Search Results: Titles starting with S from Hordern House Rare Books

London: Imray, 1881. Main work: Slight split to lower joint at foot, significant browning or staining to text from p. 150 on, text loose in binding but holding. Second and third editions present but damaged and/or imperfect.. Octavo, [6, mispaginated i-iv, iv)], 232 pp. Frontispiece map/chart of San Juan Del Sur; woodcut illustrations in the text. Original blindstamped cloth, upper cover lettered in gilt, later paper backstrip laid on the cloth, with title. Extremely scarce first three editions (of three), and a significant gathering of sailing directions for those bound to California and the West Coast during the age of the clipper ship. Though all three are to some extent damaged and/or imperfect, nonetheless they contain a plethora of early maps of coastal ports and harbours from Canada to Central America. Barrett lists the 1868 edition (#1296) but not the 1853 first appearance. The last copy of the 1853 edition at auction made $1560 in 2015. .

London: Parker, 23 January, 1836. Fine.. Quarto, pp. [25]-32, disbound. The article is reprinted from the Western Australian of January 1835. It describes the skill of two indigenous trackers - "Migo" and "Molly-Dobbin" who found a lost child after a long and frustrating search through 22 miles of dunes and thick scrub. The trackers persevere when hope is perishing, and are delighted 'beyond all conception' when the boy is finally found. This heartening account was widely reprinted at the time, including in Irwin's State and Position of Western Australia (London 1835). .

London: Seeley, Service and Company, 1929. The back board is mildly damp affected.. Octavo, frontispiece, fifteen ethnographic photo-plates, folding map, publisher's gilt cloth; bold bookseller's stamp on front endpaper, a handsome and attractive copy nonetheless. A somewhat racy account of native life in the Solomons, more anecdotal than anthropological, with much interesting observation. .

London: Harris, 1821. Head and tail of spine chipped.. Octavo with a folding frontispice map, 84 hand-coloured engravings on 28 plates (three on each); original printed boards. Second edition of this children's study of Asian lands. Each engraving is numbered and complimented by a corresponding description. The pictures and text cover a number of Asian countries, touching on their history, geography and culture. For example the the scenes which accompany the description of China include an image of the Great Wall, the gathering of leaves of a tea plant, and the feast of Lanterns. .

Venice: Battista Recurti, 1750. A fine set.. Two volumes, quarto, with a total of 62 plates (including three letterpress tables numbered in series), contemporary full vellum with gilt lettered labels. Well-preserved compendium of articles on science and technology, including a splendid array of engraved plates illustrating many different aspects of eighteenth-century science. 'Illustrations of particular interest are those of units of measurement, the pendulum, electrostatical machines, the pointing of mortar, the compressed air-gun, the refraction of light rays, and chyliferous vessels in man. In short Scienza della Natura presents a complete and ordered picture of the state of scientific knowledge in its time' (DSB). Giovanni della Torre (c. 1710-1782) was a prominent teacher of natural science and physics at Italian universities. A man of varied pursuits, della Torre is remembered for his improvement and simplification of the microscope, and as the author of a later separately published book on… Read More

Leipzig: Maurits Georg Weidmann (literis Christophori Guntheri), 1691. Two volumes in one, folio, title-pages in black and red with vignettes of terrestrial and celestial spheres; contemporary sprinkled calf, spine lettered in gilt and panelled in gilt between raised bands. A splendid printing in Greek and roman types, mostly in parallel, of the surviving works of Dionysius Halicarnassensis, the Greek historian and rhetorician who moved to Rome around 30 BCE and flourished during the reign of Augustus Caesar. He spent two decades studying Latin and its literature and preparing to write his substantial history of Rome (''Roman Antiquities''), which told the history of Rome from the mythical period to the beginning of the First Punic War. More than half the original work survived into the age of printing and some of the remainder was recovered as quotations in the works of others. He argued in favour of the rule of Rome, maintaining that the Romans were the true descendants of the original Greeks. He… Read More

Copenhagen: Ernst Henrich Berling, 1743. Joints skilfully repaired.. Folio, with woodcut headpieces, tailpieces, and initials, engraved allegorical frontispiece and 68 full-page plates, mostly showing various formations, manoeuvring, and engagements of naval fleets; title-page with oval library stamp of "Søe Officerernes Bibliothek Stempel"; a fine, fresh copy in an attractive contemporary calf binding, decorative gilt borders to sides with the cipher of King Christian VII of Denmark at the centre. A wonderful royal copy of this splendid naval work. This is the first edition of this important Danish work on naval manoeuvres, loosely based on the French classic L'Art des Armées Navales by Père Paul l'Hoste, first published in Lyons in 1697. Instructions are given for the fleet to sail out in an orderly formation, deploy for battle in line or column, retreat, cope with foul weather, and so on. The fine and detailed engravings illustrate how the ships of a fleet should shift from one formation to… Read More

London: G. and W.B. Whittaker, 1823. Occasional foxing, lightly rubbed at extremities.. Tall quarto, copperplate engraved music and text; contemporary half calf, a very handsome copy, the spine gilt and with an unusual triple "harlequin" set of labels in red, white & blue. First edition of this early collection of the patriotic ditties and rollicking shanties of the British navy: a fascinating and important record of the conditions of the Georgian sailor. Many of the songs had a lasting influence on the spirit of the navy, especially during the protracted war with France. Each is present in an engraved musical score with lyrics. The collection was put together by the prolific Charles Dibdin (1745-1815). His son Thomas, in a brief biographical notice appended to the 1850 collective edition of his father's sea-songs, remarked: 'These songs have been the solace of sailors in long voyages, in storms, in battles; and they have been quoted in mutinies to the restoration of order and discipline'. Readers… Read More

Paris: Hachette, 1864. Some moderate foxing yet very good.. Two volumes, octavo, with a world map and splendid folding engraved view of the Himalayas; contemporary green quarter roan, flat spines with gilt lettering. Endearing account of a world voyage, including a sojourn in Victoria, by eccentric traveller and mountaineer Henry Russell (1834-1909). Henry Patrice Marie - Count Russell-Killough - was born in France of Irish descent. A comfortable inheritance left Russell free to travel and pursue his love of mountaineering. This book recounts his travels across the globe; including Siberia, central Asia, Nepal, East Asia and Hong Kong, before sailing for Australia and New Zealand. Three chapters are concerned with the author's stay in Victoria, with notes on the Ballarat, Maryborough and Castlemaine mines. Russell recounts his impressions of day-to-day life, including Chinese miners, the culture of personal liberty and intemperance of colonial life. The travel notes are interspersed with… Read More

Sydney: Government Printer, 1860. Fine. Single foolscap sheet. Petition by one Lei Afoo, protesting against confiscation of opium, and financial hardship resulting thereof, presented to the Legislative Assembly, April 1860. .

Sydney: Government Printer, 1859. Single foolscap sheet, fine. This sheet acknowledges receipt by Legislative Assembly of petition signed by 400 members of the Sydney Chamber of Commerce regarding the overly-harsh punishment of one Captain Johnson, master of the American vessel "Kate Hooper", and other merchants, relative to the confiscation of contraband opium. .

London: Kegan Paul, 1889. Octavo, engraved frontispiece; in a stunning Zaehnsdorf binding. First edition thus: collected edition of some of the lighter verse by the diplomat and author Matthew Prior. .

London: J.Webber, June 4, 1784. Very good.. Stipple engraving, oval 120 x 95 mm, printed in sepia; a proof before letters; mounted. Rare proof impression before letters of John Webber's and Francesco Bartolozzi's fine oval portrait of Captain Cook. This portrait has a very large margin, unusual for this decorative oval shape, which is perhaps more often seen clipped to fit an oval frame. The original portrait of Cook was painted by Webber in 1776 and has been in London's National Portrait Gallery since 1858. Webber had collaborated with Bartolozzi earlier in 1784 to execute his famous depiction of the death of Cook, and the relationship was evidently a happy one, as they also issued the rare oval version of the depiction of Cook's death as well as this portrait. It is fair to say that the original painting of Cook has not met with universal acclaim: Beaglehole claims that on first viewing Mrs Cook exclaimed 'Who is that low villain?' (Beaglehole, On the Character of Captain James Cook, p. 418).… Read More

London: Dickinson Brothers, 1852. In good condition in original binding.. Large folio, 4 pp. (title and text) and nine images on eight coloured lithograph plates; original printed wrapper with red cloth backstrip, preserved in a solander case. One of the finest Pacific illustrated books of the nineteenth century. This is a beautiful copy of the rare coloured issue, complete in the original illustrated wrappers. The superb handcoloured lithographs are by the naval commander Richard Aldworth Oliver. Oliver (1811-1889) commanded the HMS Fly on survey voyages of New Zealand and Pacific waters between 1847 and 1851, including acting as escort to Selwyn's schooner Undine to New Caledonia and the New Hebrides in 1849. It was during these voyages that he observed the Māori people first-hand and recorded the New Zealand and New Caledonian landscape for this publication. Various Māori and Pacific island artefacts collected by Oliver during his travels have recently appeared for sale (Christie's London 15… Read More

London: James Hodson, 1816. A few scattered stains affect the title page, a good copy overall.. Quarto, disbound. Sermon delivered in the aftermath of the Littleport riots of 1816 on the Isle of Ely. The riots arose from inflation following the Napoleonic Wars that drove the price of bread and other necessities beyond the reach of the labouring poor. During the subsequent trial, the position of Chief Justice of the Isle of Ely was Edward Christian, brother of the Bounty mutineer Fletcher Christian. Edward Christian's competence as a magistrate was repeatedly challenged in the course of his career yet his wide knowledge of legal history earned him a Cambridge professorship. The sermon here printed was delivered to a congregation of prominent Ely residents by the parson Sir Henry Bate Dudley, who earlier instigated the suppression of the rioters. The trial resulted in the execution of five rioters, a spectacle that elicited great sympathy from the gathered crowd in a charged political atmosphere. A… Read More

London: Privately Printed, 1916. A very good copy.. Octavo, original wrappers, uncut, partly unopened. A very good copy of the only edition, with pencil revisions to several poems, probably by Baylebridge himself. Christened Blocksidge, the Australian poet and short story writer is better known as William Baylebridge, the name he took without legal change soon after 1925. He went to England in 1908, and travelled extensively on the Continent. He published several volumes in England, most privately printed. He was openly influenced by the writings of Friedrich Nietzsche, which led him to develop a mystic nationalism as early as 1913. He returned to Queensland in 1919, but soon after settled in Sydney. He had few friends, guarded his privacy rigorously, shunned literary society, resolutely refused nearly all invitations for publication in anthologies, and was regarded by many as a mysterious recluse. As the Australian Dictionary of Biography notes, he 'wrote continually, revised constantly and… Read More

Melbourne, 1880. In very good original condition.. Watercolour on paper, 355 x 540mm, mounted and framed; signed lower right. A lovely example of Ashton's atmospheric watercolours, illustrating his sensitive use of colour and light; the steam ships and the warehouses beyond are painted delicately at sunrise when the light is especially soft, whilst the Yarra River is bathed in a shimmering glow of subtle colour. This was one of six works that Ashton exhibited in the tenth exhibition of the "Victorian Academy of Arts" in 1880. Catalogue number 117 was, "Shipping on the Yarra, early morning". All his works drew high praise: "In each the artist has succeeded in exhibiting comparatively common place objects under a poetic aspect, without doing violence to nature; and in all he proves himself to have a remarkably fine eye for colour" Julian Rossi Ashton (1851-1942) had exhibited at the Royal Academy of Arts, London before emigrating to Australia in 1878. He lived in Melbourne for five years before moving… Read More

London: Printed for H.D. Symonds and Curtis, 1805. Some spotting and embrowning, but a good copy.. Octavo, six engraved plates in the first work, and one folding engraved plate by Bauer in the second work; contemporary half calf (restored). One of remarkably few works by Joseph Banks to have appeared in print. Despite his general pre-eminence in scientific and enlightenment London, and despite having been one of the most prolific correspondents known, Banks was remarkably shy of print and hardly anything was published over his name. He had a particular interest in agricultural crops. He became alerted to the increasing problem of blight in wheat and corn in 1804 and, in the face of a devastating drop in the harvest that year, worked with Franz Bauer (Ferdinand Bauer's elder brother) in examining and recording specimens in an attempt to discover the means by which the disease was transmitted. "Blight" or "rust" in wheat and corn was a problem for farmers both in England and abroad, including… Read More

London: J. Debrett, 1787. Octavo; a little light spotting but a very nice copy in old half roan. An ironic (and sometimes biting) commentary on the political state of Britain by Sir Nathaniel Wraxall, including a savage attack on Lord Sydney and the First Fleet set for Botany Bay. Wraxall was a contemporary of Townshend in parliament, and the two men locked horns on a number of issues including the contentious scheme for a penal colony in New South Wales. This edition, the seventh "with additions", as well as the sixth edition of the same year, are the only two versions to contain the long passage on pages 77-83, which is in fact one of the earliest printed references to transportation to Botany Bay. Overall, Wraxall is scathing in his opinion of sending felons to the 'extreme verge of Nature' and likens the scheme to the fabled land of Lilliput by Swift. Lord Sydney comes under heavy fire; indeed Wraxall condemns him as downright incompetent in handling the most basic issues. Regarding the departure… Read More

Paris, 1814. Folio, 320 x 205 mm, manuscript in ink on first page of a bifolium, the other 3 pp blank; (accompanied by an earlier note by Rosily). Formal letter from the Napoleonic minister Fontanes, thanking Admiral Rosily, head of the Dépôt de la Marine, for having presented him with "l'Atlas du Voyage du Capitaine Baudin aux terres australes". This refers to the hydrographical atlas of the 1800-1804 Baudin voyage to Australia, with its accompanying text, the work of Louis and Henri de Freycinet, publication of which was formally completed in 1815. Since this letter is dated 26 December 1814 it must be acknowledging an early pre-publication presentation. The rarest part of the official account of the Baudin voyage, the hydrographical section of the voyage with its glorious Atlas was the first full atlas of the Australian coastline. Not only was it the distinguished rival of Flinders' more famous (because English) Atlas but it also substantially preceded the English work's appearance. The text… Read More