CROMARTY, George Mackenzie, Earl of.

An historical Account of the Conspiracies by the Earls of Gowry, and Robert Logan of Restalrig,...

First edition, dedicated to Queen Anne, ‘and to all the Princes who share in her royal blood’. The Vindication of Robert III was first published in 1695.

£150

D’ISRAELI, Isaac.

Romances …

London: Printed for Cadell and Davies … Murray and Highley … J. Harding … and J. Wright. 1799.

First edition, a collection of three prose tales by the father of the novelist and Prime Minister, with an introductory ‘Poetical Essay on Romance and Romancers’. The longest piece is ‘Mejnoun and Leila, the Arabian Petrarch and Laura’, which has echoes of Beckford and draws on the learned orientalism...

£950

D’URFEY, Thomas.

The Progress of Honesty: or, a View of a Court and City. A Pindarique Poem …

London: Printed for Joseph Hindmarsh … 1681.

First edition of an allegorical poem inspired, like Dryden’s Absalom and Achitophel, by the Exclusion Crisis of 1681. ‘Honesty’ describes to ‘Error’, ‘Faction’ and ‘Beauty’ the court of Charles II (‘Titus the Second … the joy of human kind’), and the malign effects of Treason...

£300

[JUVENILE.] DAY, Thomas.

The History of Sandford and Merton, abridged from the Original. Embellished with elegant Plates … Third...

London:

Third edition of Richard Johnson’s abridgement of Day’s most famous and most enduring children’s book (1783, with sequels in 1786 and 1789), first published in this form in 1790. ESTC shows three copies of the first edition; five of the second; and BL and UCLA only of this third; Roscoe adds a...

£200

DENNIS, John.

The Grounds of Criticism in Poetry, contain’d in some new Discoveries never made before, requisite for the Writing...

London, Printed for Geo. Strahan … and Bernard Lintott … 1704.

First edition. Published as a ‘preliminary’ to a proposed, but never completed, masterwork, The Grounds of Criticism in Poetry comprises a Preface, Proposal and ‘Specimen’, the latter being an essay substantially on Milton, ‘one of the greatest and most daring Genius’s that has appear’d...

£1250

DIBDIN, C[harles], the younger.

Mirth and Metre: consisting of Poems, serious, humorous, and satirical; Songs, Sonnets, Ballads,...

London: Printed for Vernor, Hood, and Sharpe ... by W. Wilson. 1807

First edition of the first collection of verse by the manager of Sadler’s Wells, including a section of songs from his ‘most approved’ pantomimes and ‘scenic’ productions. The ticket of a Newark bookseller makes it likely that the stamp ‘Newstead’ refers to Byron’s ancestral home, Newstead...

£225

DICKENS, Charles.

Mäster Humphreys Klocka … Förra [–Sednare] Delen.

Stockholm, Hos. L. J. Hjerta, 1842.

First edition in Swedish, very rare, of Master Humphrey’s Clock (1840-1), comprising the framing narrative of short stories, followed by The Old Curiosity Shop (‘Den Gamla Antiqvitets-boden’). Barnaby Rudge, omitted here, was published separately in 1845.

£850

DILWORTH, W. H.

The History of the Conquest of Mexico, by the celebrated Hernan Cortes. Containing a faithful and entertaining...

London: Printed for William Anderson … 1759.

First edition, very scarce, of a history of the conquistadores for young readers, loosely derived from Antonio Solís de Ribadeneyra’s Historia de la Conquista de México.

£1850

[DISNEY, John].

Memoirs of Thomas Brand-Hollis Esq. ...

London: Printed by T. Gillet ... 1808.

First edition of a privately printed memoir of Thomas Brand of the Hyde, who assumed the name Brand-Hollis on inheriting the Dorset estates (and library and collection of sculpture) of his friend the ‘Republican’ Thomas Hollis, the Whig bibliophile. The author, John Disney, a close friend of Thomas...

£750

DUTENS, Louis.

An Inquiry into the Origin of the Discoveries attributed to the Moderns: wherein it is demonstrated, that our most...

London: Printed for W. Griffin … 1769.

First edition in English of Recherches sur l’origine des découvertes attribuées aux modernes (Paris, 1766), an illuminating and voluminous study of how ‘in almost all truths of the greatest importance, the ancients preceded the moderns; or at least pointed out, or prepared the way, for their...

£300

FIDDES, Richard.

A General Treatise of Morality, form’d upon the Principles of natural Reason only. With a Preface in Answer...

London: Printed for S. Billingsley … 1724.

First edition, the variant with the misprint ‘FIDDFS’ in the author’s name on the title. ‘Written against Shaftesbury’s Inquiry Concerning Virtue and Mandeville’s Fable of the Bees, and displaying marked sympathy with the works of Malebranche and [John] Norris of Bemerton, this book was a...

£850

FIELDING, Henry.

The History of Tom Jones, a Foundling …

Paris: Printed by Fr. Amb. Didot the eldest, and sold by J. N. Pissot, and Barrois Junior … Booksellers. 1780.

The first French edition in English of Fielding’s masterpiece, only the second English edition to be printed abroad (after Dresden, 1774). Here the text benefits from critical attention by Didot, who collated Murphy’s edition of Fielding’s Works with the last separate English edition.

£425

[FRYER, Michael, editor.]

The Trial and Life of Eugene Aram; several of his Letters and Poems; and his Plan and Specimens of an...

Richmond: Printed by and for M. Bell … 1832

First edition. The unfortunate Yorkshire schoolmaster Eugene Aram, implicated with the shoemaker Daniel Clark in fraud in 1745, and twelve years later accused of Clark’s murder, was convicted and hanged in 1759. While in prison in York, without books and papers, he produced the Plan and Specimens published...

£100

GAY, John.

The Distress’d Wife. A Comedy. By the late Mr. Gay, Author of the Beggar’s Opera.

London: Printed for Thomas Astley … 1743.

First edition, the issue with no press figures on pp. 8, 39, press figure p. 56: 3 (no priority). Gay’s comedy of the sexes revolves around Sir Thomas Willit’s attempts to inveigle his wife to leave London for the country, in order to reign-in her expenditure. Lady Willit abhors the idea, ‘Sure...

£350

GENUINE ACCOUNT (A)

of the Life and Actions of James Maclean, Highwayman, to the Time of his Trial and receiving Sentence at the...

London, W. Falstaff, [1750].

First edition, the scarcer of two contemporary pamphlet biographies of the ‘gentleman highwayman’ James Maclaine (1724-1750). The son of a Scottish Presbyterian minister, Maclaine, having squandered an early inheritance and his wife’s money, joined up with a down-at-luck apothecary, William Plunkett,...

£1250

GLAISTER, Elizabeth.

The Perfect Path. A Novel … in two Volumes …

London, Smith, Elder, & Co. … 1884.

First and only edition, scarce. The novel opens among a group of English expatriates in Mentone on the French Riviera, where Colonel Ashby wastes money at Monte Carlo. His spirited, ‘slangy’ and distinctly wayward daughter, Cordelia, is invited to live with her aunt in rural England, where her greatest...

£450

[GRANVILLE, George, Baron Lansdowne].

Poems upon several Occasions.

London: Printed for J. Tonson … 1712.

First edition; containing ‘all the Poems which have been written by the Right Honourable George Granville Lord Lansdown, very few of which have been ever before printed’. Granville (1666-1735) wrote his first play, The She-Gallants, at age 15, and his adaptation of Shakespeare, The Jew...

£350

[GRATTAN, Thomas Colley].

The Heiress of Bruges; a Tale of the Year Sixteen Hundred … In four Volumes …

London: Henry Colburn and Richard Bentley … 1830.

First edition of Grattan’s first novel, a sprawling historical romance set in the Low Countries during the time of Spanish occupation, charting the fortunes of the eponymous heiress and her numerous suitors alongside the military upsets of the period. It was ‘one of the best historical romances of...

£450

HALL, Major Herbert Byng.

The Adventures of a Bric-a-Brac Hunter …

London: Tinsley Brothers … 1868.

First edition of a charming travel guide to Europe for the dilletante porcelain collector; some of the sketches that make up the book first appeared in the Belgravia magazine.

£275

HAY, William.

Mount Caburn. A Poem. Humbly inscribed to Her Grace the Dutchess of Newcastle …

London: Printed for J. Stagg … 1730.

First edition. Hay’s only original poetic composition, Mount Caburn is a celebration of his native Sussex, historical, antiquarian and archaeological, as viewed from a hill fort on the South Downs near Lewes. The poem is dedicated to Henrietta Pelham-Holles, wife of the secretary of state, hinting...

£375