antiquarian bookseller - Peter Harrington

Peter Harrington Antiquarian Bookseller
32. CHURCHILL, Winston S.
Publisher’s retained copy of the
original contract for My African
Journey, initialled and signed by
Churchill.
London, 1908 [40379] £6000
8vo (223 × 204mm). 4ll. copy typescript, initialled at the foot
of the first 3 sheets and signed on the last. Creases from old
folds, rust-marks from staple, now removed leaving small
hole to the upper inner corner, docketed verso of the last
sheet, together with later Hodder & Stoughton stationery
envelope. Very good, now housed in blue cloth chemise in
dark blue quarter morocco slip-case, red and dark green labels
to the spine.
My African Journey was the first book to derive purely
from Churchill’s journalism, as distinct from his work as
a war correspondent, and themes of opportunism and
thorough exploitation emerge from its publication
which were to remain constant throughout his long
career. In 1907, when Under-Secretary for State for
the Colonies, Churchill decided to undertake a tour
of Uganda, immediately receiving an offer “... from
The Strand of £750 for five articles on the tour: ‘I
propose to accept it,’ he wrote to his brother... ‘as it
will definitely liquidate all possible expenses in this
journey. There will be another £500 in book form.’
He then handed the matter over to his then literary
agent A. P. Watt...” (Woods, Artillery of Words). In the
first instance this fee is in itself extremely impressive,
Churchill was receiving “more than Kipling, whom
The Strand were paying £90 for his short stories;
more than W. W. Jacobs, whose rate at the time
was £110 for a story” (Pound, The Strand Magazine).
Watt returned with the present arrangement; “That
the said new work shall be of about 45,000 in length
and shall be made up of matter about 35,000 words
of which will be published serially in the “Strand
Magazine” and about 10,000 words of which shall not
have been published before either serially or in any
other form. That the Author shall if desired furnish
the Publisher’s with not less than fifty original
photographs for the purposes of illustrating the said
new work” (Clauses 2 & 3). It is interesting to note
that Churchill retained serial rights beyond those
stipulated, as also “the American rights, the rights
of translation, and the right to publish the new work
in English on the Continent of Europe...” Churchill’s
advance was £1000, which set against a 25% royalty
on the 5/- selling price of an initial print-run of
12,500 copies seems generous, or perhaps merely
confident of the author’s ability to produce a return.
My African Journey is widely accepted as one of the
best-written of Churchill’s works,
combining a considered and
felicitous style with his irrepressible
interest in everything new. His
touristic commentary on conditions
on safari sit side by side with some
of his most visionary observations,
the possibility of harnessing of
Ripon Falls for hydro-electric
power, the rising racial tensions
caused by Asian immigration, and,
most radical of all, his suggestion
that Uganda would be an ideal
test-bed for state socialism. No
wonder Lord Elgin, Churchill’s chief
who had been only too keen for
him to spend some time overseas,
was to remark of his bumptious
junior’s African progress that “the
course is strewn with memoranda.”
Unsurprisingly such documentation
relating to Churchill’s litarary
career is rarely encountered on the
market.
33. CHURCHILL, Winston S.
My African Journey.
London, Hodder and Stoughton, 1908 [24923] £875
8vo. Original pictorial red cloth, titles to spine gilt, titles and
decoration to upper board in blue and black. Illustrated with
photographic frontispieces and maps. Some light sporadic
foxing, slight fading to spine, some detail missing from figure
and palm trees and small water stain to front board, otherwise
in very good condition. Ownership inscription in ink to front
free endpaper.
FIRST EDITION in book form, first published in shorter
form as a series of magazine articles. Churchill had set out
in autumn 1907 on a tour of east Africa which began as a
hunting expedition but turned into a semi-official inquiry
into colonial affairs. In Kenya he went big-game hunting
and investigated the conditions of African contract
workers. In Uganda he visited Christian missions, took tea
with Daudi Chewa, the 11-year-old kabaka of Buganda,
and took up with great enthusiasm the project for a dam
across the Ripon Falls.
Woods A12.
34. [COLENSO, Frances
Ellen]
Catalogue 57: Travel Section 2: Africa and the Middle East to Persia
My Chief and I. Or, Six Months
in Natal after the Langalibalele
Outbreak. By Atherton Wylde
[pseud.]
London, Chapman and Hall, 1880 [but 1879]. [39729]
£1500
8vo. Modern green half calf on marbled boards, red
morocco label, spine gilt in compartments. Oval mounted
Woodburytype portrait frontispiece of Durnford and one other
mounted photographic plate, 2 tinted lithographic plates. A
little browned, else very good.
FIRST EDITION. “Under the fictitious guise of a young
soldier, the authoress gives an account of six month’s
life and experiences with Colonel A. W. Durnford who
lost his life at Isandhlwana. The writer was evidently an
enthusiastic admirer of the gallant soldier” (Mendelssohn).
Daughter of Bishop Colenso of Natal (described by
SADNB as a “protagonist of the Zulu people”), Frances
completed Durnford’s work History of the Zulu War and
its Origins, also with the publication date 1880. The first
series of adverts here has the issue date November 1879.
This copy has the bookplate of Durnford’s father Edward
William Durnford mounted on the front pastedown, and a
gift inscription, “John Wolfe Lydekker from his grandfather
Edward C.L. Durnford” on the verso of the front free
endpaper. Lieut.-Colonel Edward Durnford R.E. was
brother of the subject and editor of his posthumouslypublished
A Soldier’s Life and Work in South Africa, 1872–
1879 (see item 41 below)
FINE VIEWS IN JERUSALEM AND
THE MIDDLE EAST
35. DAPPER, Olfert.
Naukeurige beschryving van gantsch
Syrie, en Palestyn of Heilige Lant.
Amsterdam: Jacob van Meurs, 1677 [13125] £4250
Folio, in two parts. Contemporary mottled calf neatly rebacked,
two-line gilt border to edges, all edges speckled red. First title
page printed in red and black, with engraved allegorical title,
8 maps, 30 plates (mainly double-page) and 34 plates in the
text. Text printed in double-columns. A very good copy: clean,
sound, with excellent impressions of the plates, and complete
with the Directions to the Binder.
FIRST EDITION. Dr Olfert Dapper (1636–1688), physician,
geographical and historical scholar, was the author of
a series of works dealing with Africa, America and Asia;
all were published in handsome folio format and are best
known for their fine double-page or folding views and
panoramas. The extensive panorama of Jerusalem in the
present work had also been used in Dapper’s book on Asia
(Amsterdam 1672). There are fine views of Damascus,
Tripoli, Aleppo, Jaffa, Rama, the Temple of Solomon, and a
birds-eye view of Jerusalem (trimmed at sides).
22 23
Mendelssohn I, p. 356.