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An illustrated chansonnier, highly decorated, and including songs such as: Souvenir de ‘70, Les Femmes soldats, Le Baiser, l’Anglaise, Le Testament du Libre-Penseur, Marche du Bataillon d’Afrique, L’Africaine, Départ pour Madagascar, La Pucelle de Bellville, Les Prisonniers morts pour la liberté.

These notebooks are a fascinating example of a popular method of collecting popular French cabaret songs, all neatly copied up with headings and illustrations (usually suitably suggestive) copied from contemporary song sheets (an example of one of these loose sheets is loosely inserted). We have seen several similar examples, in which the illustrations are apparently traced using carbon paper from printed (or other manuscripts) exemplars. Their context is usually military or naval and they represent a significant form of popular or naive art.

The decorative title, with elaborate borders describes Arbez Carme as ‘employé au Magasin des Vivres de Réserve du 23me Reg[im]ent d’Inf[anter]ie a Bourg, Ain’. Military records record his birth in 1876 in Jura, his occupation as a perruquier (wigmaker) and his recruitment in 1896.

Delille’s French translation of Georgiana Cavendish’s best-known poem, The Passage of the Mountain St Gothard (1799) appeared twice in 1802: here, and in a separate edition with plates (also published by Prosper in London). It is unclear which appeared first. The poem was written during Georgiana’s exile, and the translation is preceded with reciprocal poems of dedication between author and translator.

Agnes Maria Bennett’s Minerva Press novel, The Beggar Girl (1797) first appeared in Mme. Brayer-St.-Léon’s translation earlier in 1798, in 7 volumes. This pretty set in 10 volumes, each with a frontispiece illustration, though separately bound (and numbered on the spines 1-10) was issued as vols 5-14 of the Oeuvres complètes

‘The Beggar Girl and her Benefactors was published in seven volumes in 1797; it was supposedly based on existing characters at Tooting and was dedicated to the duchess of York, near whom Anna Bennett then lived. The Beggar Girl was very popular, and had some distinguished admirers’ (Oxford DNB).. cf. Rochedieu p. 21 (for the 7 volume edition of the same year).

A collection of finely-executed miniatures reproducing in colour sixteenth-century printer’s ornaments and initials: 39 selected initials, three tailpieces, one headpiece and one printer’s device (Giunta, dated on verso 1567). Some are signed, minutely, ‘A. Baudon’ who we have been unable to trace. The artist has copied, in remarkable detail, these wood and metalcut ornaments, reproducing in many cases the speckled backgrounds typical of punched or ‘criblé’ designs.

First edition, rare. John Wesley had delivered a sermon at the laying of the foundation stone of the Methodist mother church in City Road in April 1777. In this critical pamphlet the ‘gentle Strictures’ promised by evangelical preacher Hill on the title-page turn out to be vitriolic criticisms of Wesley laid out in 37 chapters, attacking his self-centred address. Chapter 31 takes issue with Wesley’s perfidy in his perceived encouragement of the American revolution in Free Thoughts on the Present State of Public Affairs, in which he had stated the the British government’s attitude towards the Americans’ could no longer be defended. ESTC: UK: Birmingham, BL, Congregational Library, Rylands (3 copies), US: SMU and Wesley Theological Seminary.

Probably the first edition in French—one of several issues of the same year with the same pagination but differing title ornaments. First published in 1740 as The Chronicle of the Kings of England under the pseudonym of Nathan Ben Saddi, Dodsley here displayed his egalitarian leanings with this rewriting of English history in the style of the King James Version of the Old Testament Pentateuch. The imprint is false and it is unlikely that the French editions were actually printed in London. In this issue the engraved vignette on the title-page is a frame with a pedestal upon which are a spear, a shield, laurel wreaths and an owl, there are several variants, as enumerated in the ESTC. Rochedieu, p. 88 (noting issues with both Londres and Amsterdam imprints).

First edition of this rare comic and satirical novel, partly set in England in the years of the French Revolutionary Wars, culminating in the fall of Bonaparte. It was later disowned (along with no less than 12 other novels) by its prolific author, who is best known as the author of the Mystères du Palais-Royal (1845-6). Gay I, 879. COPAC: no UK copies; Worldcat: no copies outside continental Europe (Bn and Hungarian Academy of Sciences only).

A complete manuscript course of stenography, or shorthand ― the art of writing ‘aussi vite que la parole’, finely written with numerous thumbnail drawings. Divided into four parts (introduction, pronunciation, punctuation and an atlas) with an errata, a table of contents and two sheets of stenographic examples or exercises.
The ‘Atlas’ supplies description of the stenographic signs in 13 charts, with 51 finely drawn vignettes giving the figurative equivalent of the stenographic signs and their pronunciation. Among them we find the links of a chain for representing an open ‘a’ (as in anneaux), a radiating halo for an ‘o’ (as in oréole), a drunkard for the ‘i’ (ivrogne), a gallows for the ‘p’ (potence), a cat for the ‘ch’ (chat), and so on, including a funnel, lyre, clock, umbrella, falls, arrow and gondola, the morphology of the signs given an ideogrammatic cue as a mnemonic. The whole represents a complete teaching system aimed at the aspiring stenographer.

First edition of this defence of Wilde by his loyal friend, composer and pianist, Dalhousie Young. ‘Published after Oscar Wilde's trial, during which Wilde's works were used as evidence of his ‘immorality'’ Apologia pro Oscar Wilde sets out to defend Wilde and his writing. Dalhousie Young argues that a work of fiction is not automatically a work of autobiography; fiction does reveal an author's inner secrets or true character. Powerfully, Young furthermore publicly questions whether it is right that sexual acts between two consenting adults of the same sex should be outlawed (see p. 38), or looked upon as a ‘sin’’ (British Library).

This is the second of two issues of the first edition, distinguished by its darker wrapper. Millard, Bibliography of Oscar Wilde, p. 574, no. 679.

Sole edition: tales and snippets based on the argot, gossip and jokes of the Porcherons quartier of Paris, at the foot of the slope to Montmartre. It includes the woeful tale of a young clerk and a prostitute as well as a Catéchisme poissard. It purports to be the work of a washerwoman, ‘Mame Fanchon’. The term ‘Poissarde’ (literally, a fishwife) refers, in general, to coarse and vulgar language and is frequently to be found in chapbooks of the period. Worlcat: Flanders Heritage Library (Antwerp) only.

First edition in French of the Italianate gothic novel Angelo Guicciardini, or, The Bandit of the Alps: a Romance (London, Colburn 1809). Rare. Sophia Francis’ other novels include: Constance de Lindensdorf, Vivonia and The Nun of Misericordia. They were all popular circulating and subscription library titles. No British copies in Jisc/Library Hub (formerly COPAC), Worldcat: University of Virginia only in US. cf. The Novel in English: a bibliographical Addition to Andrew Block’s The English Novel, 263, a.

A Napeoleonic-era manuscript course in classical and modern French history made for a woman or girl, Caroline Hémart. Probably prepared by a tutor, the texts are enthusiastically neo-classical in tone: the opening ‘Élements de chronologie’ serve as a grounding in ancient history (with definitions of terms such as ‘Olympiade’) of Europe and the near East, based on the text of Napoleonic scholar, Luc de Lancival. The manuscript concludes with 27 stanzas of a heroic poem, ‘Ode à Clio’ by M. Le Comte François de Neufchateau (published c. 1807), which is, again, a glorious version of history seen through still-rosy Napoleonic lenses.

First edition in French of The Castilian, an historical novel in English (Colburn, 1829), by a notable Spanish historical novelist, very much in the vein of Scott. Though most of his novels were in Spanish, Trueba y Cosío had been educated partly in England, and this attempt in English attracted favourable reviews. The translation is by Defauconpret, best known for his translations of Scott. Rare: Worldcat lists the Bn copy only.

A superb art nouveau decorated poetry manuscript, copied and illuminated throughout by a M. Jullien with geometric designs inspired by Renaissance and Islamic tiles, in keeping with the Orientalist symbolism of the 56 poems by Henri de Régnier (1864-1936), a disciple of Mallarmé and one of the most significant French Symbolist poets. The binding is skilfully decorated by Jullien in pyrography. Although we are aware of other decorated manuscripts in his hand, almost nothing more is known of him.�

A rare satirical elegy and epitaph for the celebrated electrical eel, who could no longer rise to the occasion. A reissue of the sheets of the first edition of 1777 with a cancel title, of this elaborate addition to the corpus of salacious 1770s pamphlets devoted to the subject of the electrical eel, a topic of serious scientific enquiry and popular merriment. This one continues the phallic joke and manages to draw in the hapless Chevalier D’Eon (whose sex was then popularly debated) alongside the lecherous Earl of Harrington.

‘If the Gymnotus Electricus, lately exhibited to the Public, be really dead, it is to be hoped that we shall have no more of these witty indecencies’ (Monthly Review, Nov. 1777). ESTC: Harvard and Princeton only worldwide of this issue. ESTC gives the pagination [4], 29, [1], but both the 2 copies reported have only pp [2] before title, as here, though it is perhaps likely the work was issued with a half-title or initial blank not present in surviving copies.

An unusual New Years’ gift from an unnamed compiler ‘for my dearly beloved Isabella Sophia Ochando de la Vanda. January one, 1830’; a manuscript compilation of patriotic verse and pious texts by hymnodist Edmeston, Shepherd, Southey (’The Victory’), Millman, Bowring, Burden, Emmerson, and Carlyle’s ‘Hymn before public worship translated from the Arabic’. Most of the texts are in English but a couple, by the Mechitarian cleric Nerses Clajense, are in Spanish and French respectively.

The two fine watercolours show HMS Victory in battle and a fallen arab horseman.

Gay describes this Le Passe partout as a “recueil de pièces satiriques, dirigées pour la plupart contre la clergé”, with the Jesuites du College de Louis le Grand and Louis XIV's great general, the Maréchal de Villars singled out for special attention. The anonymous author satirically describes himself as “Chevalier de l’Ordre de l’Industrie & de la Gibeciere” (‘chevalier d'industrie’ means swindler in French and ‘gibecièr’ is a gamebag or satchel), but his real identity remains a mystery. This is the second edition. A more common issue with the imprint 'la présente année' is considered variously to have been printed from 1700 to 1708. The BL catalogue suggests Holland as the place of publication for our edition. No source hazards a guess at the author.

First published in 1674, this edition of Traité de la jalousie contains a fine and detailed allegorical frontispiece juxtaposing a family with an image of adultery and an emblem of heart in a vice or press. De Courtin’s work purports to be an early self-help manual which offers practical advice on dealing with jealousy in marriage, which, as the advertisement proclaims: ‘De toutes les maladies de l’esprit, La Jalousie est assurément la plus dangereuse, & la plus difficile à guerir’. It is, in effect, a profoundly misogynistic work insisting on the subordiation of the woman, just as certain members of society must necessarily be subject to the state. Despite being described by Gay as an ‘ouvrage ennuyeux et mal ecrit’, the frequency with which the title was reprinted after its first publication in 1674 is testament to its contemporary popularity. It appeared in English as A Treatise of Jealousie, or, a Means to preserve Peace in Marriage in 1684�

The final work Octavie ou l'Epouse fidelle was first published in 1683; this imprint is not dated, but other undated copies are suggested to have been published c.1700. Passe Partout: Gay, III, 659; Courton: Gay, III, 236; Chavigny: not found in Gay.

First edition, all published. Delandine’s short-lived and scarce literary magazine includes numerous translated excerpts from British authors and other articles of British interest, notably Chesterfield (his portraits of Marlborough and Bolingbroke), Thomas Parnell (’Health, an Eclogue’), a letter from actor James Quin, Thomas Hunter’s Observations on Tacitus, Thomas Chatterton, Johnson (two excerpts from The Rambler, plus a note on his Dictionary), Dick Whittington and his cat, an article on the origin of British newspapers, and Butler’s ‘A Huffing Courtier’.

First edition, inscribed to poet and novelist André Theuriet. One of 500 copies on tinted paper (total edition 537).

A collection of children’s stories evidently written by a father (perhaps Herr Schmutzer, whose stamp appears in each) for two young daughters. Each volume is a separate story telling of the girls’ adventures around the world. The text is in German throughout and every page bears a large illustration. A terrifying insight into one early-twentieth century father’s idea of a family entertainment.

Das buch von den beiden Babys. [n.d. c. 1902]. Small 4to (206 × 165 mm), pp. [22], alternating text and drawings. A tale of parental neglect: a family outing on a steam train goes terribly wrong.

‘...Laurentia und Emerentia Stutzlmeier’. 1902. Folio (330 × 210 mm), ff. [30] (the last blank) of which 28 each bear text and a large drawing. Card wrappers, loose in cloth backed boards. The tale of two young sisters lost in the forest during a family picnic. Rescued from a wolf by a kindly hermit they embark on a series of miraculous adventures with a cartload of magic pears and a menagerie of animals. Reunited with their parents they return to the woods to find the hermit dying; they bury him and he is borne aloft by angels.

‘Die gar wundersame geschichte von den beiden Babys in der Techanei’. 1904. Folio (325 × 210 mm), ff. [56], of which 54 each bear text and a large drawing. Crudely sewn in cloth-backed boards, uniform with the above. The father takes his daughters out on an excursion, but an encounter with a witch separates the girls from him. Kidnapped in the witch’s house, they elude her protective snake, toad and cat and escape in a paper boat. Reunited with their father they embark on a series of terrifying adventures under his protection: he slaughters all assailants with a pistol, sword and bare hands, leaving a trail of bloodshed. A return to a derelict house scattered with the skeletons of pets and family members begins a new chapter, before the trio return home in a magical amphibious horse-drawn cart.

‘Die Geschichte von die beiden Babys und die Reise um die Erde’. 1910. Folio (340 × 205 mm), ff. [42], of which 41 each have text and a large drawing. Cloth backed boards. In this final volume Herr Schmutzer oversteps the mark. Taking his young daughters on a round-the-world trip in a self-propelled car (Gibraltar, Africa, Egypt, Persia, China, Siberia, The North Pole) he indulges in the worst kind of xenophobic violence against most of the inhabitants of the known world, all in the interests of the protection of his daughters.