC as being held by Caribbean institutional libraries. Individual prints from this album are occasionally encountered on the open market – generally with later coloring, as this work was only ever issued in the form described by Abbey at the published price of £1.10s. However, the complete work, as here, is extremely rare. Little is known of the career of Bridgens. According to the title he was resident in Trinidad for seven years, and also published a work on the antiquities of Sefton Church near Birmingham. The work begins with four plates of the sights encountered during the voyage to the West Indies: two handcolored plates of fish, and an uncolored view on board during part of the ceremony of "crossing the Tropic." The "sea-views" conclude with a very fine view for the Port of Spain, Trinidad, taken from the sea. The remaining plates are a mixture of pure topographical views: "St. Ann’s, the Governor’s Residence"; "View of the Pitch Lake"; a series of five images connected with the production of sugar; nine plates recording the everyday life of the black inhabitants; two sheets of character studies. The work finishes with four images of trees native to the area (including a final handcolored plate of plantains and bananas). Each plate is accompanied by a single leaf of letterpress text, generally comments by Bridgens on the image, but also including quotes from Robert Montgomery Martin’s History of the British Colonies (London, 1834-35), Henry Nelson Coleridge’s Six Months in the West Indies (London, 1826), and a number of other contemporary works. The work can be dated from these quotes, as well as the date on the imprint of the plate titled "Carting sugar. / Rose Hill the residence of Edward Jackson," and the fact that Day & Haghe are listed as "Lithrs to the King" (Queen Victoria came to the throne in 1837). ABBEY 680. OCLC 16785217. SABIN 7814. $42,500. 33. [Brooklyn]: SPOONER’S BROOKLYN DIRECTORY, FOR THE YEAR 1823. Brooklyn: Published by Alden Spooner, June 2, 1823. 57,[1]pp., including frontispiece map. 12mo. 19th-century three-quarter black morocco and marbled boards, original rear wrapper bound in. Boards rubbed, chipped at foot of spine. Map trimmed to the neat line and backed on paper. Titlepage repaired along gutter and upper outer corner, with repairs on verso as well (not interfering with contents information). Rear wrapper repaired along gutter, repair in center of sheet with small loss of advertising text. Ink ownership stamp on first page of text. Good. The second Brooklyn directory, preceded only by Spooner’s Brooklyn directory of the previous year. The map shows the borough bordered by the East River and the Navy Yard, and identifies the major thoroughfares. The directory lists the names and residences of all the "householders," often giving their profession as well. Also included is a description of Brooklyn, an abstract of the laws of the village and a list of its officers. There are also listings of the local churches and their leaders (including the African Methodist Church), the officers of the United States Navy Yard and the Kings County militia, and firemen. There is an extensive list of Long Island stages with fares, departure and arrival times listed, and advertisements for local merchants, including a printer and a binder. A scarce early Brooklyn directory. SPEAR, p.60. SABIN 8289. $1500. 34. Burr, David H.: A NEW UNIVERSAL ATLAS; COMPRISING SEPARATE MAPS OF ALL THE PRINCIPAL EMPIRES, KINGDOMS & STATES THROUGHOUT THE WORLD. AND FORMING A DISTINCT ATLAS OF THE UNITED STATES CAREFULLY COMPILED FROM THE BEST AUTHORITIES EXTANT BY DAVID H. BURR. New York: D.S. Stone, 1836. Engraved throughout, title-leaf, 1p. contents list, sixty-three handcolored engraved plates. Small folio. Expertly bound to style in dark blue half morocco over contemporary blue embossed cloth-covered boards, title panel blocked in gilt on upper cover, the flat spine divided into six compartments by single gilt fillets, lettered in gilt in the second compartment. Very good. A fine copy of the second edition of this important work from greatest early American cartographers. David H. Burr was one of the great American mapmakers of the 19th century. Born in Bridgeport, Connecticut, he began his career leading a road survey through the southern counties of New York for the purpose of building a highway. This led to his being given, in 1829, the responsibility of revising Simeon De Witt’s seminal New York State Map of 1804 (under De Witt’s direction) to account for the considerable changes that had occurred over the last generation. This and the Atlas of the State of New York he published in 1830 established Burr’s prominence in American cartography. The success of his state atlas persuaded him to aim at wider audience and publish a general atlas. However, Ristow states that Burr completed only eight of the sixty-three maps by 1832, when his involvement in the project was severely curtailed when he accepted the position of topographer for the United States Post Office Department. His maps were engraved by Thomas Illman and Edward Pillbrow and they took over the responsibility for finishing the work, although it is probable that Burr retained some sort of editorial roll, and he was probably able to make use of his new position which gave him access to geographical material sent in from postmasters throughout the land. The present work was first published by D.S. Stone of New York City, under the title of A New Universal Atlas in 1835. The present second edition appeared the following year. RUMSEY 2849. PHILLIPS ATLASES 1379a (1835 ed). RISTOW, p.106 (1835 ed). $17,500. |
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