Book Trade History

One page, 4to, good condition. He gives belated thanks for writing to them "and sending us your contribution for our catalogue." They delayed so that thanks would accompany a copy of the catalogue. They have sent the catalogue under separate cover and "hope you will find it enertaining. Too, we hope that you will find our comments on your work not unworthy of your talents." See Donald C. Dickinson, "Dictionary, for discussion of the "rambunctious" bookseller, including his interaction with major literary figures.

One page, 7 x 4.5", good condition. Annual Register

One page, on paper roughly seven inches by eight wide. Good, on lightly creased paper. Stamped with date. He thanks his correspondent for 'the typed list'. Headed 'Memorandum from | GEORGE GREGORY, Book Merchant, Library Buyer and Exporter, | The Imperial Book Store, | 5 and 5a ARGYLE STREET, BATH. | Out-of-Print and Rare, or Out-of-the-Way Books sought for and reported promptly, with option of purchase. Send me your List of Wants. | Licensed Valuer. Stock well classified in Thirty Rooms. Libraries Purchased. | Bankers: UNION OF LONDON & SMITHS BANK, LTD., BATH.

Total three pages, various formats, minor defects. Items include stationery, pens, plays, poetry, periodicals, history

One page, c.6 x 7", good condition. He is billed for "State Trials" and the "Political Register".

ADD "York House" to BBTI. And "Publisher. And Worcester bookseller. Four pages, minor defects, text complete and clear. He requests his account for "Stationery & Consitutional Tracts" and asks how much "it would cost to purchase the whole of the Tracts published by you from the commencement of the Debates of the momentous Reform Question to the present hour, to place in one's Library for the inspection of posterity." He rails agaoinst the "wicked and unprincipled Ministry and the King who is "regardless of the complicate interests of this once great Empire-".

Dimensions of paper roughly twelve inches by ten; dimensions of print roughly nine and a half inches by seven and a half. A good clear impression, on aged, creased paper, of a striking illustration showing a portly and sleek Asperne, beautifully turned out in Freemason's robes and paraphernalia, holding a leather-bound book, and seated in an ornately carved wooden chair with the Freemasons' eye in a triangle at its head. Captioned 'Mr James Asperne | BOOKSELLER, CORNHILL, | Past Master of the FOUNDATION LODGE NO. 96 And St. Peter's No.. 249 | P.S.D. of the LODGE of Antiquity No.

Good clean image of a seventeenth-century engraving, from an earlier idealised portrait of the putative 'father of printing'. It is of irregular shape, the background having been carefully cut away. Neatly mounted on piece of beige paper, illustrated with a brown pseudo-frame with decorative book devices in the four corners. Half-length portrait of a bearded Gutenberg in fur-lined hat and coat, with composing stick in left hand and stylus in right. Dimensions roughly eight and a quarter inches by seven wide. Engraved beneath is 'P Stent Excudit: R Gaywood fecit'.

4to, good condition. Dobell describes a defective "tract" ("A Precious Apple") and speculates on its authorship (Lady Eleanor Douglas). He will send it to be examined. Another hand (presumably Windle) has added pencil notes on the reference works which do not list the item and speculating "probably part of a larger work with different title."

Periodical, 4to, separate issues, good condition though the paper for earlier numbers has aged (cheap). It contains advertisments and articles relating to the antiquarian and secondhand book trade, with columns of "Books Wanted".

Invoices, one page each, 4to, good condition. Receipts of conventional size, both signed "R. Toley" [not in BBTI]. The subjects are subscruiption editions of Lewis's Topographical Dictionaries of England and Wales (1845), Scotland and Ireland (1847), with prices, including "colouring Atlas[es]".

One page, c.8 x 6", minor defects, mainly good condition. 17s 6d received in payment of an invoice for "Philosophical Transactions" for 1814.

Pamphlet, 8pp., 12mo, blank wraps except inside back wrap ("Reprinted from The Nation / 50 Copies"), minor damage at one staple, mainly good. Enclosed: printed anonymous poem entitled "It Takes a Book", one page (verso blank), 12mo, the theme of which is that you can trust a friend to return anything except a book. Not in Beverly Chew. Essays and verses about books. New York: D. B. Updike, 1926)

Dimensions roughly six inches by three and a half. Wormed (but only affecting two letters of text) on aged paper. One page, blank reverse. Wood cut at head, roughly one and a quarter inches square, illustrating a leather-bound book with clasps. Thirty-three lines of text, beginning 'At the Bible in Newgate-street, over against the Blue-Coat Hospital Gate.

One page, c.16 x 6.5", good condition. The list includes history including military, geology, theology and other subjects. A list of volumes bound is appended. Note:A "Lewis Smith", wholesale stationers, printers and publishers, bookbinder and circulating library , occupied 50 Union Street, 1842+ No mention of a "John Smith" (SBTI).

On thin laid paper roughly two and three-quarter inches by three and three-quarter inches wide. Good clean image, on aged paper with slight wear in bottom left-hand corner. Enclosed by a border. Reads, in a variety of hands, 'Thomas Payne | BOOKSELLER, | Near the South Sea House | BISHOPSGATE-STREET | LONDON. | Sells all Sorts of Stationary [sic] Wares.' According to BBTI the Thomas Payne who was at this address in 1750 may possibly be the eminent bookseller Thomas Payne I (1719-99) of the Mews Gate.

The collection as a whole is in good condition, although lightly creased in places and somewhat dusty and aged. All items have unobtrusive pinholes, and Item Seven has fraying and closed tears to extremities. An interesting correspondence casting light on publishing practices at the turn of the nineteenth century. ITEMS ONE TO FIVE: 12mo letters from Lucas's solicitors Field, Roscoe & Co., each on the firm's letterhead, to the 'Receiver and Manager appointed to carry on [Richards'] business', H. C. K. Stileman, dated 9, 11, 18 and 21 March, and 1 April 1905.

Stapled and unbound. Octavo: four leaves (eight unpaginated pages). On aged and lightly spotted paper. Vignette on title page. Includes list of plates and 'Specimen Entry' of pages 51-3. Verso of last leaf headed 'from CONSTABLE'S BIBLIOGRAPHICAL LIST', comprising 'THE CARTER-POLLARD DISCLOSURES', 'BIBLIOGRAPHIA SERIES' and 'DORMY HOUSE CATALOGUES'.

Two pages, c7.5 x 19", folded, good condition. It comprises more than 80 tiles, some entries are multiple, mainly theological, but other subjects include history, memoirs, and poetry. Brief details of binding work given, and prices, total £4.1.6. Philip also charges for "advertising Scott's Bible" in the "banner" and "Journal". The list is substantial enough to represent a private library.

[24]pp., 12mo, unbound (formerly bound into a book?), crude repair to spine, partly detached leaves, foxing, text clear and complete. Subjects; Voyages, Travels, Geography, and Topography; Miscellaneous; Divinity; Medicine, Surgery and Chemistry; Novels, Romances, etc.; Education (most substantial section); Books to be published. Note: I have yet to trace another copy but the major American libraries have microform copies, as does CUL, the only holding library listed on COPAC.

One page, 8vo, minor damage and staining. The invoice is to the account of [J?] Handscomb but the receipt is signed by "E. Hanscomb" identifiable with Eb Handscomb perhaps in BBTI though the dates are a problem. Apparently unrelated figures in pencil on reverse.

Two pages, 8vo, fold marks but good condition. He apologises for not returning a book he had borrowed from the Baron ("L'almanack Medical"). He had taken it to the country "pour en lire quelques passages a mon frere" and forgot to bring it back. He plans the eventual return. "L'etat de la sante de mon frere ne s'ameliore que peu et bien lentement - Il reviendra de la campagne probrablement avec moi mardi prochaine." Heconcludes with politenesses at length.

Arranging the three in what appears to be chronological order, the first (good, roughly four inches by two and three-quarters wide) has 'Josiah C. Wedgwood' in copperplate beneath a straightforward Victorian armorial design, with shield, coronet and motto 'OBSTANTIA DISCINDO'. The second (three and a half inches by three wide) dates from after Wedgwood's election as a Member of Parliament in 1906, having 'EX-LIBRIS JOSIAH C. WEDGWOOD, M.P.' on a scroll beneath a more modern armorial design, with helmet and leaves. It has slight damage to the bottom right-hand corner.

On piece of paper roughly three and a half inches by three wide. Good, lightly aged with a little creasing to one corner. Pleasant armorial design within floral arrangement. Motto 'VIGILANS' on scroll above 'Sir Richard Burton' in copperplate at foot. Indentation of plate around edge.

Quarto, twelve pages. Unbound. In original grey printed wraps, with facsimile portrait of Caxton laid down on front cover as part of design. Stitched. Lightly aged and worn, and a little loose. A handsome production, with five full-page facsimiles of pages from the book, and three other illustrations (including duplicate of that on front wrap). Large plate of charcoal drawing, captioned 'A view of the facade of 16 & 17 Pall Mall as seen from the Athenaeum', laid down inside back wrap.

Chairman of Unwin Brothers (born 1870). One page, quarto. Good, but discoloured and lightly creased, and with staple stain at head. Docketed and bearing the Society's stamp. He is sorry not to have answered sooner, but 'some very important business has engaged my attention during the last few days with the result that I put your letter into my private drawer without acknowledging it.

Printing family (famille des imprimeirs) and eminent collector. One page, 4to, chipped with small loss of text., torn along a fold mark, fragile. The printed form is headed as above with further details of the Society ("Maison de Retraite et de Sante en faveur des Artistes, des Hommes de Lettres et de Science") Firmin Didot has signed a declaration ("Adhesion aux Statuts") that he will adhere to the "Statuts de la dite Societe . . .

Director of the Imprimerie Royale, Paris, and later met his end on an "echafaud revolutionnaire" (1794). One page, 8vo, good condiiton "M. Anisson Duperon, Directeur de l'Imprimerie Royale, a l'honneur de presenter son respect a Monsieur le President de l'Assemblee Nationale"; il a celui de les prevenir qu'en vertu du Decret de l'Assemblee il a fait remettre au M. Baudouin son [to the Assemblee] Imprimeur Douze cents Soixante Exemplaires de cinq nouvelles Lois, dont il [joint..?] Deux Exempls de chacune pour la disposition particulaiere de Monsieur le President."

Printer, editor, classicist, and publisher. Three pages, 8vo, minor damage but text clear and complete. "The Virgil [pubd. 1819 re.BLC] was I assure you sent thro Baldwins at the time it was published but the first 10 Nos are not mine & therefore I have no choice in giving away a copy - I forward you a copy of early Poems [?Sanderson, "Poems chiefly sacred original and translated"] - they are mine, & not my Fathers. I know nothing of the prose trans[latio]n of Faust.

One page, 4to, chipped with small loss of text, paper fragile. Text as follows: Monsieur Anselin, Paris, Je vous prie de m'expedier aussitot [underlined] par l'entremise de Mr Ren[loss of text] les livres suivants, je vous recommande surtout les petits brochures vieux dont je suis tres presse." There follows a list of 22 titles, all military (e.g "Dictionnaire d'artillerie", "Manoeuvres de chevres & de forces 1821", etc.). Usually one copy required, but he requires 3 of one book (the Dictionnaire) and 2 of its supplement.