antiquarian bookseller - Peter Harrington

Peter Harrington Antiquarian Bookseller
324.SEPPINGS, Sir Robert.
A Letter addressed to the Right
Honourable Viscount Melville, Baron
Dunira, First Lord Commissioner of
the Admiralty, on the Circular Sterns
of Ships of War.
London, Printed by Winchester and Co., 1822 [36993] £650
4to. 7 lithographed plates. Plates slightly foxed, a little
browned throughout, else very good in old marbled boards,
rebacked and re-cornered in calf, new patch label to the upper
board. This copy inscribed on the title page, “Francis Freeling
from the Author”. Freeling was head of the Post Office and a
noted bibliophile.
FIRST EDITION. Seppings’s suggestion to improve the
strength of the stern of British ships (“this weak and
defenceless point is in a part of the ship where strength
of fabric, and the means of defence, are not infrequently
most required”) met with opposition largely on aesthetic
grounds: “That the ship looks not, in the seamen’s phrase,
ship-shape”. His reply, as one of the most innovative ship
designers of the era, was that “I know not exactly what is
meant by ship-shape.”
325.[SHIELDS, Henry]
MEIKLE, James.
Famous Clyde Yachts.
London, Oatts & Rungman, 1888 [27407] £4250
Folio. Bound in recent half green morocco, using the original
green boards, titles and illustration to front board gilt. 31
mounted chromolithographic plates. A few marks to boards,
and occasional minor foxing to some plates and text pages,
but overall a very good copy of this rare work with fine colour
plates.
FIRST EDITION of this celebrated book illustrated with
a series of chromolithographs after paintings by Henry
Shields of the famous Clyde racing yachts of that era.
326.(SIGNALS)
Signals and Instructions in Addition
to the General Printed Sailing and
Fighting Instructions.
[London, The Admiralty,], n.d. [1780] [38584] £750
4to (305 × 205 mm). 3pp. Tabular “Index to the Signals”. Light
browning, else very good in the original ultramarine light card
wraps, slightly rubbed.
FIRST EDITION thus. No copy on COPAC, OCLC has just
the Society of the Cincinnati copy of this issue. Not listed
on the NMM Caird Library website. A very sharp copy in
contemporary, unissued condition. Unusually there are
just two minor additions to the Index.
327.SLEEMAN, Charles
William.
Torpedoes and Torpedo Warfare:
Containing a Complete and Concise
Account of the Rise and Progress
of Submarine Warfare: Also a
Detailed Description of All Matters
appertaining thereto, including the
Latest Improvements.
Griffin & Co., Portsmouth, 1880 [36929] £295
Tall 8vo. Tinted lithographic frontispiece and 56 largely
diagrammatic plates. Skilfully re-cased in original red cloth,
gilt, somewhat rubbed and a little soiled, very good.
FIRST EDITION of the first book in English entirely devoted
to the torpedo. Apparentely this is in some way a family
copy, with a gift inscription on verso of the front free
endpaper from G. S. Hunt to Mary Paring Sleeman, dated
in the year of publication; and a lengthy news-clipping
tipped onto the last leaf of the catalogue relating to
Sleeman’s services with the Ottoman navy during the
Russo-Turkish War, including his installation of “a fresh
line of torpedoes … to defend the sea approaches” to
Sulina. A second edition was published in 1889.
“POOR FRAGMENT OF A MIGHTY
STRUCTURE…”
328.[SLIGHT, Julian]
A Narrative of the Loss of the
Royal George, at Spithead, August,
1782; Tracey’s Attempt to raise
her in 1783; her Demolition and
Removal by Major-General Pasley’s
Operations in 1839–40–41–42 &
43; including a Statement of her
Sinking, written by her then Flag-
Lieutenant, the Late Admiral Sir C.
P. H. Durham … Bound in the Wood
Catalogue 57: Travel Section 7: Mapping, Navigation and Naval History
of the Wreck. Eighth Edition.
Portsea, Printed and Published by S. Horsey, Sen., 1847 [39896]
£600
12mo (110 × 70mm). Original leather-backed wooden
boards. Four plates and one near full-page illustration, tables.
Light browning, else very good.
Whilst undergoing repairs off Spithead in 1782 the Royal
George sank with the loss of 800 lives, including that of
her commander Admiral Kempenfelt. As she had become
an obstruction to the anchorage, Sir Charles Pasley, who
had been experimenting with the use of gunpowder
underwater, was instructed to clear the wreckage.
Souvenirs such as this, titled “Relic of the Royal George”
on the spine, were made from the salvage. Reprints W.
Holloway’s “Lines on receiving a Piece of the Wreck of
the Royal George”: “Poor fragment of a mighty structure
– won from the dark charnel-house beneath the wave.”
This edition not on COPAC or OCLC.
329.SOUTHEY, Robert.
The Life of Nelson.
London, for John Murray, Bookseller to the Admiralty and to the Board of
Longitude, 1813 [37736] £950
12mo (162 x 100 mm). Engraved portrait frontispiece to vol. I,
frontispiece of vol. II with five facsimile signatures. Some light
browning, offsetting from the frontispieces as usual, else very
good in contemporary green half straight-grained morocco on
dun boards, slightly rubbed and with some stripping from the
boards, but a handsome little set.
FIRST EDITION. “Southey constructed an early-nineteenth
century hero as a model for the young – in his words, a
‘patriotic manual’. He told a friend that he would write
‘such a life of Nelson as shall be put into the hands of
every youth destined for the Navy’” (Knight, The Pursuit
of Victory, p.542). As it most assuredly was, and many
more besides, coming to dominate the Nelson biography
market, perpetually in print. Elegantly written and
surprisingly even-handed on the issue of the Neapolitan
Jacobins.
330.[STEEL, David]
The Art of Rigging; containing an
Alphabetical Explanation of the
Terms, Directions for the Most
Minute Operations, and the Method
of Progressive Rigging; with Full and
Correct Tables of the Dimensions
and Quantities of Every Part of the
Rigging of all Ships and Vessels.
London, Steel, Goddard, and Co., 1818 [36992] £850
8vo. Engraved frontispiece & 10 other plates, all but one of
them folding, 26ll. of tables, 12 folding. Lightly browned,
but overall very good, uncut in the original boards, spine
chipping and joints a little cracked. Contemporary ownership
inscription of Major Swinburne to the upper board. Extremely
unusual in this unsophisticated condition.
“The Third Edition: considerably enlarged and improved;
with Additional Tables, expressly adapted for Merchant-
Shipping.” The last edition of Steel’s Rigging, first
published in 1794, “containing the most extensive Set of
Tables heretofore published; accurately calculated, and
according to the present methods adopted in his Majesty’s
Dock Yards, and in the Merchant-Service.”
166 167
Witt 32.