M

London: George Bell & Sons 1870-1875. 9 volume set, 10 inches tall. A magnificent Victorian half morocco by Bickers with gilt raised bands and beautiful floral gilt tooling to the panels. All edges gilt. Both second editions, illustrated with 598 splendid lithographic plates, as called for, all hand finished. A couple of scuffs but overall in fine condition, inside and out. Morris was an early champion of conservation, campaigning extensively and ultimately successfully for a nature conservation act, he also founded the Plumage League. A very smart set of these classic works on British Birds.

London: Longmans, Green and Co., 1873-1876. 10 volumes, 8 1/2 inches tall. Very smart full Victorian calf by Carss of Glasgow, and with their binder's ticket. With gilt raised bands and neat gilt tooling to the panels. The boards are framed by gilt and blind fillets and blind corner tools. The best edition, containing his classic 'History of England', in eight volumes and 'His Life and Letters' in two. Armorial bookplate.

Albany; Joel Munsell, 1867. Full vellum, 8 1/2 inches tall. A splendid full Victorian full vellum by Zaehnsdorf with a crest shaped label and delicate gilt tooling to the smooth spine. A gilt fillet frames the boards. With gilt dentelles and all edges. Foxing to the preliminaries, then clean. Boards slightly splayed. With the armorial bookplate of William Waldorf, Viscount Astor of Hever Castle. Baroness von Riedesel's husband commanded the Brunswick forces with the British Army. This volume contains her Memoirs of this period, including her family's life as prisoners of war.

London: John Macrone, 1835. 6 volume set, 6 1/2 inches tall. A very bright and fine early Victorian full calf with gilt raised bands, twin labels and delicate gilt tooling to the panels. A gilt fillet and series of blind fillets frame the boards. With the armorial bookplate of James Alexander and bookseller's ticket. With portrait and engraved frontispieces to all volumes and 'imaginative illustrations by J.M.W. Turner' as engraved title pages to all volumes. The engravings are foxed, the rest of the text blocks perfectly clean.

Edinburgh: Archibald Constable, 1819. Half calf, 8 1/2 inches tall. A splendid Regency binding on half 'Russia' calf, with gilt raised bands, blind pallets and ornate, dense extra gilt panels. Particularly interesting marbled paper on the boards. From the library of Alfred de Rothschild but without the bookplate. Some foxing on the engraved frontispiece, otherwise clean. A tear on one leaf, not affecting the text. Romanticized by Sir Walter Scott and John Buchan, 'The Great Montrose', Seventeenth century Scottish nobleman, poet and soldier, fought for Charles I in the Civil War.

Paris: Librairie Centrale des Beaux-Arts. Émile Lévy, 1901. Full morocco, 16 inches tall. A magnificent binding, unsigned but by the great firm of J. Leighton of Brewer Street. With gilt raised bands, twin labels and fabulous gilt tooling to the panels and boards. Gilt top edge and dentelles. With the bookplate of Alfred de Rothschild. Some slight foxing to the preliminaries but in fine condition. Illustrated with photographs in the text and then with 100 superb plates, many sepia and with 7 in colour. A sumptuous record of the Golden Age of French furniture when some of the finest and most refined pieces were ever created, in a fabulous binding from the library of a great connoisseur.

Florence: G. Barbèra, 1887. Full morocco, 4 inches tall. A beautiful little binding by Zaehnsdorf, with their stamp obscured, with gilt raised bands, superb extra gilt panels ans ornate gilt corner tooling to the boards. Gilt top edge and dentelles. From the Library of the Late Christopher Foyle of Beeleigh Abbey. Portrait. Light Foxing. The poetry, letters and Life of the great Renaissance Florentine painter, sculptor and architect, in the original Italian.

London: John Murray, 1853-54 & 1871. 8 volumes, 9 inches tall. The Earl Stanhope was styled Viscount Mahon between 1816-1855, the later volume precedes the text of the 7 volume set and is uniformly bound in an elegant half crushed morocco by Roger De Coverley, one of the greatest binders of the period. The bindings have gilt raised bands, splendid gilt centre tools and gilt top edges. There is some foxing to the preliminaries, then perfectly clean. Stanhope was an antiquarian politician and much respected historian.

London: Longmans, Green and Co., 1903. 2 volume set, 9 inches tall. A superb half crushed morocco by Zaehnsdorf with raised bands and splendid gilt tooling in the Art Nouveau style and gilt top edges. Some rubbing to the edges and bumps to the corners but still an impressive set. From the Library of the Late Christopher Foyle of Beeleigh Abbey. This very scarce work has been controversial since its publication with vociferous critics for and against. Myers was a British poet and a founder of the Society for Psychical Research whose conception of human self and its survival of bodily death was influential up to the present day. Aldous Huxley considered this work to be "an amazingly rich, profound and stimulating book."

London: Doewney & Co., 1902. Half morocco, 8 3/4 inches tall. Half straight grain morocco binding by L. Broca, one of the finest and most interesting binders of his day. With gilt raised bands and superb gilt tooling to the panels. Gilt top edge. This deluxe reprint is limited to 100 copies, of which this is numbered 83 and has the 12 plates and engraved title page hand coloured. From the Library of the Late Christopher Foyle of Beeleigh Abbey. A satire on English society and specifically the Count d'Orsay. A lovely copy.

London: John Murray, 1858. 7 volume set, 7 inches tall. A most attractive Victorian full calf binding with gilt raised bands, twin labels and extra gilt panels. Gilt corner tools and fillets and a blind fillet frame the boards. A couple of edges are badly scuffed, otherwise in fine condition. Philip Henry Stanhope, 5th Earl Stanhope, Viscount Mahon was a politician, antiquarian and historian, this history of England being his greatest work.

London: Henry Colburn, 1817. Half morocco, 13 inches tall. A smart later half morocco by Zaehnsdorf with gilt raised bands, fine gilt tooling to the panels and all edges gilt. From the Library of the Late Christopher Foyle of Beeleigh Abbey. Half title, additional decorative title, frontispiece, 26 aquatint plates with contemporary hand-colouring, including a folding view of the Battle of Waterloo, and 2 folding maps. The colouring is exceptionally bright and fresh. Tooley states that the frontispiece is often missing and replaced with the 'Portraits of General Officers', as in this case. Minor repair to the margins of the title page. A super copy of this classic work.

London: Thomas Tegg, 1835. 8 volume set, 6 1/2 inches tall. A delightful little set in a classic early Victorian full calf with gilt raised bands, twin labels and extra gilt panels. Gilt and blind fillets frame the boards. Bound by Cleaver of Baker Street, Portman Square and with their ticket. Engraved title pages to all the volumes.

London: Constable and Company, 1909. Full morocco, 7 3/4 inches tall. A very neat binding by Zaehnsdorf with gilt raised bands, framed gilt panels and ornate gilt tooling to the boards within a series of gilt fillet panels. Gilt dentelles and top edge. Before establishing himself as a very successful novelist Meredith's first emphasis was as a romantic poet, Oscar Wilde described his poetry as "chaos illumined by brilliant flashes of lightning".