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London : Archibald Constable, 1906. A standard set of “what remains the most famous biography in any language, one of Western literature’s most germinal achievements: unprecedented in its time in its depth of research and its extensive use of private correspondence and recorded conversation” (Gordon Turnbull in ODNB). Boswell on Samuel Johnson (1709-1784), first published in 1791, and here edited by Augustine Birrell (1850-1833), retaining all the prefatory matter of the earliest editions.
Six volumes. Foolscap 8vo (170 x 104mm). Frontispieces. Bound in a most attractive near contemporary half polished calf, banded and prettily gilt, by John Ramage (1836-1911) & Co.; contrasting labels; top edges gilt; marbled sides and endpapers; very lightly rubbed, but a very good clean and sound set.

£500

Currently on display at Bryars & Bryars in central London, please enquire about availability – books@ashrare.com

London : for T. Payne; and T. Cadell & W. Davies, 1796. First edition. One of the most popular and influential novels of its time – the tale of Camilla Tyrold and her sisters, their cousin the beautiful Indiana Lynmere, and their suitors – love and marriage, darkness and light, intrigue, contretemps and mistake. The book also has probably the most distinguished list of subscribers ever to grace a novel – featuring not least the twenty-year-old Miss J. Austen of Steventon – Jane Austen, much influenced by Fanny Burney (Madame d’Arblay), specifically referring to “Camilla” in “Northanger Abbey” as one of those works “in which the greatest powers of the mind are displayed, in which the most thorough knowledge of human nature, the happiest delineation of its varieties, the liveliest effusions of wit and humour, are conveyed to the world in the best-chosen language”. Also on the subscription list, besides a broad swathe of the aristocracy, were Edmund Burke, Sir Joseph Banks, James Beattie, George Canning, Maria Edgeworth, Warren Hastings, Richard Heber, Edmond Malone, Hannah More, Hester Piozzi, Anne Radcliffe, and Humphrey Repton.
Five volumes. Post 12mo (180 x 102mm). xlviii,390,[ii]; [iv],432; [iv],468; [iv],432; [iv],556pp. Bound in a very pleasant contemporary full sprinkled calf gilt; contrasting red and green labels; some minor external wear, rubbing, faint cracking and slight scuffing; endleaves lightly tanned; some occasional browning and mild spotting; a few minor signs of age and use; small inkstain at the end, but overall a very good and attractive set.

SOLD

London : John Pearson, 1872. Second collected edition. “Writing is a kind of lottery in this fickle age, and dependence on the stage is as precarious as the cast of a die”. All nineteen of Centlivre’s plays, from the “The Perjur’d Husband”, which “went off with general applause” in 1700, to “The Artifice” of 1722, including “The Wonder” (1714) – which Garrick chose for his farewell performance in 1776 – and “The Busie Body” (1709) – another Garrick favourite, which ran to forty editions before 1884; “The Gamester” (1705) – probably her most popular; “The Man’s Bewitch’d” (1709) – with its heroine’s rousing chorus of “Give Me Liberty and Love”, and “The Gotham Election” (1715) – the first English play to deal with vote-rigging and considered too dangerous ever to be staged, as well as “The Platonick Lady” (1706), “The Perplex’d Lovers” (1712), etc. With facsimiles of the title-pages of the only earlier collected edition of 1760-1761.
Three volumes. Crown 8vo (179 x 111mm). [2],xii,376; [ii],380; [ii],372pp. Bound in a fine later (mid twentieth-century) half chestnut morocco, banded and ruled in gilt, by Oliver & Boyd of Edinburgh; top edges gilt; a couple of scuffs to bottom edges; one leaf torn and repaired, without loss, but otherwise a very good set indeed – sound and clean. With the nautical book-plate of the collector George G. Stevenson in each volume.

SOLD

London : for E. & C. Dilly; and J. Walter, 1775. First edition. A collection of various pieces from Hester Chapone – Richardson’s “little spitfire” – including her much-admired essays “On Affectation and Simplicity” and “On Conversation”, the novella “The Story of Fidelia”, and a selection of poems.
Foolscap 8vo (162 x 96mm). (xii),178pp. Bound, without half-title or final advertisement leaf, in a contemporary calf, now neatly rebacked, retaining the original title-label; endpapers replaced; a little browned and thumbed; two leaves a little soft at centre and slightly torn, one with a small hole and the loss of a few letters; names partially erased from title-page; a reasonable and modestly-priced copy.

£40

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London : J. M. Dent & Co., 1889. First Temple Library edition : one of 150 numbered copies (of 250) on large paper. A handsome set, delightfully printed on fine paper at the Chiswick Press and bound by Birdsall of Northampton. “The Traveller”, “The Deserted Village”, “Elegy on the Death of a Mad Dog”, “When Lovely Woman”, “The Good Natur’d Man”, “She Stoops to Conquer”, and a host of lesser known material. Edited and introduced by Austin Dobson (1840-1921).
Two volumes. Post 8vo (198 x 128mm). [2],(xxx),(198),[ii]; [viii],234,[ii]pp. Six charming etched illustrations by John Jellicoe and Herbert Railton. Bound in a stylish later (mid twentieth-century) half tan morocco, banded and gilt, by Birdsall; top edges gilt; original japon vellum spines preserved at rear; just a hint of rubbing; occasional mild browning to a handful of leaves, but a very good set indeed.

SOLD

London : for C. Dilly, 1798. First edition. “No, Sir; we had talk enough, but no conversation ...” – the essential Johnson distilled (with Boswell’s entire approbation). Johnson on conversation, wine, marriage, children, education, conduct, manners, London, trade, travelling, life, death, religion, politics, and much else.
Demy 8vo (213 x 130mm). [iv],446,[ii]pp. Bound in a smart modern sprinkled calf, richly gilt in period style; marbled endpapers; some spotting, mainly to outer leaves; a few minor marks, but a very good copy.

£400

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London : for Richard Phillips, 1803. First collected edition of the convention-defying Lady Mary Wortley Montagu – with an extensive selection of her letters from Constantinople, Venice and other foreign parts, a selection of poems, some of the essays, her translation of Epictetus, etc. Anonymously edited, with a memoir, by James Dallaway (1763-1834), from materials supplied by her son-in-law, Lord Bute – apparently in exchange for the suppression of other manuscripts held by Richard Phillips, the publisher.
Five volumes. Crown 8vo (187 x 108mm). Two engraved portraits. Nine facsimiles, some folding, one on two plates. Bound in an attractive (probably Scottish) contemporary mottled calf, prettily gilt with guilloche bands, small tools, etc.; red morocco labels; lemon edges; marbled endpapers; ribbon markers; the upper cover of one volume slightly pitted; a few slight nicks, chips, creases and faint discolourations; one leaf slightly damaged at gutter, but overall a very good and highly attractive set. With the contemporary ownership inscriptions of F. Forbes.

SOLD

Philadelphia : Printed only for Subscribers by George Barrie, [ca.1896]. First American edition, limited to 1,000 numbered copies on hand-made paper, of this elegant rendition of Montesquieu’s famous satire on French and European civilisation, viewed through the prism of two fictional Persian travellers. The forthright and unafraid iconoclasm of the apostle of freedom, once “extolled to the clouds ... as the man of genius who had rediscovered the title-deeds of the human race”. First published in 1721 and translated into English the following year, but here in its first complete translation, as privately printed in England in 1892. Translated, with an introduction and biography, by the poet John Davidson (1857-1909), and graced with the delightful illustrations of the curious hermit artist Charles Édouard de Beaumont (1821-1888), etched by Émile Boilvin (1845-1899). Published in George Barrie’s impressive “Bibliophilist’s Library” series.
Two volumes. Demy 8vo (224 x 149mm). [6],xlviii,(204); [6],vi,(236)pp. Portrait frontispiece and eight etched plates – each plate with a tissue guard and a duplicate etching printed in bistre. Index. Bound in a handsome contemporary half red morocco, banded and gilt; top edges gilt; marbled endpapers; some very minor rubbing and wear to corners; mild tanning to opening leaves, but a very good set. With the nautical bookplate of George G. Stevenson in each volume.

£250

Currently on display at Bryars & Bryars in central London, please enquire about availability – books@ashrare.com

London : William Tegg & Co., 1851. An attractively bound collected edition of Sheridan, with a perceptive biographical and critical introduction by Leigh Hunt (1784-1859). Includes “The Rivals”, “St. Patrick's Day”, “The Duenna”, “A Trip to Scarborough”, “The School for Scandal”, “The Camp”, “The Critic” and “Pizarro”. First published in this form in 1841.
Medium 8vo (223 x 151mm). (xvi),(154)pp. Bound, without half-title and advertisement leaves, in a pleasant contemporary half calf, richly gilt; marbled sides; sprinkled edges; a little rubbed and very slightly worn; mild spotting of binder's blanks, but internally clean and sound. Contemporary ownership inscription of Charles Woodbridge (1830-1924), a well-to-do Uxbridge solicitor.

£50

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[Boston] : G. K. Hall & Co., 1964. A facsimile of the original 1788 edition, issued as a Christmas gift by the bookselling firm. With a note on the author. “Books, that were worthy of superior praise, Unlike the flimsey works of modern days ...”. Loosely inserted is a card signed by G. K. Hall.
Post 4to (28cm). (40)pp. Title-page illustration by Thomas Rowlandson. Original stapled wrappers; a little bruised; faint mark on upper wrapper; staples rusting, but a good copy.

£20

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London : for J. Dodsley, J. Johnson, G. G. J. and J. Robinson, T. Cadell, J. Murray [and others], 1793. A handsome early collected edition of Sterne, comprising “Tristram Shandy”, “A Sentimental Journey”, three volumes of sermons and two of letters, as well as “A Fragment in the Manner of Rabelais” and “The History of a Watch-Coat”, together with his own memoir of his life and family.
Ten volumes. Crown 8vo (175 x 112mm). Engraved portraits of both Sterne and his daughter Lydia, his daughter shown sitting beside the Nollekens bust of her father, engraved by James Caldwall from a painting by Benjamin West. Plates. Marbled leaf. Bound in a most attractive contemporary tree calf, prettily gilt and with contrasting red and green labels; lemon edges; some minor rubbing, a few slight marks and minor signs of age and use, but overall a very good and clean set with an attractive provenance. From the library of Fasque Castle, with the Fasque bookplates and ownership inscriptions, dated Liverpool 1798, of (Sir) John Gladstone (1764-1851). Gladstone was the father of William Ewart Gladstone (1809-1898) and this set would have formed part of the household furniture among which the four-times prime minister grew up. For more on Fasque Castle, see my Bookhunter on Safari blog-post of 10th May 2012.

£750

Currently on display at Bryars & Bryars in central London, please enquire about availability – books@ashrare.com