Showing 77238 results

Correspondence and papers.

Transcript

London, 15 Piccadilly, W. 1 February 1899 {1}

Dear Sir,

My experience does not extend to the contents of public libraries; but only to the books which have passed through public sales during the last forty years. I may therefore congratulate you on the possession of the finest copy I have ever seen of the first edition of the Genevan Bible.

I well remember the feeling of incredulity with which I listened some ten or twelve years ago to Mr Makellar’s {2} description of his copy as being a really fine one. When I saw it at his sale I was taken by surprise, and determined to have it at any price.

I thank you for the cheque—a receipt for which is enclosed;—and I am, dear Sir,

Faithfully yours
Bernard Quaritch

Professor W Aldis Wright

—————

{1} The first three figures of the year are printed.

{2} William Makellar, a minister of the Free Church of Scotland, who died in 1896. His library was sold by Sotheby’s on 7 November 1898. See List of Catalogues of English Book Sales now in the British Museum (1915), p. 434.

14 Vencatachalamudaly Lane, Triplicane [Thiruvallikeni], Madras [Chennai]. - Has been given a scholarship of at least one year of £250 a year which will be extended for a year if the reports from Cambridge are favourable. Is starting on 17 Mar. from Madras and will travel by sea all the way. Has written today to Mr Hardy. Asks Neville to 'take me or at least send some-body to London as I am new to anything and everything'; apologises for the trouble taken on his behalf by Neville.

(Includes a reproduction of an engraving from Johann Stumpf’s Gemeiner Loblicher Eydgenossenschaft Stetten. Cf. An Introduction to Bibliography, p. 41.)