Page:Notes and Queries - Series 11 - Volume 5.djvu/292

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NOTES AND QUERIES. [11 s. v. MAR. 23, 1912.

The two most valuable MSS. are an ' Office of the Blessed Virgin ' and a Petrarch, both Italian of the 15th century, on parchment. The former 235 leaves, small 8vo is the work of Sigis- mondo de' Sigismondi, whose name is twice signed in the course of it, and contains 5 minia- tures, 11 full-page arabesque borders in colours on a dull gold ground, as well as side-borders of flowers and scrolls, initials, and other ornaments in colour and gold (18,000kr.). The Petrarch 187 leaves, large 8vo has 2 frontispieces in the style of Andrea Mantegna, 3 coloured borders, and 400 initial letters in burnished gold on a blue ground decorated with white. The binding is the original Medicean calfskin (9,000kr.). We may mention briefly one other MS. of a different character : 8 pages of music in. Beethoven's handwriting rough notes and sketches (2,400kr.).

Among the 228 Incunabula are two English examples : a fragment of a Caxton fol. C iiii, from the first edition of ' The Golden Legend,' printed on both sides, with a capital T inserted by hand in red ink, framed between two panes of glass (1483, 480kr. ) ; and a clean and sound copy of Wynkyn de Worde's ' Golden Legend, ' lacking 34 leaves (1498, 5,000kr.).

Perhaps the most interesting of the rest, though it is difficult to make selection, are the curious coloured woodcut of the Nativity, con- sidered by Prof. Schreiber to date from about 1465 (4,000kr.) ; the copy of the third German Bible, printed by Giinther Zainer at Augsburg, 1473-4, a complete and perfectly preserved example (4,800kr. ) ; Wenssler & Kilchen's beautiful ' Gradual ' a copy which agrees with the examples in Berlin and Paris, from which the copy in the British Museum somewhat diverges (2,400kr.) ; Sweynheim & Pannartz's -' S. Jerome' (' Tractatus et Epistolae'), vol. ii. '(Rome, 1468, 5,000kr.) ; Ptolemaeus, ' Cosmo- graphia.' printed by Nicholas Donis at Ulm (1482, 3,600kr.), containing 32 maps ; and the ' Speculum Humana3 Salvationis, Latine et 'Germanice,' another of the works of Zainer of Augsburg, containing 192 delightful woodcuts i(c. 1473, 4,200kr.).

MESSRS. MAGGS'S Catalogue 283 (Autograph Xietters and MSS.) presents us, as usual, with an '" embarras de ri chesses " from which to make selection. Among the historical letters, the two or three most important are again American : wo letters from Capt. John Paul Jones to Jeffer- son, the first written in 1785, on the subject of prize-money due to men who had served on board his squadron ; the second, in 1786, denying that he was a privateer IQOl. each ; and a letter from George Washington to his .London agents, dated 10 Nov., 1773, describing the transactions he was engaged in on behalf of his wards, 681. Of no less interest are a letter offered at 45Z. written to Nathaniel Bacon by Sir Thomas Gresham in 1579, not long before his death, full .of personal detail, and another to the same -person from William Davison, Elizabeth's secre- tary, giving a brief account of the massacre of St. Bartholomew, 30 Sept., 1572, 321. There are several good Stuart autographs, the best being a letter of Henrietta Maria's to " ma soeur Magde- leine Eugenie," 1669, 211. ; and a marriage contract signed by the same queen, and also by her daughter, afterwards " Madame " of Prance, .1655, 251. Among the autographs of men of

letters we noticed several of Scott, Dickens, Tennyson, and Wordsworth, two of Lewis Carroll, one of Thoreau ; but the most valuable are the original MS. of Swinburne's Essay on Landor, 10 \ folio pages, signed by the author, 151. ; the original MS. of several poems all unpublished by Emily Bronte, three pages of which are the back of the draft of a letter by Patrick Bronte, 1836, 52Z. 10s. ; the MS. of Meredith's poem ' The Crisis,' 35Z. ; a letter of Byron's to Master J. Favell at Eton, asking him to look after a new boy, " the son of my friend Mr. Hanson," 1812, 25Z. ; and a letter of Marv Shelley's, written from Marlow to W. T. Baxter^ 1817, 13Z. 13s.

Music and art are somewhat less abundantly represented, but we have Moscheles's MS. of ' Fidelio,' with three autograph corrections by Beethoven, 211. ; two of Wagner's letters, one offered for 221. 10s. written in 1844 to a fellow- musician, giving an account of his work and his plans for the future : the other 111. 10s. belong- ing to 1845, announcing to C. Gaillard, the musical critic, the first performance of ' Tann- hiiuser ' : and a letter to Frederick Sandys by Whistler, 211.

[Notices of other Catalogues held over.]

THE REV. W. J. COUPEB is writing a book on the Miller family, one member of which George Miller is notable as having been, some hundred years ago, a pioneer in the provision of cheap and good literature. He issued cheap books from his press at Dunbar, where also he established a reading-room ; and he published The Cheap Magazine and The Monthly Monitor. His brother James, of Haddington, co-operated with him. Mr. Couper will be grateful for any letters, papers, or other means of information connected with these Millers, and also for the names of any booksellers or publishers with whom they^had relations. Mr. Fisher Unwin, who is to publish the book, undertakes the transcription and return of any documents entrusted to him.

ON Monday, the llth inst., the London County Council affixed a tablet of blue encaustic ware to No. 88, Paradise Street, Rotherhithe. to commemora.te the residence of Thomas Henry Huxley in the house for some months during the vear 1841.

to

REV. J. WILLCOCK. Forwarded.

H. M. L. MORGAV. We fear we cannot comply with your request. We mi^ht easily fill our columns with matter of the kind.

B. B. M. (" All Lombard Street to a China orange "). See 5 S. i. 189, 234, 337; iv. 17; 10 S. viii. 7, 136.

MR. WALTER SMITH (" There is so much bad in the best of us "). See 10 S. iv. 168 ; v. 76 ; viii. 508, where, however, no satisfactory answer was obtained.

CORRIGENDUM. Ante, Fp. 213, ol. 1, 1. 16 from bottom, for " 1191 " read " 1172."