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First edition of this collection with the Lydis illustrations. Number 85 of 165 copies and contains the inscription: ‘A Ida, avec toute mon amitié — en souvenir d’une semaine heureuse passée auprès d’elle. Mariette Lydis Paris 1934’ likely to have been addressed to the Russian-born dancer Ida Rubinstein.

Chant des Amazones is a celebration of female athleticism in verse, prose and image and is dedicated to ‘une jeune fille victorieuse dans la course des 1,000 mètres’. The texts are drawn from Montherlant’s Les Onze devant la porte dorée (1924) which he had written against the background of preparations for the 1924 Paris Olympics. Women’s participation in Olympic athletics was then extremely limited, but the decade after 1924 witnessed its rapid expansion and a general enthusiasm for women’s sport, reflected in this book. Well-known as a writer, Montherlant was an important contact for Lydis throughout her career though his posthumous reputation has revealed him as a serial pederast and dabbler in right-wing politics. His later works were marked by distinct anti-feminism and misogyny. Lydis’ illustrations are fresh and well-meaning, but her evident sexualisation of pubescent girls is troubling to the modern eye. The book was issued in handsome silver, green and turquoise lithographed wrappers.

Rare first edition of the memoirs of the great circus performer Jules Léotard, pioneer of the flying trapeze who inspired the 1867 song ‘The Daring Young Man on the Flying Trapeze’. A second edition of his Mémoires appeared in the same year, with the same pagination, but giving ‘deuxième édition’ on the title — almost all library copies appear to be of this later edition. The superb comic lithograph by Durandeau shows Léotard trapezing over the city of Paris, while adoring female fans cry out to him from the rooftops (some flying heart-shaped kites). With Blondin, Léotard was one of the first great celebrities of the circus, when he visited London in 1861, Charles Dickens wrote: ‘I have been beguiled into seeing Léotard, and it is at once the most fearful and most graceful thing I have ever seen.’ (Letter to Macready, June 11, 1861).

First editions of all three of George Auriol’s monogram books, with a rich array of designs for his artistic and literary colleagues in Paris and further afield. Polymathic poet and songwriter, part of the Chat Noir (along with his lifelong friend Erik Satie) Auriol created designs that became emblematic of Art nouveau Paris, together with his typography for the Metropolitain railway and type designs adapted by Peignot. The three volumes of monograms include marks for himself and his closest collaborator, Henri Rivière, as well as Stéphane Mallarmé, Octave Uzanne, the Théâtre du Chat Noir, Edmond Haraucourt, Anatole France, Henri de Toulouse-Lautrec, Steinlen, Octave Mirbeau, Aristide Briand and Woodrow Wilson. Most display the clear influence of the pervading japonisme in contemporary Parisian design, with Auriol adapting the Japanese quasi-heraldic culture of the pictographic Japanese ‘mon’ to western lettering.

Publishers for whom Auriol supplied monograms included Ernest Flammarion, Quillot, Larousse, Hachette, Peignot et fils, Henri Laurens and we also find the earliest logo for Cadbury’s chocolate (1905, in the volume for 1907).

Each volume of the set is of regular trade issue (nonetheless issued in small numbers) and the 1924 volume bears an elegant inscription by Auriol in red ink to the publisher Pierre Monot, at the Larousse Mensuel — one of Auriol’s most important publishing connections. It also contains an autograph letter from Edmond Lauren on notepaper bearing his Auriol-designed notepaper. The 1907 volume contains two prospectuses.

A striking needlework pattern for Berlin-work. ‘Berlin wool work is embroidery with Berlin wools or any type of thread or beads on canvas by means of copying a coloured chart known as a Berlin pattern. Almost exclusively confined to the 19th century, Berlin wool derived its name from the wool that came from Merino sheep in Saxony. It was taken to Gotha to be spun and on to Berlin to be dyed... Prior to the introduction of Berlin patterns it was very rare to find any indication about the choice of colour or threads. Berlin patterns were always coloured by hand at first, until the emergence of industrial printing techniques’ (V&A). Though the patterns (which rarely survive) usually originated in Germany, Berlin work was enthusiastically practised by women all over Europe and in North America.

A pocket guide for visitors to the three levels of the Eiffel Tower.

First edition of this luxurious production, the text translated by Lucie Paul-Marguerite from the Chinese seventeenth-century collection Kin-kou-kikouan (or Jingu qiguan) and telling the moral story of an extra-marital adventure. The 16 original paintings on silk are attributed to Ouang Shao Ki of Szechuan, copied for this edition in Peking by four separate artists (one each for the drawing, the foliage, the clothing and the figures). They are remarkable productions, and each one is captioned in manuscript with Chinese characters. Produced in only 125 copies, this is one of the 10 copies on Japon reserved for the author (copy number 3).
Lucie Paul-Margueritte (1886-1955) began publishing in magazines at the age of eighteen. After three years of marriage, she divorced and thereafter lived with her widowed sister, Ève Paul-Margueritte. Together, they raised the latter's son, living from their writings. She made numerous translations including several from the Chinese and a number of English novels, including Bram Stoker’s Dracula. Carteret IV. p. 265: ‘Belle publication’. WorldCat: Bn and Boston Athenaeum only.

First edition of these three photographically illustrated albums, mainly portraits of contemporary Parisian actresses, dancers and singers, both from the mainstream theatres and the smaller dance halls and cafés-concerts. Reutlinger’s studio specialised in such portraits, usually actresses photographed in different degrees of deshabille in either studio settings or in the corridors and dressing rooms of the theatre. The voyeurism of the photographer is extended into bedroom and bathroom scenes intended to illustrate the daily routine of the ideal Parisienne. Sarah Bernhardt and Yvette Guilbert appear, while most subjects are now little-known but then much admired Parisian performers.

First edition of one of the most interesting Paris Exposition guides.

A steel-engraved plate collection made after daguerrotypes. Another issue (with variant title contained 28 plates).

First edition of the Art Journal’s retrospective catalogue of the 1867 Exposition, including notice of the prize winners. It is a kaleidoscope of Second Empire decorative and applied arts from all over Europe and beyond. It comprises: a general Introduction by C. Boutell; Glass - Domestic and Decorative by G. Wallis; Lace and Embroidery by Mrs. B. Palliser; Adaptations From the Antique by C. Boutell; Art Materials and Products in Clay, Stone, Marbles, Etc. by D.T. Ansted; Furniture. by J.B. Atkinson; Textile Fabrics by Mrs. B. Palliser; Goldsmith's Work, Silver, and Jewellery by H. Friswell; Porcelain and Pottery by J. Dafforne and Bronzes and Bronze Imitations by G. Wallis.

First edition. A comic album by ‘Mars’ casting a lighthearted eye over life in belle époque Paris, with walks in the park, visits to the theatre, family picnics, bike riding and horse riding.

First edition. Rimmel, a phenomenally successful perfumer and cosmetics innovator was a member of the committee of the second Paris exposition. His Recollections contain a colour-printed additional title of the Broussa mosque, the medieval Yechil Djami (the Green Mosque), reconstructed in reduced form in the Turkish section of the Exposition. The book appeared in both French and English versions, which eachran to several editions.

First edition of a charming illustrated guide by the bibliophile journalist–photographer Jérôme Doucet (1865–1957) to the various ‘little trades’ plied on the streets of turn-of-the-century Paris, from tram rail cleaner to map seller, lamplighter to bootblack, cigar end collector to saw sharpener, marshmallow vendor to bill sticker, ragmen and organ grinders to women carding stuffing for mattresses, people renting chairs or toy boats, or selling ice cream, or chestnuts, or chickweed, or mistletoe, or lettuce, or soup. And, naturally, les bouquinistes.

First edition of this classic belle époque survey of the culture of the café-concert and the circus. Ibels was one of the major commercial graphic artists of the period and a collaborator of Toulouse-Lautrec’s.

First edition.

First edition of an illustrated pocket guide to Paris’s new park, published in the series ‘Bibliothèque des chemins de fer’.

A sketchbook made by British architect, George Truefitt (1824-1902), first at Antibes and then in Paris, recording architectural details as well as general views and other sights of interest. There are some delightful details of Closebrooks, the Antibes villa he had designed for banker and businessman William Brooks Close, together with several metalwork details.

Truefitt travelled to the 1889 Exposition at the invitation of Brooks and his wife. In this album he made a brief journal of his visit, and preserved 25 excellent sketches. The first is an amusing sketch of ladies lying head-to-head on a shipboard saloon bench, while the others are mainly architectural views including of the Eiffel Tower seen from his hotel room at Maurice’s; architectural details of the chateau at Fontainebleau; some from the Hôtel de Cluny and metalwork details from the Trocadéro as well as a few other small sketches of people. There is an especially good view of the crowded exhibition around the dome of the Trocadéro sketched from his lunch table at Spiers and Pond’s restaurant. The journal and drawings are pasted into a sketchbook which also includes a sketch journal of his earlier visit to Antibes in 1886.

Truefitt was prolific in his contribution to Victorian British architecture, best known for his work at Tufnell Park in London, for numerous country churches and for his remodelling of the Brooks estate at Glen Tanar in Scotland.

First edition in this form; a second edition followed in 1815. It was also issued uncoloured. ‘At least 14, and very probably all of the plates, are copies of images published around 1790 in an octavo suite, called Vues pittoresques des principaux édifices de Paris, “by Le Campion, Guyot, Roger, Guillot, Belley, Mlle Guyot, after Testard and Sergent” (see NUC). The last two are identifiable as the Parisian artists and engravers François Martin Testard (active 1790–1819) and Antoine François Sergent-Marceau (1751–1847), with “Segard” on the title-page probably being an error for “Sergent”’ (Library Hub Discover).
‘The City of Paris has always been an object of much interest to the Traveller. Recent events, which have filled every mind with astonishment, gratitude, and joy, have rendered the Metropolis of France, now enriched with the choicest spoils of conquest, and the noblest specimens of art, doubly interesting. From every neighbouring kingdom, and especially from the shores of Britain, thousands have eagerly flocked to that Capital, formerly the scene of the most horrible atrocities, now the depository of the most valuable treasures’ (Advertisement).
Abbey, Travel 104; Tooley, English Books with Coloured Plates 1790 to 1860, 448.

First edition of this lighthearted account of the typical Parisian Sunday, with superb etched vignettes by Lepère depicting picnics, rambles, cycling, drinking, dining and boating, complete with an original sketch for the first vignette, initialled by the artist. Number 50 of 250 copies. While Lepère is best known for his work in the revival of the woodcut in France, his immense talent in other media, including etching is attested by his many book illustrations. This deluxe copy, bound by Lenoë, has an inlaid engraved stone plaquette, evidently the work of Lepère, and perhaps an experimental or trial plate - its smooth surface has been incised in the manner of a woodcut (suggesting a soft stone like soapstone or alabaster) and inked. It depicts a tavern or dining room scene with diners, drinkers and a breastfeeding mother in the foreground. Carteret IV, 294. ‘Dernière et très belle publication de cet éditeur, très cotée... maintenant que le livre est très coté, on peur dire que c’est une des meillures et des plus pittoresques de l’artiste, la plus importante avec des eaux-fortes’.

First edition: a survey of the city in 1860 (its buildings and infrastructure, ),with long sections on the Asile impérial de Vincennes, founded in 1855 for convalescent workers, the Maison Eugène-Napoléon, a school for poor girls set up in 1858, and the history of Paris’s theatres after Napoleon limited the number of theatres in the city to twelve, then eight.
Vicaire V, 1021.