Justin Croft Antiquarian Books Ltd ABA (597 results)

A popular commonplace book verse in the nineteenth century, it was included in The World's Best Poetry in 1904 with the caption 'The MS. of this poem, which appeared in 1820, was said to have been found in the Museum of the Royal College of Surgeons, in London, near a perfect human skeleton. It was published in the Morning Chronicle. The author was never discovered, although a reward of fifty guineas was offered.''BEHOLD this ruin! 'Twas a skull Once of ethereal spirit full. This narrow cell was Life's retreat; This space was Thought's mysterious seat. What beauteous visions filled this spot! What dreams of pleasure long forgot! Nor hope, nor joy, nor love, nor fear Has left one trace of record here.' Letterpress printed handbill (208 × 130 mm). Traces of old folds.

A comprehensive descriptive catalogue of the published works of Mariette Lydis 1922-1940, including several unique items. With an introductory essay and bibliography. 4to (280 × 210 mm), pp. 84, colour illustrations throughout. Soft cover.

Sixteenth edition (the first was November 1924). A very presentable copy. 8vo (185 × 120 mm), pp. x, [2], 99, [1], Illustrations throughout. Original dark blue blue cloth, gilt (no dustwrapper). Head and foot of spine slightly bumped, slight wear to corners. Endpapers slightly browned, early gift inscription (1928) to half-title. A good copy.

Small 4to, pp. 192, 7, [1] (adverts), illustrations. Brown cloth, stamped in gilt, black and green. Rubbed and shaken. [Not in King, Victorian Decorated Trade Bindings (British Library & Oak Knoll, 2003).].

First published 1903. 2 vols., 8vo (221 x 143 mm.) pp. viii, 1026; viii, 948. Brown cloth, gilt Rubbed and slightly faded with further wear to head and tail of spine. Endpapers spotted, former owners name in ink to front free endpapers. A good copy.

A new edition of the Scottish novelist Stevenson's 1878 study of the city of Edinburgh, it includes a personal introduction to each part of the city and follows with the history of these places. 8vo (186 × 119 mm), pp. 189, [2], plus a frontispiece and 15 plates. Some occasional foxing. Contemporary full morocco, with gilt title to spine, top edge gilt, others uncut. A very good copy.

A panorama of the French illustrated books assembled by legendary book scout Martin Stone (1946-2016). 272 items described and illustrated. 2 vols. 4to (260 × 200), pp. [102]; [100]. Illustrated in colour throughout. Original pictorial wrappers.

A rare imprint of a popular satire on the Reform movement, in the form of a mock marriage service. The sheet is known with a J.V. Quick, Spitalfields imprint, but LibraryHub records no copy of this Birt imprint. Single sheet broadside (248 × 200 mm), browned and slightly stained, short tears to edges with minimal loss to right hand edge, just affecting a few words.

Inscribed by the author. Pierret was curator of the Musée Égyptien at the Louvre. His essay on the cults of the sun-god was issued in this 48-page version and in a larger, simultaneous, edition with lithograph hieroglyphic apparatus. Pierret is best-known for his Vocabulaire hiéroglyphique. 16mo (198 × 120 mm.), pp. 48. Original paper wrapper, inscribed at head of title 'A Monsieur de Villiers di Terrage, Hommage de l'auteur. P. Pierret.' A very good copy.

First edition. A descriptive catalogue of the lifetime collection of James Dearden (1931-2021) devoted to John Ruskin. Containing a near-comprehensive set of all important early editions of Ruskin's works, manuscripts, letters, photographs, ephemera, Ruskiniana and a reference collection (345 item). With introductory essays by Stuart Eagles ('Ruskin Today') and Stephen Wildman (a biographical appreciation of James Dearden). Catalogue text by Justin Croft and Jonathan Stone. Large 4to (295 × 208 mm), pp. 176, colour illustrations. Softback.

4to, pp. xiv,[2], 318, [2], wood engraved illustrations. Blue cloth stamped in black and gilt, white inlay to upper cover. Covers slightly smudged, perhaps from an attempt to recolour in blue, spine ends chipped. [King 703, Victorian Decorated Trade Bindings (British Library & Oak Knoll, 2003).].

Small 4to (152 × 115 mm), pp. [4], 448, [4], plus frontispiece, lithographed title page and 3 plates, each page has illustrated borders. Contemporary full red morocco with decorative gilt to the top and bottom right corners, scolloped edges, gilt panelled spine, inner gilt dentelles and gilt edges. Small white marks to lower cover, otherwise a lovely book.

First published in 1852. A tale of boyish desert island adventure of six young lads for which Bowman adopts the trope of a lost manuscript found in a bottle by one Christopher Romaunt. 8vo (163 × 130 mm), pp. xvi, 333, [3]. Plus engraved title page, frontispiece and 4 plates. Preliminaries slightly browned. Contemporary red roan, with decorative gilt border to both sides, gilt panelled spine and gilt edges. Very slightly rubbed to the top edge of the spine, but an excellent copy.

First edition. 8to (189 × 118 mm), pp. [vi], vii-xiii, [1], 2-115, [5], plus a frontispiece, 31 plates in monochrome, other small illustrations. Deep red cloth, gilt. Slight creasing to the head and foot of spine.

First edition. 8to (181 × 118 mm), pp. [vi], vii-xiii, [1], 2-120, plus 1 frontispiece and 31 etched plates in monochrome, other small illustrations. Dark blue cloth, gilth. Slight creasing to the head of spine.

First edition of this diminutive near-miniature tribute to Queen Victoria 'Dedicated to Children in all Places of Her Imperial Majesty's Dominions'. 32mo (72 × 60 mm), pp. 95, [1], including monochrome plates. Original white parchment paper covered boards, black leather labels gilt, gilt edges. Lower cover slightly soiled, but a very nice copy.

Oxberry's edition. Moore's play opened in 1753 with a run of 10 nights at the Drury Lane with Garrick in the lead role and remained popular until the middle of the nineteenth century. 12mo (207 × 125 mm.), pp. vii, [v], 57, [3], with frontispiece. Occasional browning and offsetting (slightly affecting title), edges unopened. Original printed drab wrappers. [Only three copies listed on COPAC, at Oxford, Manchester and Birmingham.].

8vo, pp. 107, [1]. Illustrations (by Birket Foster), ornaments (by John Sliegh) engraved by the Dalziel brothers and printed in colour. Blue cloth stamped in gilt. Gutta percha perished, contents loose [King Victorian Decorated Trade Bindings 615 (John Sliegh).].

The eighteenth annual report of the Liverpool Catholic Blind Asylum for children (for the year 1862). Includes also the rules and regulations for the government of the Asylum, founded in 1841 by the very reverend Dr Thomas Youens. 12mo, pp. 26. Disbound. A good copy. [Evidently scarce with Worldcat and COPAC listing no copies of this or of reports for other years.].

8vo, pp. vii, [1], 90, [2], illustrations. Foxed at front and rear. Red cloth stamped in gilt and black. Contemporary gift inscription. Shaken. [King Victorian Decorated Trade Bindings 735 (Albert Warren, King's example in blue).].

A satire on educated women, one of the many such little books illustrative of 'the craze that swept Paris in the early 1840s for a series of small illustrated volumes marketed under the general title of physiologies [looking back, perhaps, to Brillat-Savarin's bestselling Physiologie du goût (1826) and Balzac's Physiologie du marriage (1830)]. Some 120 different physiologies were issued by various Parisian publishers between 1840 and 1842 (ranging alphabetically from the Physiologie de l'amant to the Physiologie du voyageur), and it is estimated that approximately half a million copies of these pocket-sized books were printed during the same two-year span' (Sieburth, p. 163).Designed for mass consumption, these satirical guides to particular social types were based on 'the witty interaction of image and text, drawing and caption, seeing and reading ? Byproducts of the recent technological advances in printing and paper manufacturing which had made illustrated books more commercially feasible and analogous to the various dioramas and panoramas which enjoyed a considerable popularity during the period, these illustrated anthologies of urban sites and mores catered to the public's desire to see its social space as a stage or gallery whose intelligibility was guaranteed both by its visibility as image and its legibility as text ?'Quickly produced and marketed, consumed and discarded, ? the physiologies (like the sensational tabloids or canards hawked on Paris streetcorners of the period) are early instances of the cheap, throwaway "instant book" whose appeal lies in its very topicality and ephemerality' (op. cit., pp. 165-7). 16mo (137 × 90 mm), pp. 124, [4]; uncut in the original illustrated wrappers, a little dusty, spine chipped at extremities. [Richard Sieburth, 'Same difference: the French Physiologies, 1840-1842', Notebooks in Cultural Analysis, (Duke UP, 1984), pp. 163-200.].

First edition, one of 600 copies only. Catalogue of this unique book artist's exhibition in Paris, Spring/Summer 2024, with 33 items fully illustrated. Introduction by the French cultural and medieval historian Michel Pastoureau. Text in French, the English translation on a separately printed insert (8 pages). Ships from the UK, postage extra and charged at cost (this is a large book). Folio (370 × 270 mm), pp. 129, [3]. Colour illustrated throughout, hardback.

8vo, pp. [viii], 103, [1], illustrations. Foxed. Green cloth stamped in gilt and black, binder's ticket (Bone & Son). Rubbed. [Not in King, Victorian Decorated Trade Bindings (British Library & Oak Knoll, 2003).].

First edition. Marsh, biblical critic and later bishop of Peterborough was born at Faversham, Kent, on 10 December 1757 and educated at Faversham grammar school and the King's School, Canterbury, before going up to Cambridge. He travelled in Egypt, Arabia and Europe before returning to Cambridge for his BD. The Authenticity of the five Books of Moses, defending Mosaic authorship of the Pentateuch was one of his qualifying sermons. 4to (235 × 190 mm). pp. 16. Stitched as issued. Marginally browned and rather frayed.

Small 4to, pp.159, [1], illustrations. Green cloth, stamped in gilt and black. Scottish prize label (1876), later inscription. [Not in King, Victorian Decorated Trade Bindings (British Library & Oak Knoll, 2003).].

4to, pp. [8], 407, [1], engraved frontispiece, wood engraved illustrations. Red cloth, gilt, binder's ticket (Edmonds & Remnants) at rear. Rubbed, wants front free endpaper. [King Victorian Decorated Trade Bindings 361 (Red, John Leighton).].

8vo, pp. [17], 8-375, [1], plus engraved frontispiece and additional title, illustrations. Green cloth, stamped in gilt. Joints a bit rubbed, head of spine bumped. [Cf. King 151 (1853 edition, but the same binding stamps, by John Leighton).].

James Speirs was a prolific evangelical speaker and publisher, whose printed output suggests he was an important figure in the Victorian Sunday School movement. Sown in the spring-time collects 12 addresses aimed at a juvenile audience by Speirs and others (R.L. Tafel, Alfred J. Johnson, Samuel Teed and Charles A. Faraday) several on a theme of natural metaphor: "About Hares and Tortoises"; "The Horse and its correspondence", "The Serpent and its correspondence" and "Trees". 8vo (162 × 100 mm), pp. viii, 3-169, [1], complete despite there being no pp. [1-2], pagination includes initial advert leaf. Original publisher's decorative cloth gilt, upper cover with a roundel depicting a sower at work in the fields. Slightly rubbed, but a nice, bright copy. [COPAC and Worldcat lists editions of 1876, 1877 and 1879. Worldcat lists 2 copies of this edition (Graduate Theological Union Library and Urbana College) but COPAC lists none in the UK].

A satire on contemporary fashion, one of the many such little books illustrative of 'the craze that swept Paris in the early 1840s for a series of small illustrated volumes marketed under the general title of physiologies [looking back, perhaps, to Brillat-Savarin's bestselling Physiologie du goût (1826) and Balzac's Physiologie du marriage (1830)]. Some 120 different physiologies were issued by various Parisian publishers between 1840 and 1842 (ranging alphabetically from the Physiologie de l'amant to the Physiologie du voyageur), and it is estimated that approximately half a million copies of these pocket-sized books were printed during the same two-year span' (Sieburth, p. 163).Designed for mass consumption, these satirical guides to particular social types were based on 'the witty interaction of image and text, drawing and caption, seeing and reading ? Byproducts of the recent technological advances in printing and paper manufacturing which had made illustrated books more commercially feasible and analogous to the various dioramas and panoramas which enjoyed a considerable popularity during the period, these illustrated anthologies of urban sites and mores catered to the public's desire to see its social space as a stage or gallery whose intelligibility was guaranteed both by its visibility as image and its legibility as text ?'Quickly produced and marketed, consumed and discarded, ? the physiologies (like the sensational tabloids or canards hawked on Paris streetcorners of the period) are early instances of the cheap, throwaway "instant book" whose appeal lies in its very topicality and ephemerality' (op. cit., pp. 165-7). 16mo (132 × 84 mm), pp. 121, [7]; a very good copy in modern marbled boards, some wear, preserving the original illustrated wrappers; the Donaueschingen copy, with its usual stamp to title verso. [Richard Sieburth, 'Same difference: the French Physiologies, 1840-1842', Notebooks in Cultural Analysis (Duke UP, 1984), pp. 163-200.].

4to, pp. [8], 407, [1], engraved frontispiece, wood engraved illustrations. Foxing at front and rear. Blue cloth, gilt, binder's ticket (Edmonds & Remnants) at rear. Rubbed, corners worn. [King Victorian Decorated Trade Bindings 361 (John Leighton).].