View of Rome from the Tiber River with Castel Sant’Angelo and Saint Peter’s Basilica. Rome, ca. 1870

$4,500

United States Capitol. no publisher, c. 1870

This dramatic photograph of the United States Capitol shows the building in the 1870s, after the completion of the new dome and the extensions.

$2,500

Works. Chapman and Hall, [1870s]

A very handsome set of the famous “Illustrated Library Edition,” here in an early printing. The dedication at the front of the first volume (Pickwick Papers) states, “This the best edition of my books is, of right, inscribed to my dear friend John Forster, biographer of Oliver Goldsmith, in affectionate acknowledgment of his counsel, sympathy, and faithful friendship during my whole literary life.” “The Library Edition came about largely because of the suggestion of Forster that while Dickens’s works were available in volumes in the Cheap Edition and in reprints of the serial parts, there was no high-quality edition that would appeal to the wealthy. Dickens eventually came round to the idea that an elegant edition could raise the stature of his writings.

$3,500

Extra. Senseless Panic. New York: New York Daily Bulletin, September 24, 1873

The Panic of 1873 was set off by the failure of Jay Cooke & Co., the leading American banker of its day. Because of financial crises in Europe , the Credit Mobilier scandal, and related problems, the firm declared bankruptcy on September 18, 1873. The bank’s failure set of a chain of events including the failure of many insurance companies and banks and the ten-day closure of the New York Stock Exchange starting on September 20. Within two months 55 railroads had failed. The downturn, which lasted for the rest of the decade, was known as the Great Depression until the 1930s depression took that name.

$1,200

Autograph note signed to Robert Watt with original albumen print photograph. No place, July 16, 1874

Mark Twain the humorist. Samuel Clemens sent this delightful humorous note with the accompanying half- length standing portrait of the debonair author.

$18,000

The Works. With Notes Critical and Explanatory and a Biographical Memoir by W. Gifford Esq. With Introduction and Appendices by Lieut.-Col. F. Cunningham. London: Bickers, 1875

Gifford’s edition of Jonson’s works played an important role in the Jonson revival.

$900

Autograph manuscript on Ralph Waldo Emerson. No place, [ca. 1870s]

In this fine manuscript Whitman writes, “It is very plain after reading Emerson’s forenoon essays, and then those of his elder age that the latter are not the consecutive fruits or crowning results of the former.”

$28,000

Chinese Sketches. London: Trubner, 1876

FIRST EDITION. Sinologist Herbert A. Giles began his distinguished career was a British diplomat in China. There he wrote these literary and historical sketches to show that, contrary to prevailing Western views, “the Chinese are a hardworking, sober, and happy people, occupying an intermediate place between the wealth and culture, the vice and misery of the West.” Giles later became professor of Chinese at Cambridge for thirty-five years.

$1,200

Bust portrait of Whitman wearing a hat. New York, 1878

Boldly signed and dated 1879 by Whitman. Whitman observed of this delightful portrait, “It is one of my good-humored pictures. … This is strong enough to be right and gentle enough to be right, too: I like to be both: I wouldn’t like people to say ‘he is a giant’ and then forget I know how to love.”

$7,200

Autograph letter signed to Alfred, Lord Tennyson. Camden, New Jersey, 9 August 1878

“The Good Gray Poet” to the Poet Laureate. Tennyson was the most important of of the many English literary figures who subscribed to the “Author’s Edition” of Leaves of Grass, privately issued by Whitman in 1876. Hearing that Whitman was “in great straits, almost starving,” Tennyson sent him five pounds virtually as an outright gift, rather than the more modest subscription price (Kaplan, Walt Whitman).

$60,000