Continental Books

A scarce novel telling of the adventures of an impressionable young man who, on the death of his father, comes to Paris to seek his fortune and enlist in the army. His mind full of romances and fairy tales, he immediately falls in love with his aunt by marriage, who is the only person in Paris to offer him any help and who, miraculously, falls for him with an equally fiery passion. The rest of the novel recounts his various adventures in the army and in fashionable Paris society. Olimpe, the aunt, pops in and out of the narrative throughout, but so do numerous other sirens, most notably cousin Emilie. This is the first work by the marquis du Terrail, lieutenant general of Verdun. He wrote one other novel, La Princesse de Gonsague, 1756, and a tragedie called Lagus, roi d'Egypte, 1754, as well as publishing his plans for the erection of statues of Louis XIV, entitled Projet relatif à la noblesse, au militaire et à l'établissement de deux places pour les statues équestre et pédestre de S. M. Louis XIV, 1750.

A delightfully printed selection of fables glorying in a profusion of typographical decoration from the Quillau press, at this point run by Quillau’s widow. This scarce first appearance of Delacour Damonville’s work consists entirely of poems in the form of quatrains. It contains 150 fables, followed by 50 Maxims, a final Epilogue, Envoi and Réponse and a concluding quatrain ‘Au Critique’. The work is preface by a dedication, to a ‘M***’, also in the form of a quatrain, and quatrains addressed to the Reader, to Critics and to Children. Two final introductory poems (quatrains, of course) provide a portrait of Aesop and the ‘Dessein de la Fable’. The charm and wonder of this work is two fold: in the simplicity of form, adhered to throughout, and in the luxuriance of typographical ornament abounding on every page.
This appears to have been Delacour Damonville’s only work: it is the only entry in Cioranescu and we have been unable to discover anything else about the author. A new edition by Joseph Barbou was published in 1756 with the subtitle ‘à l’usage des enfans’, which would tie in with the dedicatory verse ‘Aux Enfants’ included among the preliminary quatrains. A further edition appeared in 1761 and was accompanied by plates, though it would be hard to beat the simple charm of the presentation of this first edition.

A fascinating educational work on logic written in French by the Italian nobleman Fortunato de Felice, philosopher, scientist, leading publisher (he founded the Typographic Society of Bern as well as the press at Yverdon) and pioneer of education in Switzerland. A prolific writer on many subjects, he is chiefly remembered for the Encyclopédie d’Yverdon, which grew out of the educational establishment for young people that he had founded in 1762 at the same time as the printing press. As well as editing the encyclopaedia, he contributed more than 800 articles to it on a wide variety of philosophical, theological and scientific subjects. He wrote a number of educational works of considerable importance and also translated numerous authors including Descartes, d’Alembert, Newton and Maupertuis into Italian as well as works by Burlamaqui, Albrecht von Haller, Winckleman and many others into French.
Fortunato de Felice’s Leçons de Logique, which are suitably arranged into a logical array of parts, chapters and sub-divisions, present a kind of manual of rational thought: in its 28 clearly-presented lessons, it has been much praised as one of the best examples of this genre in French. ‘Il est assez singulier que nous soyons redevables à un étranger de la meilleure logique que nous ayons en françois’ (Elie Fréron, cited in Perret, Les Imprimeries d’Yverdon aux XVII et XVIIIe siècle, p. 188).
This work was printed at Fortunato de Felice’s own press in Yverdon in the same year that the first two volumes of his 48 volume Encyclopédie d’Yverdon were published.

A lovely, fresh copy of this antiquarian study of a newly discovered Bamberg incunable, Historie van Joseph, Daniel, Judith und Esther, 1462. An unsophisticated copy in original condition with wide margins and five wonderful plates.
Camus was an ardent revolutionary whose zeal for social and political reform was only matched by his enthusiasm for bibliography and literature. In 1789, he was appointed by the Estates General as archivist of the Commission des archives, from which role he founded the Archives Nationales which he presided over until his death. An indefatigable speaker in the National Assembly and one of its earliest presidents, his legal background gave an authority to his speeches and he was called on to speak more than any other elected member: he is said to have addressed the Assembly more than 600 times, over a hundred more than the next most frequent speaker. Extreme in his political opinions, he was heavily involved in the Civil Constitution of the Clergy, in cancelling payments of annates to the papacy and, in 1791, in abolishing titles of nobility. At the trial of Louis XVI, he voted for ‘death without appeal and without reprieve’.

A good copy of a scarce Munich dissertation on the classification of the sciences, presented under the supervision of the Benedictine philosopher, Leonardo Neumayr and drawing on the work of Moses Mendelsohn, Condillac, Plattner and Wolff. Opening with a section on Logic, the dissertation is neatly presented in clear sections and puts forward a scheme for the division of the sciences. Further sections are devoted to the study of Ontology, Psychology, Natural Theology and Mathematics.

The scarce first edition of this translation into Italian by an unknown female writer, ‘Madamigella ****’, of Jean Pey’s reworking of Young’s Night Thoughts, first published as Le Sage dans la solitude, Paris, Guillot, 1787. Pey’s original preface is included (in Italian), in which he explains the process of his translation and of how his original intention of presenting a simple translation came by degrees to be an almost entirely new composition, as he found passages that needed to be suppressed or remade, leaving little of the original work. He therefore decided ‘to make a new work, keeping the same titles, the same tone, and more or less the same order, inserting several passages [of Young’s] that seemed to merit inclusion’. Other prefatory material includes an editor’s note to the reader, speaking of the ‘cultured lady’ who made the translation in her ‘idle hours’, a letter from the lady accompanying her translation and two other letters written in response.
Jean Pey was a canon at the Cathedral of Notre Dame in Paris who wrote a number of popular devotional works as well as several works of apologetics. As stated above, Pey has retained Young’s format for the present series of devotions, which comprise twelve meditations on spiritual subjects: God as eternal, omnipotent, God the creator, God as infinitely wise. Also as in Young’s original, the work is presented in two aspects, that of wakefulness and that of sleep. The female translator of the present work remains unidentified.
FirstSearch notes an earlier Italian translation by Lodovico Antonio Loschi, Il savio in solitudine, 1783, which it claims to be a translation of Pey’s work. However, the text of Loschi’s version is entirely different to the present work, which seems to be a direct translation of Le Sage dans la Solitude, ou Meditations religieuses sur divers sujets, par l’Auteur des Nuits d’Young, Londres 1771. As well as the different subtitle, this earlier French version does not have Pey’s name on the title-page and it seems likely that the FirstSearch attribution is erroneous.

A fabulous set of what appear to be designs for opera productions, though they also have been produced for theatre. The set comprises 31 watercolours depicting characters in full costume, including soldiers, sailors, servants and elegant gentlemen as well as seven designs for female characters, notably Carmen and Mercedes, with some flamboyant and very elegant costumes. The later two names suggest a performance of Bizet’s Carmen, while other characters such as Rinaldo might be from Handel’s opera of the same name.

Apparently the only edition of this collection of anthems and patriotic songs printed in Strasbourg for the German-speaking population of the French Rhineland. The repurposing of well-known folk tunes for republican songs was a popular practice in the Revolution, but this appears to be one of the first to have been published for use in German-speaking regions of France. While the French-language equivalent of this kind of work would have used almost entirely folk songs, Lamey turns also to Lutheranism for his inspiration: ‘Ein feste Burg’ provides the tune for ‘Lied von der Republic’, while the patriotic hymn ‘An den Schöpfer’ is sung to ‘Wie schön leuchtet der Morgenstern’.
This copy has a wonderfully elaborate calligraphic ownership inscription on the front free endpaper, translating as ‘This Song Book, written following the New Constitution, belongs to Frau Susanna Katharina Hammännin of Oberhaüßbergen. Written on the ninth of Frimaire in the third year of the Republic’.

An apparently unrecorded edition of this popular work on children’s education by Saint Jean-Baptiste de la Salle, educational reformer, priest and founder of the Institue of the Brothers of the Christian Schools. He is celebrated by the Catholic Church as the Patron Saint of Teachers of Youth. He was also related to Claude Moët, founder of Moët & Chandon. Unpopular during his lifetime for his insistence on bridging the social divide, for devoting his life to the education of the children of artisans and the poor - and for inviting teachers to live in his house so that he could train them - La Salle’s legacy continues today with over 1000 educational centres worldwide.
The first part of his text is devoted to the body, encouraging cleanliness and good manners and warning against frowning, nose picking, knuckle-cracking and spitting. In the second part he proceeds to discuss clothes, diet and recreation, including social conventions, basic habits of honesty and the solving of disagreements. In a curious final section he lists easily confused words, such as ‘bois’ for wood and ‘bois’ for I drink.
This edition was printed by Anne-Charles-François-Bonaventure Poignant, bookseller, bookbinder, playing card and second hand clothes seller, and Chartres’ first lithographic printer. His published output includes a catechism, a Latin grammar and a Psalter, all for the use of local schoolchildren.

A scarce dramatised account of the life, imprisonment and death of young Louis-Charles (1785-1795), son of Louis XVI and Marie Antoinette and briefly titular King of France as Louis XVII following his father’s execution in 1793. Born four years before the French Revolution, he was imprisoned in the Temple Prison with the parents in 1792. Following his father’s execution, he was removed from his mother and put under the care of the cobler and representative of the Paris commune, Antoine Simon, in the hopes that he could be ‘retrained’ and become sympathetic to revolutionary ideals. The harsh and unsanitary conditions in which he was kept undermined his health and died of scrofula a few months after his tenth birthday.
This account, by the German philosopher Gosch, focusses on Louis-Charles’ life after 1791 and includes a number of key figures from his life, not only both his parents, but also his sister, his governess the Marquise de Tourzel, the cruel Antoine Simon and his wife, a friendly monk who brought succour to the royal family, and Maximilien Robespierre. The striking frontispiece shows the young prince dying in his bed and raising his hands to heaven: ‘I have had much to suffer, yet have done nothing bad’. Ironically, it was only a few years after publication of this book that Gosch himself was to die in captivity, in Rendsburg prison.

A very attractive little almanac and a scarce one. As well as the calendar and numerous tables, this little compendium provides lists of the public and private libraries of Paris, giving their dates of foundation and founders’ names as well as detailing the number of books held by each library and specifying the addresses and opening hours. The almanac is illustrated with a number of attractive vignettes, including, as well as the standard pastoral genre, several rather more unusual scenes, such as the pipe-smoking cherub who is also a merchant (in the section ‘marine et commerce). In the section devoted to ‘l’Imprimerie’, there is a vignette of two cherubs working the press.

An attractive copy of a scarce anti-Jansenist work by the Catalan Jesuit Francesco Gusta who had moved to Italy following the expulsion of the Jesuits from Spain. Gusta discusses the Synod of Pistoia of 1786 - ‘the most daring effort ever made to secure for Jansenism... a foothold in Italy’ (Catholic Encyclopedia) - and targets some of the leading figures involved. The Synod had been summoned by the Bishop of Pistoia, Scipione de’ Ricci, under whose influence a number of Enlightenment style decrees were adopted, only to be condemned by Pope Pius VI in his bull Auctorem difei, 1794. In this work Gusta attacks Ricci and the Jansenist theologian Pietro Tamburini for their part in the Synod. He concludes with a translation of the papal bull that ‘dealt the death blow’ to the influence of Jansenism in Italy.

Two orations written in celebration of the elevation to the role of Doge of Venice by two Venetian dignitaries. This was an interesting time in the history of Venice, with the war against Austrian-funded pirates raging as well as the threat of Spanish invasion. The Doges being celebrated are Giovanni Bembo (1543-1618), who was elected the 92nd Doge on 2nd December 1615, and of Antonio Priuli (1548-1623), the 94th Doge, who was elevated in May 1618 and remained in office until his death. Vianello is described as the ambassador from Chioggia and Grigis, described as ‘il Morlacco’, dedicates his speech to Felice Nola, ‘canonico d’albe de Marsi’. This is a charming object, the Grigis oration embellished with hand-painted arms on the outer wrapper and both speeches preserved at some later date in a wallet-style vellum binding.

A scarce and elegantly printed collection of sonnets on the subject of a debt of the sum of three giuli. Giovanni Battista Casti was the author of a number of opera libretti, some of which, such as his most famous, Cublai, gran Kan de’ tartari, 1788, were set by Salieri. Casti dedicates the work to Cecilia Mahony Giustiniani (1740-1789), who was a Naples-born protegée of James III and who was painted by Pompeo Batoni in 1785.

Provenance: Edward H. Bunbury (1811-1885), fellow of Trinity College, Cambridge, best known for his work on the study of geography among the ancients.

An excellent set with an illustrious female provenance of this important faux mémoire telling of Paris social life and the sentimental education of the eponymous hero. With a preface addressed to his father, this was one of Crébillon fils’ earliest literary triumphs and was widely read - the Earl of Shaftesbury is known to have read it - and translated into English as The wanderings of the heart and mind, London, 1751. These three volumes represent the scarce first editions, the first volume printed in Paris by Prault and the subsequent two volumes printed in the Hague by Gosse and Neaulme. The work was an overnight best-seller and editions were published frequently for the next half century or so. It was also included in the Bibliothèque du campagne, 1738-42 and in the Bibliothèque universelle des romans, 1786. The first volume is more often found with later editions of the second and third volumes.
‘A text which readers, scholars, and historians have continued to revisit, if not for the early modern circumvoluted beauty of the sentences, then for clues about the tacit system of rules associated with the liaisons of Parisian aristocrats during the Regency and early years of Louis XV’s reign’ (Ganofsky, Marine, The Literary Encyclopedia, 2017).

Provenance: i.) Elisabeth Farnese, Queen of Spain (1692-1766), by marriage to Philip V. Described by her biographer as a ‘termagent’. ii.) Ownership inscription of J.M. Waugh, with the note in his hand: ‘Les Egaremens du Coeur se sont egarés des mains du Roi de l’Espagne entre celles de J.M. Waugh’. iii.) Another hand continues the note, ‘et ensuite entre les mains de J. Redshaw(?)’. iv.) With the bookplate of William Charles Flack in each volume.

A scarce classically-inspired ‘roman galant’ by the Poitiers-born soldier and novelist, Louis Moreau du Bail, and an early example of the genre. Du Bail’s prolific output, though not didactic, was intended as an inspirational and moral celebration of romantic love. About half of his thirteen known novels, including the present, have a classical inspiration, and many of these are notable for their strong heroines. In this novel, the heroine is modelled on the fictitious illegitimate daughter of King Henry III of France and tells the story of her two marriages, the betrayal by her second husband and her subsequent ruin, captivity and escape from execution. Not much is known about Du Bail, except that he was a soldier and a novelist: ‘Un écuyer poitevin de confession catholique, né certainement avant 1600, qui connut la vie militaire et a captivité: telles sont les maigres indications que nous pouvons ramasser’ (Alain Niderst). This is the sixth of his known thirteen novels, which were published between 1622 and 1646. ‘[Son] inspiration est toujours élévée. Il veut porter le lecteur au repentir, à la pénitence, à la retraite’ (Joseph Salvat in Dictionnaire des Lettres Françaises, XVII Siècle, 401).
This is a stunning copy from the libraries of the marquis de Tugny and, later, the duchesse de Gramont, bibliophile and patron of the arts whose library of some 3,000 volumes was dispersed during the French Revolution after she was guillotined. ‘En dehors d’éminentes qualités qui appartiennent à l’histoire, son goût pour les choses de l’art et le soin éclairé qu’elle apporta dans la composition de sa belle bibliothèque, la désignent encore à l’attention des curieux et des lettrés... Les livres de la ducesse de Gramont sont reliés simplement, mais avec une certaine élégance. Le soin avec lequel a été exécuté le corps d’ouvrage justifie l’empressement dont ils sont l’objet de la part des bilbliophiles et les prix quelquefois élevés qu’ils obtiennent’ (Ernest Quentin-Bauchart).

Provenance:
1. Joseph-Antoine Crozat, marquis de Tugny (1696-1751), this work no. 2426 in his catalogue and bearing his inscription, ‘Ex Bibliotheca D. Crozat’, on the verso of the title-page.
2. Béatrix de Choiseul-Stainville, duchesse de Gramont (1730-1794), with her arms on the binding.

The scarce first edition of a delightful attempt to reconcile biblical truths with modern enlightened philosophy, heavily influenced by the works of David Hartley. Presented in three books, addressing human existence, the passions and ethics. In the first section, human existence is divided into physical characteristics, the soul and the effects of original sin, in the second, the passions are deemed to include all human desires and temptations including love, ambition, the thirst for knowledge etc. In the final section, the author begins with a statement of the equality of man and goes on to discuss original sin and natural vices as well as more elevated things like art, culture, music and languages, as well as political power and the legal system.

Giuseppe Gorini Corio was a playwright and philosopher from Lombardy. His attempt to justify contemporary enlightened thought through the bible was sadly not met with the reaction he may have hoped for and this work was placed on the Index in 1759. Following this, a French translation appeared as L’anthropologie in 1761.

A charming copy of this collection of erotic epigrams, engraved throughout in a delicate script and accompanied by a handsome frontispiece. This is the first of two companion volumes to the original La légende joyeuse, first published in 1749, with Seconde suite de la Légende Joyeuse following in 1751. The epigrams are by several authors, including Jean-Baptiste Rousseau, Ferrand, Grécourt and Piron. Gay says of the style of poetry: ‘Pour citer une de ces petites pièces nous sommes bien embarrassé, car elles sont généralement fort libres’. In keeping with this, it is worth noting that the imprint gives the publisher as ‘Pyne’, a double reference to the French slang for penis and the English publisher John Pine, whose 1733 Horace remained one of the most famous fully-engraved books of the time.

A scarce Swedish translation of Robert Bage’s first novel, Mount Henneth, first published by Lowndes in 1782. Mostly remembered today for his best-selling Hermsprong, Bage was a successful paper-manufacturer from Staffordshire. He also went into partnership with Erasmus Darwin in an ironworks and slitting mill at Wychnor, but this business was to fail in 1782 on the bankruptcy of one of the other partners. It is thought that perhaps this loss of income was one of the factors that encouraged him to start writing novels. A Quaker by birth and a radical by politics, Bage combined good business with a belief in excellent welfare for his employees. He was also known for his ideas regarding animal welfare, religious tolerance and the education of the poor. He served as a trustee for Reverend Hill’s local charity dedicated to providing schooling for the poor children of Elford village, was a member of the Derby Philosophical Society and in later life studied mathematics under the astronomer Thomas Hanson.

Well-received on publication, Samuel Badcock praised Mount Henneth’s ‘superior merit’ and recommended it with conviction: ‘for we do not remember that we have, for many years, had the satisfaction of reviewing a work of this kind, that abounds with more lively strokes of wit, or sallies of fancy; with more judicious reflections, or pleasing and interesting characters. Its sentiments are liberal and manly, the tendency of it is perfectly moral; for the whole design is to infuse into the heart, by the most engaging examples, the principles of honour and truth, social love, and general benevolence’ (Monthly Review, 66, February 1782, pp. 129-30).

As Bage’s first publication, it is not surprising that this is one of the scarcer of his novels. A German translation was published as Henneth Castle, Leipzig 1783, but there appears to have been no French translation.

A fabulous copy of this scarce account of seventeenth-century French politics, extra-illustrated by Renouard and bound by Simier. Listed by Renouard under ‘Histoire’, the anonymous text is by Gatien Courtilz de Sandras, the popular novelist most remembered for his memoirs of d’Artagnan and his tales of adventure and derring-do under the administrations of Richelieu and Mazarin.
Antoine-August Renouard (1765-1853) was an industrialist and political activist who turned his attention to bibliography and bookselling after the Thermidore coup of 1794. An avid collector and bibliographer of Aldine and Estienne editions, Renouard swiftly gained a reputation for collecting fine books, both illustrated and handsomely bound. The present example, extra-illustrated and in a fine signed binding, is an excellent example of Renouard’s taste. Internally the work is a little browned and has seen some restoration but the twelve additional portraits are in good condition and the binding fresh.