antiquarian bookseller - Peter Harrington

Peter Harrington Antiquarian Bookseller
151.BURTON, Richard F.
2
Falconry in the Valley of the Indus.
London, John Van Voorst, 1852 [16442] £6500
Large 12mo. Original brown ribbed cloth, titles to spine gilt,
rules to boards in blind. Housed in a quarter red morocco
solander box with marbled paper boards. Frontispiece and
three other full-page sepia tinted illustrations. Partially
unopened, a fresh and practically unread copy, cloth unmarked
spine only very lightly faded. Essentially a fine copy and rarely
seen in such immaculate condition.
FIRST EDITION of an early Burton title, nominally a record
of the sport of falconry as practiced by the landed gentry
in Sindh, but also a significant record of their culture as the
British sought to incorporate them into the Empire. The
book features a remarkable autobiographical postscript.
Never common in any form, Falconry in the Valley of
the Indus was published by Burton’s friend Van Voorst
and proved slow to sell. Van Voorst never gave in to the
temptation to remainder the title and Burton continued to
receive small amounts from its sales for some years.
152.BYRON, Robert.
The Road to Oxiana.
MacMillan and Co., Limited, London, 1937 [31855] £975
8vo. Finely bound by The Chelsea Bindery in full dark blue
morocco, titles and decoration to spine gilt, rule to boards gilt,
inner dentelles gilt, marbled endpapers, all edges gilt. With 16
black and white plates. A fine copy.
FIRST EDITION, First Impression of Byron’s masterpiece.
153.CALDECOTT, R.M.
The Life of Baber, Emperor of
Hindostan.
London, James Darling, Clerical Library, 1844 [39882] £575
8vo. Original brown embossed cloth. Lithographed map
frontsipiece. Light browning, marginal foxing, front hinge
very slightly cracked, but overall a very good copy, the cloth
with just the lightest of shelf-wear.
FIRST EDITION. Essentially an abridgement of Leyden and
Erskine’s translation of Baber’s autobiography with “many
geographical descriptions … altered and enlarged with
the aid of later authorities.” [Author’s preface.] This copy
inscribed by Caldecott on the front free endpaper, “Mrs.
J. Watson with the Author’s love, Jan. 1st. 1847.” with
his extensive marginal annotations and amplifications
throughout.
154.CHURCHILL, Winston
L[eonard] Spencer.
The Story of the Malakand Field
Force an episode of frontier war …
With maps, plans, etc.
London, New York and Bombay, Longmans, Green, and Co.,
1898 [34416] £4500
8vo. Original apple green cloth, spine lettered in gilt, upper
cover with panel in blind lettered gilt, black endpapers, edges
uncut. Frontispiece portrait and 6 folding colour maps. Some
very light spotting to the occasional page, cloth rather marked
but still an excellent copy.
FIRST EDITION, First Impression of Churchill’s first book. In
it he relates his exploits with the Malakand Field Force, led
by Sir Bindon Blood, on the Northwest Frontier of India in
1897. An interesting copy, from the regimental library of
the 14th Royal Welsh Regiment with their rubber stamp to
the verso of the frontispiece and with a ink notation to the
half title page. On page 317 is noted that the Lieutenant
Barff mentioned there by Churchill was late of the 14th RW.
Woods’s bibliography suggests two states of the first
edition, but subsequent research indicates precedence
does not depend upon the presence or otherwise of the
errata slip; this copy is without it. The publication was
arranged by Churchill’s cousin as he was still in India,
resulting in numerous small errors, which were corrected
the following year in the Silver Library edition.
Woods A1a.
155.COUSENS, Henry.
Mediaeval Temples of the Dakhan.
Calcutta, Government of India, Central Publication Branch,
1931 [39611] £250
4to. Contemporary native morocco-backed brown textured
cloth boards, title gilt to spine. 115 plates and plans,
illustrations to the text. Front hinge a little cracked, last
plate loose from its stub, binding slightly scuffed at the the
extremities, but overall very good.
FIRST EDITION, one of 600 copies only. Cousens worked
for the Archaeological Survey of India from 1875 to 1910,
rising to the position of Superintendent of the Western
Circle. Many of the plates are based on Cousen’s own
photographs, the archive of which is now held in the OIOC
at the BL.
156.CUNNINGHAM, Joseph
Davey.
A History of the Sikhs, from the
Origin of the Nation to the Battles
of the Sutlej. Second Edition. With
the Author’s Last Corrections and
Additions.
London, John Murray, 1853 [39627] £650
8vo. Original brown embossed cloth, title gilt to spine.
Map frontispiece, coloured in outline, similar folding map,
genealogical tables. Marginally browned, hinges slightly
cracked, cloth spotted and a little soiled, spine chipped at the
head, but a very good copy, unopened.
First published in 1849, this book, though a critical and
popular success, was to be the cause of the premature end
to a highly successful military career. Cunningham passed
through Addiscombe and Chatham attracting high praise
at both establishments, passing out of the former with the
prize for mathematics and the sword for good conduct. On
reaching India he was appointed to the staff of General
Macleod, then Chief Engineer in the Bengal Presidency.
In 1837 he became assistant to Sir Claud Wade, political
agent on the Sikh frontier, a position he continued to
hold under Wade’s successors, G. Russell Clark and Colonel
Richmond. During his time in the area he developed a
profound knowledge of the manners and customs of the
Sikh people which placed him in great demand at the time
of the outbreak of the First Sikh War. He served on the staff
of Napier, Gough and finally Sir Harry Smith, seeing action
at Buddawal and Aliwal. When Smith joined the main
army he was attached to the staff of Sir Henry Hardinge,
to whom he acted as an additional aide-de-camp at the
battle of Sobraon. For his services he was promoted to
captain by brevet in December 1845, and at the conclusion
of the war appointed by Hardinge to the lucrative position
of political agent to Bhopal. In the comparative leisure
afforded by this posting he had time to write the present
history which assured his name as a historian, but led to
his fall from grace with his superiors. His assertion that Lal
Singh and Tej Singh had been bribed during the First Sikh
War was challenged by Hardinge and Sir Henry Lawrence
and in 1850 Cunningham was removed from his agency
and returned to regimental duty. Within a year he had
died at Umballa aged only 39.
157.D’OYLY, Charles,
& Captain Thomas
Williamson.
The Costume and Customs of
Modern India; from a collection of
drawings … Engraved by J. H. Clark
and C. Dubourg; with a preface and
copious descriptions …
London, by Edward Orme, [c. 1824] [30329] £2000
Folio (366 × 259 mm). Contemporary maroon straightgrain
morocco, covers with borders and panels in gilt and in
blind, spine richly gilt in compartments, lettered in second
panel, grey-green endpapers, gilt edges. Frontispiece and
19 hand-coloured aquatints, the plates within ruled and pink
Catalogue 57: Travel Section 4: Asia including Russia
wash-tinted frames. Thornton family ownership inscriptions
at head of title and front free endpaper, bookplates of John
Gage, Lincoln’s Inn, and F. G. K. Pritchard. Rubbed, corners
worn, one or two marginal spots, but an excellent copy, clean
and well-margined.
First edition thus, first issue. A charming light-hearted
look at the British in India, with aquatints after drawings
by “Charles Doyley, Esq.”, i.e. Sir Charles D’Oyly, seventh
baronet (1781–1845), who served as an administrator in
India but is best remembered for his artistic works done
there. First published in 1813 as part of The European in
India, this version is usually also dated 1813 on the basis
of the imprint given on the plates, but the text sheets are
watermarked 1822 and 1823 and the plates 1821 and
1822. Abbey’s 440 is a later issue, with the same sheets
as our copy but plates watermarked 1839 and the frames
washed in yellow. The plates here are identical with those
that first appeared in The European in India, except that
titles have been added and the frames are washed in pink
only, instead of grey and pink.
Abbey, Travel, 440 (later issue); Colas 888; Lipperheide 1486; Martin
Hardie, p. 133; Prideaux, pp. 320, 357; Tooley (1954) 184.
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