MOUNTAINEERING

[ Le Comité de Montagnards d'Ecosse. ] Manuscript 'Chopy' [Copy] of communication in French to 'Le Premier Gentilhomme de la Chambre du Roi', regarding the presentation of a volume of Ossian's poems 'en langue celtique' to the King of France.

Author: 
[ Comité de Montagnards d'Ecosse, 1815 [ Committee of the Mountaineers of Scotland; ]; nineteenth century Scottish mountain climbing ]
Publication details: 
'Paris le 27 December 1815'.
£320.00

1p., 8vo. Headed 'Copy' and with a Britannia watermark implying an official origin. On aged and worn paper with chipping and loss at head and tail. Reads: 'Monsieur | Le Comité de Montagnards d'Ecosse ayant deputé My Lord , Les Colls. Macdonall et Mackenham et Mr James Hamilton pour faire l'hommage a Sa M. Le Roi de France d'un exemplaire original des Poesies d'Ossian en langue celtique L'Ambassadeur d'Angleterre profitte de l'intervention de Mr. Le Premier Gentilhomme de la Chambre pour faire connaitre cette intention a Sa Majesté et prier S. Exce.

[ Mountaineering ] Victorian album, containing 82 photographs, including several large-scale images of mountaineering in Switzerland, and of the 1900 Oberammergau Passion Play.

Author: 
[Victorian mountaineering in Switzerland; Oberammergau; Tonneson Sisters of Chicago]
Publication details: 
[American?] Circa 1900.
£180.00

Album, in maroon cloth and fake leather half-binding, containing 24 leaves of thick paper (dimensions 36 x 26.5 cm). Small stamp on front paste-down: 'D.A.I. LONDON | No. 20[2]' (last digit added in manuscript). The binding is heavily-worn, with spine lacking, and the pages are somewhat discoloured with age, but the 82 photographs are in good condition, with four creased before insertion into the album, and one with slight discoloration. One photograph has been removed. Can be dated from picture of the 'Kreuzigung.

Autograph Note Signed "William T. Palmer", The Fell & Rock Climbing Club, to a "Mr Smith", about the 'Journal'.

Author: 
William T. Palmer, Editor of the Journal of The Fell & Rock Climbing Club of the English Lake District
Publication details: 
[Printed heading, "The Fell & Rock Climbing Club ", etc., Beechwood, Kendal, 22 Dec. 1916.
£56.00

One pager, fold marks, minor defects not affecting text. "Dear Mr. Smith, | The 'Journal' is in preparation, but will be greatly delayed this year. I will notify you later. | Yours faithfully, | William T. Palmer | Editor".

Autograph Letter Signed ('James Bryce') from James Bryce, 1st Viscount Bryce, former President of the Alpine Club, to E. W. Hallifax, endorsing 'a protest [...] raised against the ruin wrought in Switzerland by the construction of tourist railways'.

Author: 
James Bryce (1838-1922), 1st Viscount Bryce, British Liberal politician and author, President of the Alpine Club, London, 1899-1901 [E. W. Hallifax, master, Mill Hill School]
Autograph Letter Signed ('James Bryce') from James Bryce
Publication details: 
20 November 1905; on letterhead of Hindleap, Forest Row, Sussex.
£135.00
Autograph Letter Signed ('James Bryce') from James Bryce

12mo, 4 pp. 41 lines. Text clear and complete. Fair, on aged paper, with slight discoloration to edges. 'It was high time that in England, whence so many mountain climbers and tourists go to the Alps, a protest should be raised against the ruin wrought in Switzerland by the construction of tourist railways up the slopes of the mountains'. Deplores the 'irretrievable harm' already done to 'some of the noblest landscapes in the world, [...] easily accessible from the populous cities of Central and Western Europe, such as those on the shores of the Lake of Lucerne'.

Autograph Manuscript laying out requisites for voyage (to Iceland?). Manuscript, in another hand, for Alpine voyage. Long itemised receipt in German by A. Petersen.

Author: 
Rev. Charles William Shepherd of Trotterscliffe, of Trinity College, Cambridge ornithologist and traveller; A. Petersen [Iceland; Switzerland; Alpine]
Publication details: 
[1860s?]
£400.00

Item One: 12mo, 4 pp. On aged and foxed paper with slight wear causing loss to a couple of words of text. On two folded 4to leaves, with two pages written by Shepherd in German on the reverse. The list is undated, and the intended location is not named, but the voyage is a major one. Divided into sections including 'Saddles &c', 'Guns & Rods', 'Books' (beginning with 'Shakespeare - Ingoldby - Golden Treasure'), 'Food &c. Fortnum & Mason' (including two gallons of brandy and two quarts of whiskey).

Unpublished manuscript poem, titled 'The lament of a gyp', humourously recounting the 'troubles of a Cambridge man, a careful hardworked gyp' on the disappearance of Bushell on a mountaineering trip.

Author: 
[William Done Bushell (1838-1917) of St John's College, Cambridge University; later assistant master and honorary chaplain at Harrow School; Victorian mountaineering
Publication details: 
Undated (around 1861).
£65.00

From Bushell's own collection, and possibly in his hand. On both sides of a piece of light-blue paper, 27 x 22 cm. Text clear and complete. Fair, on aged paper, with four labels from previous mounting (one with small closed tear) on the reverse. A delightful item, casting light on the social history of Victorian Cambridge. Thirty-six lines in couplets. Written from the point of view of Bushell's 'gyp' (college servant). Begins 'Oh! listen to me now all ye who give anyone the slip.

Autograph Letter Signed ('J. Cor<dier>'), 'A Monsieur <Jukeur?> opticien - rue de Conde Paris'.

Author: 
Joseph Cordier (1775-1849), French engineer, in charge of work on the Simplon Pass in 1800
Publication details: 
Without date or place [Paris].
£45.00

12mo bifolium: 1 p. 11 lines of text. Address and docketing on second leaf. Good, but with 1 cm hole in first leaf of bifolium, possibly caused by breaking open of blue wafer, which still adheres. Hole causing loss to two words, including latter part of signature. Asks the recipient 'de remettre a Mr. Pousin conducteur des ponts et chaussees, un double demi metre en Cuivre et un metre en cuivre avec quatre petites roulettes pointilles'. He will pay for the order in a few days time.

"Notes of a Walking Tour with my Twin Brother Ernest 27 July 1891"

Author: 
[ MOUNTAINEERING ] Cecil C. Baker, twin brother of Ernest Baker, presumably Ernest A. Baker, author of books on the Highlands, climbing, etc.
Publication details: 
[1891]
£450.00

Notebook, soft-covered, c.90pp., 12mo,covers almost detached, contents good. Contents as follows: Table columnised, 5pp., giving details of Dates, Proposed Itinerary, Result; List of things taken "Self" and "Ernest" from clothes to toothbrush to Baedeker to bovril malt (with comments on whether worn, lost, etc.).

Manuscript Poem in his hand and signed by him on page detached from a Birthday Book.

Author: 
Brian Rhys.
Publication details: 
No date.
£80.00

Poet and mountaineer son of Ernest and Grace Rhys. One page, 4to, good condition, suitable for framing, Poem, two stanzas, 16 lines, title at end "[On attempting Snowdon Aug . 09]", starting "When first afar I saw thy mighty height . . . fading in beauty 'fore thy gifted sight. / But when thy foot, O Searcher into Heav'n! . . . "Await," I heard, "thy better wiser year."

Signature only

Author: 
W.H. Murray Walton
Publication details: 
no date
£75.00

Explorer in Japan. Good signature on pasaper, 3 x 1" approc. With: additional pencil note "Distinguished explorer in Japan made first ascents of many mountains" ascribed on the paper on which the signature is laid sown to "Dr [Howard] Somervell of Mt Everest Expedition" (1953 expedition, Somervelld.1975).

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