Antiquarian and Collectors’ Books

WELLS, H.G. The Way the World Is Going. Guesses & Forecasts of the Years Ahead. London: Ernest Benn Limited, 1928. First edition, 8vo (182 x 115mm.) (Mild toning.) Original brown cloth (some spine lean, spotting to covers), dust-jacket (light spotting to inner flaps and spine panel).

WELLS, H.G. After Democracy. London: Watts & Co., 1932. First edition, 8vo (196 x 125mm.) (Mild toning.) Original purple cloth, gilt lettering to upper cover and spine, dust-jacket (slight rubbing at top of spine panel).

WELLS, H.G. World Brain. London: Methuen & Co. Limited, 1938. First edition, 8vo (187 x 120mm.) (Mild toning.) Original orange cloth (lightly bumped spine ends), dust-jacket (rubbing to extremities, minor dust-soiling to lower panel, small repair verso).

[CORNWELL, David.] ‘John Le Carré’. A Small Town In Germany. London: William Heinemann, 1968. Proof Copy, 8vo (215 x 144mm.) (Toning to margins, browning to preliminaries, some corner creases.) Original card covers (extremities rubbed, some staining and spotting to upper cover, corner creases).

SCI-FI. – Arthur C. CLARKE. Childhood’s End. London: Sidgwick and Jackson, 1954. First U.K. edition, 8vo (187 x 121mm.) (Toning, endpapers browned, spotting to fore-edge.) Original yellow cloth, dust-jacket after Deborah Jones (toned to lower panel).

GÖDEL, Kurt. On Formally Undecidable Propositions Of Principia Mathematica and Related Systems… translated by B. Meltzer. London: Oliver & Boyd, 1962. First English edition, 8vo (194 x 123mm.) Introduction by R.B. Braithwaite. (Mild toning.) Original grey cloth (some discolouring), dust-jacket (slight chipping, small closed tears at top of spine panel). Note: rare. Gödel first expounded his ideas on decidability in mathematics in 1934 in a series of lectures at Princeton’s Institute of Advanced Study. It’s now considered the most significant contribution to logic since Aristotle.

TAROT. – Arthur Edward WAITE. The Key to the Tarot, Being Fragments of a Secret Tradition under the Veil of Divination. London: William Rider & Son Limited, 1910. Second issue, ‘Pam A’, 12mo (124 x 56mm.) (Mild toning.) Original blue cloth with gilt ouroboros to upper cover, accompanied with 78 pictorial tarot cards designed by Pamela Colman-Smith. (Mild toning, three cards with pencil annotation), original maroon card box (rubbing to extremities, old tape repair). Note: rare. Acknowledged to be the most beautiful and symbolically rich of tarot card decks, the Rider-Waite pack has become the standard among tarot readers today. Pamela Colman-Smith had made illustration work for the suffragettes and worked with Alfred Stieglitz in New York who recognised the synaesthetic quality of her imagination. After meeting W.B. Yeats in 1901 she joined the Hermetic Order of the Golden Dawn and became friends with Arthur Edward Waite. In 1909 Waite commissioned her to create a tarot deck that would appeal to both the esoteric and artistic communities they inhabited. Colman-Smith’s designs are especially memorable for the Minor Arcana (the ‘Pip’ cards) because prior to her designs the ‘Pip’ cards had tended to be simplified. It was also due to Waite giving detailed instructions for the Major Arcana, but only simple lists for the ‘Pip’ cards. Having this freedom, Colman-Smith’s inspired designs enriched the entire tarot and set a precedent that is widely imitated today. Following the first issue of the pack in 1909, the ‘Pam A’ edition was issued from April 1910 until about 1920, and the ‘Pam A’ is established as the oldest of this second issue.

KABIR. – Rabindranath TAGORE and Evelyn UNDERHILL (translators). One Hundred Poems of Kabir. London: The Indian Society, 1914. Limited edition, this being one of 750 copies only, 8vo (222 x 141mm.) (Mild spotting to the preliminaries.) Original cream cloth, gilt lettering (Toned, some dust-soiling to covers). Note: the spine has in gilt the year ‘1915’ as the date of publication, contrary to the title-page. The book was, indeed, published early in the new year of 1915 and pre-dates the trade edition published by Macmillan a few months later.

WAITE, Arthur Edward. Prince Starbeam, a Tale of Fairyland. London: James Burns, 1890. First edition, 4to (187 x 135mm.) 7 plates by Evelyn O. Stuart-Menteath. (Toning, spotting to endpapers, one plate loose.) Original cloth, pictorial gilt to upper cover (browned to spine, some dust-soiling and staining). Note: one of two allegorical fairy-tales written by A.E. Waite, the other being ‘The Quest of the Golden Stairs’, published in 1927. Rare. The only recorded copy in the U.K. is at The National Library of Scotland.

OCCULT. – Anna B. KINGSFORD. Astrology Theologized. The Spiritual Hermeneutics of Astrology... London: George Redway, 1886. First edition, 8vo (210 x 160mm.) Illustrations. (Toning.) Original white cloth, gilt lettering to upper cover and spine (spine browned, covers finger-marked). Note: rare. An active theosophist, Kingsford founded the Hermetic Society in 1884. She was a vegetarian, feminist and an anti-vivisectionist who founded the Food Reform Society in 1881.

[DODGSON, Charles Lutwidge.] ‘Lewis Carroll’. Three Sunsets and Other Poems. London: Macmillan and Co., Limited, February 1898. Reprint, 4to (205 x 159mm.) 12 illustrations by E. Gertrude Thomson, 2pp. publisher’s advertisements to rear. (Toning, endpapers browned.) Original green cloth, pictorial gilt to upper cover, g.e. (spine ends browned), dust-jacket (loss to spine ends, chipped, dust-soiled to edges and stain to upper panel). Note: scarce in the dust-jacket.

[GRIMALDI, Stacey.] A Suit of Armour for Youth. London: by the Proprietor [R. Ackermann], 1824. First edition, 12mo (179 x 100mm.) Engraved hand-coloured frontispiece by Cosmo Armstrong after William Grimaldi, 11 hand-coloured engraved plates with movable flap overlays showing a symbolic illustration of armour. (Offsetting to text, mild toning, blanks replaced.) Near contemporary Spanish calf bound by Root & Son with two black morocco pieces to the spine, gilt fillet borders, g.e. (rebacked, endpapers replaced, crease to covers).

CERVANTES SAAVEDRA, de Miguel. The History and Adventures of the Renowned Don Quixote. Translated From the Spanish… by T. Smollett. Dublin: John Chambers, 1796. 4 vols., 8vo (202 x 123mm.) Engraved portrait frontispiece by Bartolozzi, 10pp. ‘List of Subscribers’, 19 engraved plates. (Lacking half-titles, browning, occasional damp-staining, mainly to plate margins.) Contemporary calf (some insect-damage, worn). Provenance: S. Moore’s Cheap Book Warehouse, Cork (stamp to front pastedowns). – And a further eleven literary volumes (including Walter Scott’s ‘The Poetical Works’, 8 vols., 1822, 12mo). Provenance: by descent, from the estate of Frederic Thesiger, Lieutenant General, Viceroy and Governor-General of India 1916-21 (15).

DARWIN, Charles. On the Origin of the Species… (forty-first thousand). London: John Murray, 1891. Sixth edition, 8vo (189 x 121mm.) 1 folding plan, index, 1p. publisher’s advertisement. (Lacking front-free endpaper, marginal pencil mark to p.xv.) Original green blind-stamped cloth, gilt lettering to spine (some spotting to covers). – And a further volume by Charles Darwin (‘A Naturalist’s Voyage. Journal of Researches into the Natural History and Geology of the Countries Visited During the Voyage of H.M.S. ‘Beagle’ Round the World’, 1890, 8vo) (2).

HUNT, John. The Ascent of Everest. London: Hodder & Stoughton, 1993. Limited edition, this being number 322 of 500 copies signed by the ten surviving members of the 1953 expedition to commemorate the 40th Anniversary of the First Ascent on 29th May, 1953, 8vo (234 x 153mm.) Colour plates, maps, illustrations. (Mild toning.) Original blue half morocco, t.e.g., blue cloth slipcase. Note: signed in ink by John Hunt, Charles Evans, Griffith Pugh, George Band, Alfred Gregory, George Lowe, Michael Westmacott, Charles Wylie, Michael Ward and Edmund Hillary. Also contains an original invitation to the 40th Anniversary Lecture held on the 26th May, 1993.

UTTLEY, Alison. Moonshine and Magic. London: Faber and Faber, 1932. First edition, 8vo (224 x 150mm.) Colour and black and white illustrations by William Townsend. (Faint spotting to preliminaries.) Original pictorial cloth, dust-jacket (chipping to top of spine, tear to spine panel, slight dust-soiling).

CHILDREN’S BOOKS. – Rumer GODDEN. The Story of Holly and Ivy. London: Macmillan & Co. Ltd., 1958. First edition, 8vo (233 x 151mm.) Illustrated by Adrienne Adams. (Toning.) Original red cloth, dust-jacket (a stain and slight chipping to top of spine panel). – And a further two first editions by Rumer Godden (‘Impunity Jane’, 1955, 8vo, and ‘Miss Happiness and Miss Flower’, 1961, 8vo) (3).

[DODGSON, Charles Lutwidge.] ‘Lewis Carroll’. Alice’s Adventures in Wonderland. London: Macmillan and Co., 1874. Forty-fifth thousand, 8vo (183 x 118mm.) Half-title, frontispiece and illustrations by John Tenniel, 1p. publisher’s advertisement to rear. (Toning, occasional finger-mark, marginal damp-stain to last leaves.) Original red cloth, gilt medallions to covers, g.e. (rebacked, original spine laid-down, fading to covers, staining to lower cover).

[DODGSON, Charles Lutwidge.] Alice’s Adventures in Wonderland. London: Macmillan and Co., 1891. Eighty-Fourth thousand, 8vo (183 x 122mm.) (Toning, some spotting to title, small loss to front-free endpaper, illegible gift inscription to half-title.) Original red cloth, gilt medallions to covers, g.e. (slight fading to spine, lightly bumped).