Manuscripts

[Mary L. Armitt, polymath] MANUSCRIPT: Draft of the Index (ONLY) to her book, The Church of Grasmere: a history, published posthumously..

Author: 
Mary L. Armitt [Mary Louisa Armitt (1851 -1911), polymath, teacher, writer, ornithologist and philanthropist, and founder of the Armitt Library, Ambleside.]
Grasmere
Publication details: 
Book published in Kendal, 1912. See scan of sample page.
£380.00
Grasmere

Sixteen pages (two are half pages), fol., some foxing, but text clear. The text is in a large hand, with additions and occasional corrections for example, the word out is written beside 'Eighteen, the see Sidesmen', itself crossed out.

[Antonia Fraser; International P.E.N.] Typed Agenda, heavily doodled by Lady Fraser, for a Meeting of the Executive Committee of the English Centre of International P.E.N.

Author: 
[Antonia Fraser] Antonia Fraser [Lady Antonia Margaret Caroline Fraser (née Pakenham; born 27 August 1932), author of history, novels, biographies and detective fiction]
Antonia
Publication details: 
To be held at Dilke Street at 5.00 P.M. on Wednesday, 29th June 1983.
£125.00
Antonia

One page, sm. folio, fold marks, very small closed tears, basically good condition. The Agenda (typescript) includes: Apologies; Minutes of the Last Meeting, Matters Arising [...]; Date of next meeting; Candidates; Report of Meeting of Assembly of Delegates in Venice; Caracas Conference; Honorary Members in Prison; Death of Bela Menczer [...]; Any Other Business. Lady Fraser has put a tick or cross beside each item except Any Other Business.

[M.E. Grant Duff; India] Appointment Certificate Signed M E Grant Duff.

Author: 
Sir Mountstuart Elphinstone Grant Duff (1829 – 1906), Scottish politician, administrator and author. Sometime Under-Secretary of State for India.
Grant Duff
Publication details: 
Dated 8 July 1872.
£80.00
Grant Duff

One page, 4to, part printed, part manuscript, minor damage on fold marks, loss of small part of the word is, small closed tear, some weakness on fold marks. See Image. Text headed Ecclesiastical Establishment | No.

[Arabic Calligraphy; handwritten] The Creed of Sheikh al-Dardiri in Arabic.

Author: 
[Arabic Calligraphy; Mohamed Ahmed Ibin Alhaj Mohamed Ahmed Abu Qaseesah, calligrapher] Sheikh al-Dardiri
Arabic
al-dardiri
Publication details: 
[My translator says the year 1797 appears in the script.]
£450.00
Arabic
al-dardiri

I am obliged to a multi-lingual friend for the information I give. Eight pages, pages 7/8 blank, not paginated,12mo, unbound, stains on title and its verso not affecting text. See images. Titled This is the creed of sheikh al-Dardiri. Al-Dardiri was born in 1715 AD in Asyoot in Egypt. He's one of the imams of the Sunni Islam of Maliki school of thought. This document was written by Mohamed Ahmed Ibin Alhaj Mohamed Ahmed Abu Qaseesah in 1797. It discusses the twenty attributes in Sunni Islam that are obligatory for God Almighty, according to Al-Dardiri.

[Eliza Conder, poet and abolitionist] Holograph Poem with quotation from St Mark's Gospel.

Author: 
Eliza Conder, poet and abolitionist, wife of Josiah Conder, editor, abolitionist, well-connected to Romantic authors of his day
Conder
Publication details: 
Watermark 1827.
£180.00
Conder

One page, folio, signs of extraction from album (left margin has residue of separation), good condition, in her calligraphic writing, good condition. She begins by quoting St Mark's Gospel, Verily I say unto you, wheresoever this gospel shall be preached throughout the whole world, this also that she hath done shall be spoken of, for a memorial fo her.

[Vellum Deed] Indenture between Totnes Corporation to Daniel Marriott, vintner ...18 Sept.[1719]. Signed by Mayor and Councillors. WITH town seal in good condition. See images.

Author: 
[Totnes; Mayor; Corporation] See images.
Totnes
Totnes2
Publication details: 
18 Sept. 1719
£350.00
Totnes
Totnes2

Vellum Deed, c.70 x 55cm, folded as usual, signs of age but text clear and complete, with town seal with small cracks but intact. The reverse contains a memorandum signed by the Mayor and his Burgesses: Totnes Guildhall viiith Sept.

[Charles Pratt; America; Plantations] Section only of MS. Document (Secretarial text) Signed C. Pratt, memorialist as Attorney-General, concerning the Commissioners of Prizes and Plantations in America

Author: 
Charles Pratt, 1st Earl Camden (1714-1794) judge and politician.
Camden
Camden1
Publication details: 
Lincolns Inn Fields, 3 Dec. 1759.
£280.00
Camden
Camden1

Surviving section 20 x 10cm, closed tears 2.5cm, edges sl. ragged, foxing but text fully legible. See images.

[Golfers of the 30s] Signatures of Johnny Bulla (American), C.A. Whitcomb (English), Jimmy Adams (Scottish) and four others (not deciphered but see image).

Author: 
Golfers of the 30s.
Golfers
Publication details: 
Prob. 1930s.
£65.00
Golfers

Leaf removed from autograph album, 13.5 x 11cm, one rough edge (from removal), pencilled, minor stain, good condition.

[Valentín Gómez Farías; Mexico] Signature with final flourish only. See image.

Author: 
Valentin Gomez Farias [(1781 – 1858), President of Mexico twice.].
Mexico
Publication details: 
No place or date.
£350.00
Mexico

Piece of paper 9 x 2.5cm, laid down on slightly larger card, with docketing President 1835, sl. grubby but clear and bold. Notes (from Wikipedia): A. President of Mexico during two main periods: one in the early 1830s and one in the late 1840s, when he served as president during the Mexican-American War. In his first term, he enacted significant liberal reforms that were aimed at undermining the power of the Roman Catholic Church and the army in Mexico ; The Mexican Cession consisted of present-day U.S.

[Domhnall MacEacharn; Gaelic Poet] Autograph Lines in Gaelic signed 'Domhnall MacEacharn'.

Author: 
Domhnall MacEacharn [Donald MacKechnie]
Gaelic
Publication details: 
No place or date.
£56.00
Gaelic

Paper, 11 x 7cm, probably from an album (another signature on reverse (Florence Steel)), laid down on larger piece of paper, on the dingy side but text clear and apparently complete. Docketed Donald MacKechnie | Gaelic Poet.

[Bishop Alexander Cameron and others; Manuscript] Heritable Bond signed on every page by Bishop Alexander Cameron, Alexander Badenoch, Alexander Dick (accountant), George Brown (lawyer), James Francis Kyle (became RC Bishop in 1827)

Author: 
Dr Alexander Cameron [(1747–1828), Roman Catholic bishop who served as the Vicar Apostolic of the Lowland District, Scotland]., and Others
Edinburgh
Publication details: 
Edinburgh, 1814
£120.00
Edinburgh

MS.11 pages, folio, bound with string, last page dusted and grubby, mainly good condition. All pages have the five signatures. Image of first page available.

[Henry Mackenzie, Scottish Novelist] Autograph Signature Henry Mackenzie 1824 only. With the relevant page (Mackenzie entry) from a Biographical dictionary

Author: 
Henry Mackenzie (1745 – 1831), Scottish lawyer, novelist and writer.
Mackenzie
Publication details: 
[1824]
£150.00
Mackenzie

Two 12mo pages, extracted from Public Characters of All Nations: Consisting of Biographical accounts of nearly three thousand eminent contemporaries, alphabetically arranged (1823), later published as A New Biographical Dictionary, of 3000 contemporary public characters, British and foreign, of all ranks and professions (1825).LEAF THE FIRST: endpaper, foxed, edges chipped, with the clear signature Henry Mackenzie | 1824 | on recto; LEAF THE SECOND: printed potted biography of Henry Mackenzie (pp.671-2 of book), with MS additions and corrections (for example, correction of his date of birt

[Alexander McKee; post-war Germany] Spearmen of the North. A Record of Public History and Private Opinion in Germany 1945-1954, typescript

Author: 
Alexander McKee [Alexander Paul Charrier McKee (1918 – 1992), journalist, military historian, and diver.]
Publication details: 
Unpublished.
£550.00

60pp., 4to, crude card binding, damp-stained and worn at spine, typescript aged, damp-stained but clear. Sub-title: A Record of Public History and Private Opinion in Germany 1945-1954 | and an attempt at analysis of the German character as it appeared to a soldier of the British Army of the Rhine.

[R.D. Laing] Substantial Typed Letter Signed Alec Jenner [Professor F.A. Jenner] to Dr. Laing [R.D. Laing] hoping to have further conversations and discussing a case of schizophrenia at length. WITH: Notes in Laing's hand.

Author: 
Professor F.A. Jenner [R.D. Laing (Ronald David Laing, Scottish psychiatrist who wrote extensively on mental illness)]
Laing
Publication details: 
[Headed] The University of Sheffield, Department of Psychiatry, The Hallamshire Hospital, Glossop Road, Sheffield, S10 2JF, 9 May 1980
£250.00
Laing

Jenner Typed Letter Signed: Two pages, fol., fold marks, small closed tears on folds, ow good condition. He (and his team) would appreciate Laing's coming to dinner since they are starting to think about schizophrenia in something like the way you have seen it for a long time [...] In particular we are in the middle of what might be called humanistic studies of a mere handful of to us extremely interesting 'schizophrenic' persons.

[E.M. Almedingen, writer] A Substantial Collection of Manuscript and Typed Material from her Papers

Author: 
E. M. Almedingen (born Marta Aleksandrovna Almedingen, also known as Martha Edith Almedingen or von Almedingen; 1898 – 1971), British novelist, biographer, children's author, poet, of Russian origin.
Publication details: 
C.1943-1972
£1,500.00

1. Untitled Typescript. Author Unknown. An unpublished biography of E.M. Almedingen, 123pp., sm. folio, in black lever arch file, very good condition, a scattering of MS. corrections and additions.2. Seven mainly bulging Notebooks and Scrapbooks, (All my own), the Notebooks numbered I, II & III, 1943 and 1953, and the Scrapbooks numbered I, II, IV & V. (1949 and 1952 (2)).

[ Stanley Spencer ] Manuscript (Holograph) entitled Stanley Spencer.

Author: 
[ Stanley Spencer ] Daphne Charlton, artist and woman in Stanley Spencer's Life.
Spencer
Spencer 2
Publication details: 
Dated 27 May 1962.
£2,000.00
Spencer
Spencer 2

14 pages, 4to, large handwriting (lower case letters 5mm), punch-holes, two of four damaged. The manuscript has elisions, substitutions and additions by the author, indicating a lot of thinking, perhaps a desire to use a long word rather than a short. She attempts to analyse Spencer's (artistic) character and their relationship (including sexual). I have attached scans of two pages, 5 and 14 (the final page) to illustrate her subjects and re-thinking (elisions etc).

[ Julius Beerbohm, traveller and poet, half-brother of Max Beerbohm ] Manuscript Poem Signed J Beerbohm (calligraphically). See image.

Author: 
Julius Beerbohm [ Julius Beerbohm (1854 – 1906), Victorian travel-writer, engineer, explorer and poet.]
beerbohm
Publication details: 
No place, but dated by him 9 Sept. 90.
£220.00
beerbohm

32 line poem, cr.8vo, in a frame of an album page (detached), 4to, one ragged edge, celebrating summer, commencing: Is it not well, when the long day is over, | That brimmed with fulness of the summer time-| - Joy of wild bees that roam the the scented clover; [....] See image for full text. Verso: Sentiment by obscure German.

[Manuscript; Revenue; Customs & Excise ]] The Gross and Net Produce of all the Branches of the Revenue ...[full title below].

Author: 
[Her Majesty's Customs, 1710-1735]
Publication details: 
1710-1735
£450.00

[Full title] The Gross and Net Produce of all the Branches of the Revenue under the Management of the Commissioners of His Majesty's Customs in England. Together with an Adjustment of the Net Produce with the Payments into the Exchequer Annually from Christmas 1710. To which are prefixed the underwritten Acco[unts] viz[t] : 1. The Yearly Payments into the Receipt of Exchequer on all the several Branches of the Customs from Michaelmas 1679 to Christmas 1710. 2. The Payments into the Exchequer for prohibited uncustomed and forfeited goods Annually from Christmas 1701. 3.

[ Manuscript; auction ] Roup Roll of the Farm Stocking Household Furniture etc. sold at Findon 13 Nov. 1820.

Author: 
[ Findon, Aberdeenshire ]
Roup Roll
Publication details: 
[ Findon, Aberdeenshire, 13 November 1820
£80.00
Roup Roll

Five-page list of items, fold marks, some dusting, fair condition. Lots, Buyers and Prices (see image). From Scythe and rake to horses and potatoes.

[ Mrs Gore; 'silver fork' novels ] One leaf of the holograph manuscript of Sketches of English Character, with authorial corrections and additions.

Author: 
Mrs Gore [ Catherine Grace Frances Gore (née Moody, 1798–1861), 'silver fork' novelist and dramatist ]
Publication details: 
Book first published, 1846 in two volumes.
£300.00

Substantial part of pp. 226-7, in the section The Optimist and the Pessimist (vol.II, 1846). Two pages, 4to (19 x 20cm), crumpled, trimmed untidily, with several tears, many repaired as best they could.

[ Fanny Garrison; suffrage; black rights ] Autograph Poem signed Fannie Garrison with autograph verse signed by Francis Jackson] Garrison

Author: 
Fanny Garrison [Helen Frances “Fanny” Garrison Villard (1844–1928), American women's suffrage campaigner, pacifist, co-founder of National Association for the Advancement of Colored People].
Garrison
Publication details: 
{Fannie's verse} Boston, Oct.21, 1860; {Francis Jackson's verse} Boston, Oct.23, 1860.
£500.00
Garrison

One page, 12mo, very good condition. Text, a verse from Gerald Massey's To-Day and To-Morrow (see note below) as follows: [Fanny's quotation marks] Though hearts brood o'er the past, our eyes | With smiling features glisten, | For, lo! our day bursts up the skies! | Lean out your souls and listen! | The world rolls Freedom's radiant way, | And ripens with her sorrows; | Keep heart! who bears the cross to-day, | Shall wear the crown tomorrow. | Fannie Garrison. | Boston, Oct.21st, 1860 | [ 'Mrs Henry villard' in another hand ] || Why ask a name?

[ Francis Galton; Printed ] Questionnaire with introductory Letter from H.W. Crosskey, President of the Birmingham Philosophical Society, all printed., with signature of Francis Galton and his response in manuscript. also signed and dated.

Author: 
H.W.Crosskey, geologist [ Francis Galton, 'Victorian statistician, progressive, polymath, sociologist, psychologist, anthropologist, eugenicist, inventor, meteorologist, proto-geneticist'}
Publication details: 
July 8th, 1886. Manuscript response dated 12 July 1886.
£750.00

Printed Letter and Questionnaire from the Birmingham Philosophical Society, 'Translation of Scientific Memoirs' Committee, 4pp., 4to, bifolium, some sunning and marking, good condition. Printed Letter, p.[1], from H.W. Crosskey, explaining what the questionnaire is for (Action for the Translation and Publication of Foreign Scientific Memoirs to be put to the attention of the British Association). The questionnaire comprises four questions, with a final section headed Remarks.

Keywords:

[ T.H. Huxley; Printed ] Questionnaire from the Birmingham Philosophical Society, printed., with Huxley's responses to questions in manuscript and with signature Thomas H. Huxley.

Author: 
Thomas H. Huxley, biologist [ T.H. Huxley; H.W.Crosskey, geologist ]
Publication details: 
July 24th, 1886.
£350.00

In a difficult hand, with some autograph corrections.. Questionnaire from the Birmingham Philosophical Society, 'Translation of Scientific Memoirs' Committee, 2pp., 4to, detached from the printed, explanatory letter from H.W. Crosskey (not present), some sunning, chipping (loss of one letter) and marking, fair condition. The absent Printed Letter, p.[1], from H.W. Crosskey, had explained what the questionnaire is for (Action for the Translation and Publication of Foreign Scientific Memoirs to be put to the attention of the British Association).

[ J. Cuming Walters, sometime editor of the Manchester City News; Capital Punishment ] Holograph Manuscript Article on Capital Punishment with some printed ephemera from his archive on the same subject.

Author: 
J. Cuming Walters, sometime editor of the Manchester City News [Capital Punishment ]
Publication details: 
[c.1923]
£180.00

Manuscript, [21]pp., 8vo, edge of p.[1] dusted, ow all good condition, Heavily worked on discussion of the issue of Capital Punishment, a subject on wh[ich] I feel so deeply, so strongly, so earnestly, that I dare not trust myself to speak upon it without constraint.

[ Oscar Wilde; Typescript ] The Stringed Lute. A Play Based on the life of OSCAR WILDE [Playwright's own copy]. WITH Typed Letter Signed P. Macqueen discussing play with W. MacQueen-Pope, theatre historian, revealing pseudonym

Author: 
John Furnell [pseud. Phyllis Macqueen], playwright [Oscar Wilde]
Publication details: 
n.d., (before published version, 1955); Typed Letter Signed dated 23 Jan. 1956.
£480.00

[170]pp., 4to, title label, brown wraps, stabbed, sl. wrinkled edges, sl. aged, typed ownership sticker back cover, John Furnell, 'Woodend', 24 Chessel Avenue, Boscombe, Bournemouth, Hants. Final page (additional , p.[170]) includes a list of Author's suggestions for settings. With a sprinkling of corrections and additions.Opposite p.38 (beginning of Act II set in the Foyer of the St James's Theatre, an illustration from a Max Beerbohm book (Some Persons of the Nineties), with names from Wilde to Mallarme, 10 names presumably in Furnell's hand.

[Angna Enters, American dancer, painter, author.] Sketch of dance costume in pencil and watercolour, captioned 'Fleur du Mal (Proust Sequence)', signed 'Angna Enters '56'. In envelope addressed by her to theatre historian W. J. MacQueen-Pope.

Author: 
Angna Enters [Anita Enters] (1907-1989), American painter, writer, dancer and mime, partner of Michio Ito, wife of Louis Kalonyme [Louis Kantor] [W. J. MacQueen-Pope, theatre historian]
Angr
Publication details: 
Signed and dated to 1957. Envelope with London postmark dated 18 January 1957 and her embossed address: 35 West 57th Street, New York.
£200.00
Angr

Enters exhibited her artistic work - including many sketches of her own costume designs - widely in the United States and Europe, and her work is held by several museums, including the Metropolitan Museum of Art in New York. The present item is an attractive impressionistic sketch, in grey and black pencil, with watercolour wash in pink, light red and grey, showing a dancer with arms outstretched and heavy costume with full sleeves and train. Captioned by Enters at bottom left: 'Fleur du Mal (Proust Sequence)'. Signed at bottom left: 'Angna Enters '56'. On 23 x 15.5 cm laid paper.

[Gilbert White, naturalist.] Original Manuscript, said to have been dictated by White himself, of 'Gilbert White's statement' on the venomous properties of the toad, with eleven authorial emendations. Together with a series of thermometer readings.

Author: 
Gilbert White (1720-1793), naturalist and ornithologist, author of the celebrated 'Natural History of Selborne' (1789) [Thomas Bell (1792-1880), zoologist]
Publication details: 
Without date or place.
£350.00

A very nice artefact of one of the best-loved books in the England language, Gilbert White's 'Natural History and Antiquities of Selborne', which at one point was claimed to be the fourth most-printed book after the Bible, Shakespeare, and Bunyan's 'Pilgrim's Progress'. White's entry in the Oxford DNB concludes by describing the book as 'an expression of universal thanksgiving, treasured by all'.

[Percy Nash, film director; his nephew Bournemouth artist Eustace Nash.] Two synopses (one signed) of Percy Nash's review 'The Charm', with text of anti-Labour and pro-Churchill song. With watercolour of backdrop and covering letter by Eustace Nash.

Author: 
Percy Nash (1869-1958), film director; his nephew the Bournemouth artist and cartoonist Eustace Nash (1886-1969)
Publication details: 
Second synopsis dated to 1951. Eustace Nash's letter dated 8 December 1952, on his and his brother's firm's letterhead , as 'Nash & Co. Studios Artists for Advertisers' ('Partners: | L. F. N. Nash | E. P. E. Nash'), 8 Albert Road, Bournemouth.
£250.00

An interesting period piece. Two synopses of Percy Nash's review 'The Charm', the second dated by him to 1951, and with reference to the nationalisation of the coal industry. Together with the typescript of a song from the play about the 'Man of Might' Winston Churchill, and the Labour Party, who 'Have sullied the Fair name | of dear old England'. Also present is a watercolour drawing by Percy Nash's nephew the Bournemouth artist Eustace Nash of the intended backdrop to the first act of the review, together with an ALS discussing his ideas for the design of the piece.

[Charles Bestland (Cantelowe Bestland), Royal Academy Schools artist.] Twelve Regency pencil portraits (for engraving?), middle-class sitters including James Millar, Encyclopaedia Britannica editor; Col. Serle; members of Trenchard family of Dorset.

Author: 
Charles Bestland (Cantelowe or Cantlo Bestland) of the Royal Academy Schools [Col. Serle; James Millar, Encyclopaedia Britannica editor; John Trenchard Pickard of Dorset]
Bestland
Publication details: 
English. The twelve dated in pencil between 1811 and 1829.
£950.00
Bestland

Twelve pencil portraits executed in the same extremely capable style, probably for the purposes of engraving. Each on a separate piece of 4to paper. All in good condition, with light signs of age and wear, a couple with minor flecking with red paint. All dated in pencil (between 1811 and 1829), and all but two captioned. (Several of the items with watermark date supporting the pencil dating.) Three of the portraits have the tiny signature at bottom left of 'Bestland', and all would appear to be the work of the same artist, although the last appears to be signed with the initials 'C H'.

[Oxford Circuit in the 1880s.] 27 sketches and caricatures by Lauriston Leonard Batten of barristers (including Lord Loveburn; C. J. Darling), judges and others, including several court scenes; for fellow barrister the future Sir Richard Harington.

Author: 
Lauriston Leonard Batten (1863-1934) [the Oxford Circuit in the late nineteenth century; Sir Richard Harington (1861-1931), Puisne Judge in the High Court of Justice at Fort William in Bengal]
Legal sketches
Publication details: 
The Oxford Circuit [Gloucester, Reading, Shrewsbury Assizes; Birmingham Assizes]. A few items dated to 1887, 1888, 1891, 1894.
£950.00
Legal sketches

Lauriston Leonard Batten studied at Trinity College, Cambridge (see his entry in Alum. Cantab.). He was admitted at the Inner Temple in 1882 and called to the bar four years later. KC, 1905. Bencher, 1914. The present collection is from the papers of his colleague on the Oxford Circuit, Sir Richard Harington (1861-1931), 12th baronet, who was educated at Eton and Christ Church, Oxford. Called to the Bar in 1886, he practised on the Oxford Circuit before taking up an appointment as a Puisne Judge in the High Court of Justice at Fort William in Bengal in 1899.

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