Simon Beattie

The Stage Theatre, opera, Shakespeareana

From item 09, Ermitazh

July 2017

THE GREAT WIZARD OF THE NORTH

01. [ANDERSON, John Henry.] Royal Lyceum Theatre …

Monday, Sept. 3rd, 1855, and every evening during the Week,

Professor Anderson, the Great Wizard of the North, will have the

honor of introducing his new and extraordinary Series of

Délassemens Magiques or, Marvels in modern Magic, including

Illustrations and Exposures of Spirit-Rapping and the Table-

Rappers of America! With entirely new Appointments, magnificent

new Apparatus, gorgeous Paraphernalia, and an elegant and

elaborate Psychomantheum, occupying the entire Stage of the

Lyceum Theatre … [1855].

Playbill (505 × 500 mm); a little marginal fraying, creased where

previously folded. £300 + VAT in the EU

A double bill advertising a ‘programme of magic and mystery’ by famous

Scottish conjuror John Henry Anderson (1814–1874), known as ‘the

Great Wizard of the North’.

At age ten, Anderson was apprenticed as a call-boy at Ryder’s

Theatrical Company in his native Aberdeen, where he learned magic

tricks from an itinerant Italian. By 1837, he was performing a one-

hundred-night run at the Waterloo Rooms in Edinburgh, the success of

which prompted him to travel to London, where he appeared in 1840 at

the Strand Theatre to immediate acclaim. In the same year, Anderson

converted the St James’s Bazaar into ‘a temple of magic’, and cemented

his position as London’s foremost paranormal entertainer.

This playbill advertises Anderson’s residency at the Lyceum in 1855, an

ambitious production which combined ‘the inventive genius of the

French, the profound research of the Germans, and the fantastic

originality of the Oriental nations’. Anderson had travelled widely

throughout the 1840s and 1850s, preforming to royal audiences across

Europe, and showcasing a different magical innovation to each. These

were here produced together for the first time, alongside technologies

garnered in the United States, from whence he was recently returned,

and where he had performed for President Franklin Pierce.

The evening’s twelve acts, listed here, include ‘The Mesmeric Couch’ in

which Anderson sleeps unsupported in the air; ‘L’Ecrin de Verre, or the

Casket of King Croesus’, in which the audience’s money appears in a

locked box; ‘The New Bottle of Bacchus’, which can produce ‘any wine

or spirit required; and finally proving to be filled with pocket

handkerchiefs perfectly dry’; the hypnotic ‘Enchanted Chair of Comus’,

and the finale of ‘The Charmed Chest … suspended, like Mahommed’s

Coffin, in mid-air, into which all things will travel, and out of which all will

be produced’.

Anderson was also known for sharing the secrets of his magic, and for

his particular scepticism towards the Spiritualist Movement, which had

become wildly popular following American medium Mrs Hayden’s tour of

London in 1852. In response to this, Anderson had begun in earnest to

debunk spiritualism, and it became part of his act to expose as hoaxes

some of the foremost ‘table-rappers’ of the day, demonstrating how they

achieved the effect of communion with the dead. Reproduced here is a

letter by fellow Scotsman David Douglas Home (1833–1886), a medium

with the reported ability to levitate to a variety of heights, speak with the

dead, and produce rapping and knocks in houses at will, who conducted

hundreds of séances. Anderson sets out to explode Home’s brand of

spiritualism, ‘and the secret Transatlantic influences at work for its

propagation in England’.

TRANSATLANTIC THEATRICAL REFORM

02. BELLOWS, Henry Whitney. Published by Request, An

Address upon the Claims of the Drama, delivered before the

President and Members of the American Dramatic Fund Society,

1857 … (Verbatim from the New York Herald.) With an

Introduction by J. B. Buckstone, Esq. London: Published by J. W.

Anson, Secretary to the Dramatic, Equestrian, and Musical Sick

Fund Association … Sold also at … Birmingham; T. H. Lacy,

Theatrical Bookseller … and by order of all Booksellers in the

Kingdom. Sheffield, Printer … London [1857].

8vo (207 × 135 mm), pp. [2], 29, [1]; disbound. £450

Scarce first separate edition of a moral justification for theatrical

entertainment by the Reverend Henry Whitney Bellows (1814–1882).

Published in book form the same year in New York and in Melbourne

two years later, it is, according to Lowe, ‘one of the few clerical defences

of the stage.’

The late 1840s saw a concerted effort by a group of editors and opinion-

formers to encourage the development of respectable and ‘moral’

theatre. The American Dramatic Fund Association, based in New York

City but consciously part of a transatlantic movement, was founded in

1848 as the ‘organisational embodiment’ of this cause, and the Unitarian

minister Henry W. Bellows was one of its foremost spokesmen. His

Address upon the Claims of Drama was delivered to the Association and

published in the New York Herald, but quickly gained transatlantic

attention and was soon reprinted around the world.

Bellows calls for the proper management of theatres, by which theatrical

arts may become disassociated with vice and instead propagate a moral

goodness, both in audiences and in those engaged in the theatrical

professions. He argues that this will give ‘actors and actresses the

strength and courage they so much need, to rise above the perils of their

laborious and exciting vocation, and to take their place with other

respected and respectable callings’. The logistical realities of

playhouses can help or hinder this agenda, most noticeably through their

stance on the availability of alcohol. He cites the case of Irish immigrant

William Niblo (1790–1878), a latter-day reformer who transformed his

raucous pleasure garden into a place where ‘sober people of the less

tightly laced religious sects could attend’. Prohibition is held up as a

prime example of the way in which a ‘disgusting and odious gallery,

once allotted to vice,– formerly deemed inseparable from the theatre’

may be transformed. He closes, ‘in the rapid unfolding of the great

drama of American civilisation, its principal scene this capital city, the

part has fallen to me to show the relation of public amusements to public

morality, and to claim for the stage a new and better position in society’.

The treatise’s warm reception across the Atlantic was likely due to the

Haymarket Theatre’s actor-manager John Baldwin Buckstone (1802–

1879), who had made contacts in the United States’ theatrical scene

during a sojourn there in 1840–2. His gracious introduction thanks

Bellows for his support, which ‘will not be lost in England’, and he is

‘doubly grateful, when a gentleman of your guarded position in society,

braves the censure of the intolerant and the ignorant, in order to do great

right to the exponents of an art.’ Indeed, he finds Bellows’s stance

‘becomes the more remarkable when contrasted with the bigotry,

unhappily too prevalent in this country, where cheerfulness, healthy

amusement, [and] harmless gaiety … are constantly being frowned upon

by selfish and gloomy men, whose unchristian fanaticism is fast losing

them for a great portion of society’.

Lowe, Arnott & Robinson 609, listing the British edition first.

03. [BRUSSELS.] A volume of playbills and theatre journals.

Brussels, September–October 1852.

Large 4to (340 × 265 mm), contemporary marbled boards, ms. paper

label (‘Zettel von Brüxelles’) to front cover, containing two large folded

playbills (845 × 583 and 1230 × 583 mm), printed on pink paper, for the

Casino des Galeries St Hubert (upper corner torn away and

subsequently restored, with loss of a couple of letters; sense

recoverable) and for some English performers at the Théâtre du

Vaudeville, plus issues of L’Echo, moniteur des théatres (three nos.);

L’entr’acte (eight nos.); L’organe des Arts (one no.); Le lutin, journal des

théatres (four nos.); Moniteur des théatres (fourteen nos.);

L’Hippodrome de Londres (the inside of which is a playbill for an

equestrian display); Cirque oriental (two nos.; again, both doubling as

playbills inside; plus a flyer); with a couple of other printed

announcements; also a variety of playbills from Germany (Baden Baden,

Mainz, Frankfurt); some light browning, creased where folded to fit the

volume, but in very good condition overall, a few tears to spine. £400

04. [BURGTHEATER.] [Drop-head title:] Rollen-Zustellungs-

Bogen für das k. k. Hof-Burg-Theater. [Vienna, March–May

1842.]

Small folio (391 × 241 mm), pp. [4]; a little dust-soiled, creased where

previously folded. £300 + VAT in the EU

An unusual survival: the printed form, with manuscript entries, used at

Vienna’s great Burgtheater to record when scripts had been given out to

actors. It is divided into five columns: the name of the play; the role; the

actor taking the role; date of issue; and finally the actor’s signature. The

plays include Carl Blum’s Pietro Metastasio, Bernhard Anton Hermann’s

Die Tochter des Advocaten, and Schiller’s Wallenstein.

05. DICK, James, compiler. A volume of ‘Musical Scraps’

(spine labelled thus) formerly belonging to James Dick, a

Newcastle musician, including details for performances there of

Mendelssohn’s Antigone in 1883 and McCunn’s Lay of the Last

Minstrel in 1889.

8vo (210 × 134 mm); contemporary aubergine half calf and marbled

boards, rubbed; pen inscription to front pastedown, dated 1967. £400

Comprising:

i) BARTHOLOMEW, William. An imitative Version of Sophocles’

Tragedy Antigone; with its melo-dramatic Dialogues and Choruses, as

written and adapted to the Music of Dr. Felix Mendelssohn Bartholdy …

London: Published by Ewer & Co. … Printed by J. Bonsor … [1844].

8vo, pp. 51, [3]; original printed front wrapper preserved; ink ownership

inscription of James Dick to the title and front wrapper; marked up in red

ink throughout; with the following ms. ink note bound in: ‘The directions

and marks in red ink in this copy, are a facsimile of the prompters copy,

used a the performance of “Antigone” in the Theatre Royal Newcastle on

Tyne on [blank space]. On the title page was written, “John Cooper esq.

with the authors regards” John Coopers name is deleted, and below

was written that of “Henry Egerton esq.” The directions in the copy were

in the same hand as wrote Mr. Egertons name. If John Cooper was the

stage manager at Covent Garden in 1845, when the Antigone was first

performed in England; then, no doubt the directions were made for this

original performance and by authority’. [Bound with:]

ii) RULES for the Government of the Jesmond Musical Society.

[Colophon:] Newcastle-on-Tyne: A. Reid … [1888?].

16mo (136 × 104 mm), pp. 7, [1]; with a printed slip, on pink paper,

commenting on subscriptions for 1888/9. Not found in COPAC. [And:]

iii) [Cover title:] CATALOGUE of Works performed at the Monday

Popular Concerts during twenty-five Seasons, commencing February 14,

1859, and finishing March 19, 1883 … London: Chappell and Co. …

[presumably 1883].

8vo, pp. 29, [1]; front cover preserved, a little browned. Not found in

COPAC. [And:]

iv) [Cover title:] St. James’s Hall Regent Street and Piccadilly. Monday

Popular Concerts. Twenty-ninth Season. Programme and analytical

Remarks for [in ms. ink: the 1000th Concert] Monday Evening, April 4,

1887 … London: Chappell & Co. … [1887].

8vo, pp. [3], 1838–1858, xiv, [36], [1885]–1922; front cover preserved.

[And:]

v) [Cover title:] International Inventions Exhibition, London, 1885. Guide

to the Loan Collection and List of Musical Instruments, Manuscripts,

Books, Paintings, and Engravings, exhibited in the Gallery and Lower

Rooms of the Albert Hall. Printed and published for the Executive

Council of the International Inventions Exhibition, and for the Council of

the Society of Arts, by William Clowes and Sons … 1885.

8vo, pp. [2], xxix–xxxviii, [331]–352, vi, [2], 136; with a folded colour plan

of the Exhibition bound in; two newspaper cuttings on ‘The old musical

instruments’ pasted over title-page; front cover preserved. [And:]

vi) The Royal Siamese Band. Programme for this Day. [Presumably

London, 1885?]

8vo, pp. [4]. [And:]

vii) NOTES on Siamese musical Instruments … London: William

Clowes and Sons … 1885.

8vo, pp. 26; illustrations in the text; front cover (Grand Tour of the Grand

Siamese Band. Illustrated Description of Siamese Musical Instruments,

1885) preserved. [And:]

viii) BARTHOLOMEW, William. Œdipus at Colonos a Tragedy by

Sophocles, the Music composed by Felix Mendelssohn Bartholdy …

London: Novello, Ewer & Co. … [after 1867].

8vo, pp. 52; front cover preserved; with a printed note, from William Rea,

Conductor, dated 1878, on a proposed private recital of the work at

Jesmond Dene; newspaper cutting on the performance pasted to p. [4].

[And:]

ix) A small archive of material, printed and manuscript, including

newspaper cuttings, relating to a performance (1883) of Mendelssohn’s

Antigone (see next item) in aid of the Newcastle-upon-Tyne Scholarship

of the Royal College of Music. James Dick was a member of the

organising committee, and the conductor of the rehearsals in the

absence of William Rea. Unusually, the chorus was to ‘act and sing

without copies’. Also bound in is a printed notice/programme for ‘The

Antigone Choir’, the male voice choir which arose from the 1883

performance, under Dick as Honorary Conductor, from 1884. [And:]

x) BARTHOLOMEW, William. Antigone a Tragedy by Sophocles the

Music composed by Felix Mendelssohn Bartholdy … London: Novello,

Ewer & Co. … Boston, New York, and Philadelphia: Ditson & Co.

[1883.]

8vo, pp. 44, [4]; marked up in red ink throughout; front cover preserved,

on the inside of which is printed the cast list for the 1883 Tyne Theatre

performance, with Dick as ‘Chorus Leader’; also bound in is a folding

plate (from a German publication) depicting Greek costume, the printed

Preliminary Notice for the performance, and the printed programme.

[And:]

xi) A small archive of material, printed and manuscript, including

newspaper cuttings and the printed libretto (pp. 32, with ‘analytical notes’

by Joseph Bennett), relating to a performance (Newcastle Town Hall,

September 1889) of the cantata The Lay of the Last Minstrel by Hamish

McCunn, ‘who is to make his first public appearance in Newcastle at the

Concert’, including two autograph letters, signed, from McCunn to Dick

(a member of the organising committee) confirming the engagement.

xii) Printed programme, on red paper, for a performance of Sullivan’s

Cox and Box at the Northumberland Cricket Club, February 1889. Dick

took the part of Box.

DOMBEY NIGHT, NEW YORK

06. [DICKENS.] [BROUGHAM, John.] [BURTON, William

Evans.] Burton’s Theatre, Chamber Street, rear of City Hall. The

nearest Theatre to the large Hotels … Dombey Night --- As usual,

the only Interruption to the Performance of the great Comedy, The

Serious Family, Captain Cuttle … The Laughing Hyena … Feb.

21, 1850.

Playbill (505 × 250 mm); a little marginal staining and rather creased.

£250 + VAT in the EU

A playbill advertising the regular and hugely successful ‘Dombey Night’

at the New York theatre of British expatriate William Evans Burton

(1804–1860).

Burton relocated to New York in 1834,

and opened a theatre on Chambers

Street on 10 July 1848, poorly timed for a

sweltering summer. The company looked

set to fold, until the floundering

management’s fortunes turned around

overnight with the premiere of John

Brougham’s (1814–1880) stage

adaptation of Dombey and Son, on 24

July. This is perhaps no surprise, as

productions based on Dickens’s novels

such as Nicholas Nickleby (performed

under the uncompromising title The

Savage and the Maiden) had previously

proven a goldmine for New York theatre

managers.

A contemporary reviewer of Burton’s

production reported ‘such enthusiastic

applause as to distinguish the first night of

“Dombey” at Burton’s as one of the most

triumphant ever known in the annals of

our city’. However, despite its early

success, Burton and Brougham withdrew

the production for rewrites after only four

evenings, citing an imperfection in the role

of Captain Cuttle, played by Burton

himself. The revised Dombey and Son

reopened on 16 August, with broad

changes to both text and cast, including a

far expanded role for Burton as Cuttle.

After a brief transfer to Philadelphia in

September 1849, the production returned

to Chambers Street, after which every

Friday became ‘Dombey Night’.

Commentators who saw Burton as Cuttle

universally praised him as comic,

touching, and truthful, while the Spirit of

the Times’s reviewer found the entire

production ‘perfect from first to last’.

By 1850, when this playbill was produced for a fresh season of the now-

legendary ‘Dombey Nights’, the play was supplemented by a short farce

called The Laughing Hyena. Perhaps most interesting here are the

supplementary notes, such as the opprobrium given by ‘special notice’ to

‘the fidgety individuals who occasionally disturb the audience by rising

sometime before the conclusion of the entertainment’, and the

advertisement that ‘the theatre is comfortably warmed with an even and

genial heat, diffused over the whole building by Culver & Co.’s Warm Air

Furnaces’.

NOVELIST SON-IN-LAW AS PUBLISHER

07. EBERS, John. Seven Years of the King’s Theatre …

London: William Harrison Ainsworth … 1828.

8vo (203 × 129 mm), pp. xxviii, 395, [1]; with lithographed portrait

frontispiece and five plates by Engelmann, Graf, Coindet & Co.; some

light spotting, more so towards the beginning; later nineteenth-century

half vellum, spine gilt; paper on the sides a little frayed in places;

armorial bookplate of the Brynkinalt Library (Trevor family), Wrexham.

£250

First edition of an account of the King’s Theatre by its former manager,

the bookseller and publisher John Ebers (1778–1858). It is also one of

very few books published by the novelist William Harrison Ainsworth.

If Ebers was born into bookselling—taking over from his father a

fashionable bookshop-cum-circulating library in Old Bond Street—his

route into theatrical management was more circuitous. The bookshop

doubled as a letting agency for opera boxes, and the Ebers family lent

money to Edmund Waters, the manager of the prestigious King’s

Theatre in the Haymarket and ‘the home of Italian opera in London’.

After Waters fled the country in 1820, leaving the orchestra unpaid,

Ebers’s interests led him to take over the management of the theatre.

Despite the tremendous popularity of opera—this was a heyday not

seen since the late eighteenth century—the theatre continually operated

at a loss, and in 1827 Ebers was declared bankrupt.

Ebers was lampooned in the periodical press for his perceived

mismanagement, and Seven Years is his precise, cool rebuttal to his

critics. He reproduces apparently accurate figures for salaries

(enormous) and expenses (prohibitive). His motive for assenting to

them seems to have been in part vanity; the satisfaction of dealing on

apparently equal terms with aristocrats and famous artists, not to

mention the glamorous Continental opera singers who were the

foremost celebrities of the day. Ebers ultimately blamed his failure on

his initial ignorance, on the rent, and on unavailability of government

sponsorship for the arts. Subsidy, he acknowledges, is ‘against English

habits’.

Despite Ebers’s financial woes, his account gives a first-hand account of

the dazzling world of early nineteenth-century English opera. His early

seasons were dominated by the craze for Mozart and Rossini, and the

singers were distinguished. The most glamorous are represented here

in the fine lithographed portraits by Engelmann, including the celebrated

Giuditta Pasta (1797–1865) as Desdemona.

The work was published by Ebers himself, as part of an ultimately ill-

fated partnership with novelist William Harrison Ainsworth (1805–1882).

They entered into business together in 1826, shortly after Ebers had

published Ainsworth’s first novel, a collaborative effort with J. P. Aston

called Sir John Chiverton (1826). Ainsworth shortly thereafter married

Ebers’ daughter Anne Frances (1804/5–1838), and the newlyweds

moved in with Ebers. Far from cementing the partnership however, the

professional and domestic proximity proved too much; the partnership

with Ebers dissolved in 1829, and the marriage followed in 1835.

Although Ainsworth would return to the world of publishing business in

later years, owning several periodicals, he would never again work

under his own imprint.

08. EFROS, Nikolai Efimovich. Mariia Nikolaevna Ermolova.

(Dvadtsatipiatiletie stsenicheskoi deiatel’nosti) [Maria Yermolova.

Twenty-five years on the stage]. Moskva—1896. Izdanie

knizhnago magazine Grosmen i Knebel’ (I. Knebel’).

16mo (164 × 108 mm), pp. 183, [1]; a few full-page photographic

illustrations in the text; leaves toned due to paper stock; one gathering

starting, but sound; original publisher’s cloth, a lightly rubbed only, upper

board and spine lettered gilt. £700

First edition of a scarce 25th-anniversary celebration of the great

Russian actress, by the theatre writer Nikolai Efros (1867–1923).

‘Maris Nikolaevna Ermolova [1853–1928] stands out among actors of

the Maly Theatre … [as] one of the great tragediennes in theatre history.

Like Dostoevsky and Tolstoy, she represented a whole era in late

nineteenth-century Russian culture. Unfortunately, unlike a great writer,

she did not leave any permanent trace of her art. Although critics of her

time unanimously recognised her as a “tragic actress of genius”, “a

symbol of our time”, they found it almost impossible to define and

describe that genius …’ (Arkady Ostrovsky, ‘Imperial and private

theatres, 1882–1905’, A History of Russian Theatre (CUP, 1999), pp.

225–6).

WorldCat locates a sole copy, at Chicago.

AVANT GARDE

09. ERMITAZH. Programma — zhurnal. N 1[–15]. [Colophon:]

Izdatel’stvo „Alkol“ … Moskva [1922].

15 vols, 8vo (258 × 170 mm); No. 1: pp. 16, Nos. 2–13 and 15: pp. 20;

No. 14: pp. 24; some light browning due to paper stock; original

illustrated self-wrappers, a few creases, spine to nos. 1, 6, and 7 torn, a

few marks to the front cover of no. 12, lower corner torn away, old paper

repair to upper margin of inside front cover of no. 13, upper corner of

rear cover chipped; a very good set of a fragile item; in a portfolio.

£2500

A rare complete run of Ermitazh (‘The Hermitage’), an essential early

Soviet what’s-on guide to the theatre, ballet, concerts, exhibitions,

auctions, cinema, sport, and music, which ran from May to August 1922.

The print-run was 8000 copies for the first three numbers, then 4000 for

no. 4, and 6000 for the remaining numbers.

The content consists of reviews, obituaries, and insider snippets, as well

as the listings and advertisements. Meyerhold was among the

contributors; his lecture on ‘The actor of the future’ (12 June 1922) is

featured in no. 6.

The often striking wrappers feature musicians such as Chaliapin and

Scriabin, and actors such as Evgeny Vakhtangov (who died in May

1922) and a young Igor Ilyinsky (1901–1987), with some wonderful

contributions by artists such as Vasily Komardenkov (no. 9) and, in

particular, Pyotr Galadzhev (passim).

Such modernism also finds its way inside the journal, too, with articles

on avant-garde art and music hall (no. 7) and, importantly, the First

Working Group of Constructivists’ first public pronouncement: ‘The Front

of Artistic Work. The First Programme of the Working Group of

Constructivists’, No. 13, pp. 3–4.

Periodicheskii pechat’ SSSR 1917–1949 (Moscow, 1963), p. 347.

INNOVATIVE BOOKSELLING

10. [FEALES, William]. A True and exact Catalogue of all the

Plays and other dramatick Pieces, that were ever yet Printed in

the English Tongue, in alphabetical Order: Continu’d down to April

1732. London: Printed for W. Feales … 1732.

12mo (164 × 100 mm) in half-sheets, pp. 35, [1];

disbound; some light marginal browning and traces of

binding glue to the initial and final leaves. £350

First edition. As a bookseller and publisher, William

Feales specialized in drama, and in 1732 produced a

20-volume series entitled The English Theatre,

advertised on the final page here. The Catalogue was

also issued as part of Feales’ The three

celebrated Plays of that excellent poet Ben Johnson

(sic; 1732).

The present work is a supplementary catalogue to the

project, purportedly a scholarly exercise but ultimately

representing the variety of material available to

purchase at Feales’ premises near Clement’s Inn,

‘where may be had a Variety of Plays’. Unlike The

English Theatre, which was ‘more a disconnected

miscellany of dramatic texts than an attempt to organize

selected works into a representative whole’ (Schoch),

Feales’ Catalogue is a fascinating repository of hundreds of plays, listed

alphabetically, from Abdelazar, or, the Moor’s Revenge (famous for its

incidental music by Purcell) to William Mountfort’s Zelmane, or, the

Corinthian Queen. Many of the works are familiar, although some are

now lost, and the listing includes ephemeral vignettes such as royal

entertainments and coronation festivities.

According to Wiles, producing catalogues of this type appears to have

been Feales’ innovation, although it would become standard publishing

practice until well into the eighteenth century (Serial Publication in

England, p. 17).

Lowe, Arnott & Robinson 22. See Richard Schoch, Writing the History

of the British Stage: 1660–1900 (CUP, 2006), p. 205.

‘A NEW ERA OF SCENE-PAINTING IN THE THEATRE’

11. [GARRICK, David]. A New dramatic Entertainment, called

a Christmas Tale. In five Parts. As it is performed at the

Theatre-Royal in Drury-Lane. Embellished with an etching, by Mr.

Loutherbourg. London: Printed for T. Becket … 1774.

8vo (203 × 125 mm), pp. [8], 76, with an etched frontispiece by

Loutherbourg; some occasional foxing; disbound. £400

First edition of a mature play by Garrick, the production of which broke

new ground in eighteenth-century theatrical presentation.

Garrick’s biographer Thomas Davies describes the Christmas Tale as a

work in which the playwright ‘embraced every occasion to treat the

audience with fine scenes, splendid dresses, brisk music, and lively

dances’. The work—in which an underworld of evil spirits must be

defeated before lovers Camilla and Floridor can find happiness—is more

reminiscent of a masque than a traditional play, and has been described

as a cross between Milton’s Comus and Mozart’s The Magic Flute.

Recent commentators have pointed to the importance of masonic

imagery in the play, and as Garrick was not himself interested in

mysticism, this was likely influenced by the work’s musical composer

Charles Dibdin (1745–1814), and the landscape painter Philippe

Jacques de Loutherbourg (1740–1812), newly arrived in London. ‘His

services were at once secured by Garrick as chief designer of scenery at

Drury Lane Theatre. In this line De Loutherbourg was without a rival,

and the care with which he modelled and studied each detail, and the

skill with which he handled the illumination, rendered his scenes real

works of art. His first attempt was in connection with the “Christmas

Tale,” which was produced at Drury Lane Theatre on 27 Dec. 1773.

This spectacular play is said to have been by Garrick himself, and it

inaugurated a new era of scene-painting in the theatre’ (DNB).

12. [GIFFARD, Henry]. [Drop-head title:] The Case of the

Proprietors of the Theatre in Goodman’s-Fields, in the Tower

Division, in the County of Middlesex. [London, 1735.]

Single folio sheet (318 × 193 mm), docketed in type on the verso;

horizontal creases where previously folded, light marginal browning,

sometime disbound, ms. ink number in upper corner, short tear in inner

margin. £750

During the first two decades of the eighteenth century there were two

major theatres in London, one in Drury Lane, where opera

predominated, and the other in Lincoln’s Inn Fields. In 1720, the number

rose to three, with the opening of the Little Theatre in the Haymarket, in

the City of Westminster. The plays produced there were at first by

writers of little note, and were performed by actors with little training, but

within a few years the Haymarket, as it came to be known, became the

scene of productions involving more major figures. In 1729, the

theatrical world of London expanded once more, with the building of a

new theatre in Goodman’s Fields by the playwright Thomas Odell.

Odell, however, proved inept as a manager, and in 1731 he relinquished

control to the actor Henry Giffard (1699–1772), who had received his

early training at the Smock Alley Theatre in Dublin. Giffard was more

skilful at running a playhouse, and within a year he decided to build a

new and more lavish theatre nearby. In the meantime, construction

began on yet another house, the Theatre Royal in Covent Garden, and

as soon as the building was finished, John Rich transferred his company

there from Lincoln’s Inn Fields, which remained open under new

management. This brought the number of active London theatres to

five.

This relatively sudden expansion of the world of the

London stage aroused a certain degree of alarm, both

moral and political. By 1735, the feeling had arisen

among certain members of Parliament that the

indiscriminate spread of new theatres required a

change in the laws which governed them, and in

March of that year the prominent merchant Sir John

Barnard was given permission in the House of

Commons to introduce ‘a Bill or Bills for restraining

the number of houses for playing of interludes and for

the better regulating common players of interludes.’

The primary reason given for this proposed legislation

was to limit the damage being done to the city of

London by the playhouses ‘in corrupting the youth,

encouraging vice and debauchery, and being

prejudicial to trade and industry.’

This Bill was seen immediately as a threat to the

entire theatrical profession, and soon elicited a series

of petitions to Parliament, expressing opposition to its

passage. These were all printed in the traditional folio

format, docketed in type on the last page, for

distribution to members of the House of Commons.

This is one such printed protest.

In it, Giffard begins with a brief description of the subscription by which

he raised the sum of £2500 to erect his new theatre, with each share

being assigned a price of £100, and ‘each sharer being intitul’d to one

shilling and sixpence for every acting night, and the privilege of seeing

the play gratis.’ The text goes on to request that the text of the draft Bill

be amended, to make an exception to the clause requiring licensed

theatres to be located in the City of Westminster: ‘As the Bill now stands,

it excludes the Bills of Mortality, in which is compris’d the said Theatre in

Goodman’s-Fields, and lays the Proprietors under an impossibility of

obtaining at any Time a Licence from the Lord Chamberlain.’

Not found in Lowe, Arnott & Robinson (but see no. 158ff. for other items

relating to the case). ESTC locates only one other copy, at the National

Archives at Kew; that copy is badly cropped, with the loss of the title at

the top (though the docket title on the verso has the same reading).

13. GILLRAY, James. Dilettanti-Theatricals; — or — a Peep at

the Green Room … [London:] Pubd Feby 18th 1803 by H.

Humphrey, 27 St James’s Street.

Etching (344 × 515 mm), a little creased and dusty, else fine.

£800 + VAT in the EU

‘A crowded scene, the amateurs of the Pic Nic Society [a London

theatrical club, founded in 1802 by the impresario Colonel Henry

Greville] are dressing and rehearsing … The central figure is Lady

Buckinghamshire, enormous, florid, and gorgeous, her skirts outspread,

standing before a dressing-table, touching one of her many patches on

her face and holding her part, that of Roxana [in Lee’s tragedy, The

Rival Queens; or the Death of Alexander the Great]. Under her

dressing-table is a square bottle of Usquebaugh and a glass. On

Roxana’s left, with her back to the dressing-table, sits Lady Salisbury,

her legs crossed and much exposed, pulling on a laced boot … She

gazes at the huge Lord Cholmondeley who stands in profile to the left,

dominating the left of the design. He is dressed as Cupid … In the

foreground, in front of Lord Cholmondeley, stands the tiny Lord Mount

Edgcumbe in a swaggering attitude, studying his part: Alexander the

Great … Facing Lord Cholmondeley and immediately behind Lady

Salisbury is little Lord Derby blowing a French horn …

‘The title of the play is said to be an allusion to the rivalry between Mrs

Fitzherbert and Lady Jersey …’ (BM Satires), seen here dancing with

the Prince of Wales on the right of the image.

BM Satires 10169 (‘coloured impression’). It is unusual to find Gillray

etchings uncoloured, as here.

14. GLAGOLIN, Boris Sergeevich. Teatral’nye epizody

[Theatrical episodes]. [St Petersburg, Sirius, 1911.]

8vo (230 × 163 mm), pp. 198, [2]; leaves a little toned due to paper

stock; repair in the gutter of the final leaf; later boards, preserving the

original gilt-lettered front cover, ‘Za kulisami moego teatra [Behind the

scenes of my theatre]. Spb. 1911.’ £600

First edition, privately printed, drawing together articles and speeches on

the theatre, as well as diary entries, written by Glagolin (1879–1948), an

actor–director who became one of Russia’s first filmmakers before he

finally emigrated.

Glagolin had played a wide variety of roles in the first decade of the

century: Hamlet (which he writes about here, on pp. 135–149);

controversially, the title role in Schiller’s Maid of Orleans (about which he

published a book in 1905); Sherlock Holmes, in a stage version he wrote

himself; and Peter Verkhovensky in an adaptation of Dostoevsky’s

novel, The Possessed. ‘While at the Kharkov Theatre (1917–1923) he

was court-martialed as a Bolshevik sympathizer but exonerated

(1919) … At the Moscow Theatre of Revolution (1923–1925, 1927),

introducing innovations such as no props, direct address to the

audience, and breaking the frame, he staged St. Joan … After serving

as director of Franco-Ukrainian Theatre, he exploited a visit to an

exhibition in Germany to emigrate to New York (1927), where he staged

[Lope de Vega’s] The Gardener’s Dog (1928) and Othello (1929) at the

Jewish Art Theatre. Glagolin taught at Carnegie Tech and then the

Milwaukee Civic Theatre. “The Russian Barrymore” wound up as

gardener to the actor James Gleason in Beverly Hills’ (Senelick,

Historical Dictionary of Russian Theatre).

MARKED UP FOR DRURY LANE

15. HANDEL, George Frideric. Judas Macchabæus, a sacred

Drama. As it is performed at the Theatre Royal in Covent-Garden.

The Musick composed by Mr. Handel. London: Printed for the

Administrator of J. Watts; and sold by T. Lowndes … [c.1765/8].

4to (261 × 210 mm), pp. 16; edges a little browned; stitched as issued in

the original blue paper wrappers, rather frayed but holding, spine

defective; contemporary marginal annotations of singers’ names. £1750

A scarce edition of Morell’s libretto for Handel’s oratorio, this copy dating

from the Lenten season at Drury Lane in 1773, starring sisters Elizabeth

Ann (1741–1790) and Mary Linley (1758–1787). Though not quite a

prompt book (for which, see items 23–29), it has been marked up with

the names of performers for each role in a contemporary hand, tracing it

to the production which opened on 26 February 1773, part of Drury

Lane’s spectacularly popular season of oratorios starring the Linley

sisters alongside tenor Thomas Norris (1741–1790) and soprano

Frederika Weichsel (here ‘Weichell’; 1745–1786; mother of the

celebrated soprano Elizabeth Billington). The annotator has also noted

in one instance when an aria was encored by the audience.

Following an acclaimed season in Bath, the Linleys—daughters of

impresario and composer Thomas Linley (1733–1795)—had been

approached to perform at Drury Lane. The Bath Chronicle reported ‘the

two Linleys carry all before them’, estimating receipts at over five

hundred pounds a night, and further suggesting that Thomas Linley had

made nearly ten thousand pounds by Elizabeth’s voice. The season’s

success led to Linley becoming co-manager of the theatre, a position in

which he would go on to enjoy a profitable collaboration with David

Garrick.

The company was roundly well received. A review of this production in

the Middlesex Journal gave fifteen-year-old Mary in particular, a

newcomer to the London scene, a glowing review: ‘Her voice, though

not, I think, so very much in alt as some of our stage-singers make

theirs, is extremely melodious, and sufficiently high for all Mr. Handel’s

music’. The reviewer praised her ‘Italian manner of modulating’ and

tipped her for greatness, especially in the company of her sister.

However, this would prove to be one of the last times that the sisters

would perform together.

ESTC lists four printings of the libretto for Watts/Lowndes, speculating

1765 or 1768 as the date; there are variants, too, e.g. with ‘the Theatres

Royal in Drury-Lane and Covent-Garden’ and ‘Musick’ spelled without a

k in the title.

THE PLAY IN MANSFIELD PARK

16. [KOTZEBUE, August von]. Theatre Royal, Drury Lane. This

present Thursday, September 19, 1816, Their Majesties’ Servants

will perform the Play of Lovers’ Vows … To which will be added

the Farce of the Irishman in London [by William Macready] …

[London, 1816.]

Playbill (318 × 192 mm); marginal spotting. £120 + VAT in the EU

Kotzebue had been tremendously popular with English audiences in the

1790s, when translations of German theatre had dominated the London

stage. One of them had a particular effect on Jane Austen, who

featured the play advertised here in her novel, Mansfield Park (1814).

‘Lovers’ Vows, freely adapted by [Elizabeth] Inchbald from August F. F.

von Kotzebue’s sentimental melodrama Das Kind der Liebe (1790),

opened at the Theatre Royal, Covent Garden on 11 October 1798 and

was performed for forty-two nights that season, a success instantly

replicated at ... the chief provincial theatres … Austen attended and

apparently enjoyed several performances of Kotzebue adaptations …

She may have seen an amateur performance of Lovers’ Vows some

years before the composition of Mansfield Park’ (Laura Carroll, in her

introductory note to the Cambridge Edition of the Works of Jane Austen,

2005, which reprints the play in full).

THE FIRST HISTORY OF RUSSIAN OPERA

17. MORKOV, Vladimir Ivanovich.

Istoricheskii ocherk russkoi opery s

samago eia nachala, po 1862 god [An

historical sketch of Russian opera, from its

beginnings to the year 1862].

Sanktpeterburg, Izdanie M. Bernarda. 1862.

8vo (229 × 154 mm) in half-sheets, pp. viii, 161,

[1], 10 (engraved music); the odd spot only;

contemporary half roan and marbled boards,

corners worn, spine a little scraped in places;

early stamp of the Moscow music-seller Pavel

Lengol’d (Paul Ludwig Lehnhold, 1812–1896) to

the half-title, old bookseller’s marks to the rear

pastedown. £1100

First edition of the first history of opera in Russia,

compiled by Morkov (1801–1864), ‘a passionate

opera lover’ but best known as a guitarist and

composer. ‘He left over 100 compositions and arrangements, many of

them transcriptions from operas by Rossini, Donizetti, Verdi, Wagner,

Glinka and Dargomyzhsky; judging from his dedications, Morkov knew

Glinka and Dargomyzhsky personally. Besides pieces for solo guitar, he

published for guitar duet and guitar and piano … [and] a guitar

method, Polnaya shkola dlya 7-strunnoy gitary (“Complete method for

the seven-string guitar”) (St Petersburg, 1863)’ (New Grove).

The ten pages of engraved music at the end print the overture to the first

Russian opera, Francesco Araja’s Tsefal i Prokris (Cephalus and

Prokris, 1755, to a libretto by Sumarokov), arranged for piano.

18. [MOSCOW.] Five folding postcards, issued to celebrate four

major Moscow theatres, and the actor Aleksandr Yuzhin (1857–

1927). Moscow, Knigosoiuz, not before 1927.

5 folding postcards (98 × 405 mm when unfolded), each comprising

three panels and featuring hand-drawn illustrations by Konstantin

Golshtein, with tinted photographic portraits; slight stain to the Operetta

card, a few marks to the versos, including old dealer’s marks on the

Maly card, but in very good condition overall.

Together £600 + VAT in the EU

The theatres featured here are the Bolshoi, the Maly, the Operetta

Theatre (founded 1927), and the Mossovet Theatre (here called the

Moscow Province Council of Trade Unions Dramatic Theatre, founded

1923). The photographs on the Yuzhin card depict him in some of his

greatest roles, including The Merchant of Venice and Hamlet.

Golshtein (1881–1944) was a book illustrator. In 1943, he was

sentenced to ten years’ imprisonment for ‘treason’, and perished in a

prison camp the following year.

19. [PARIS.] A bound volume of the Gazette des Étrangers,

etc. Paris, April–May 1864.

Folio (378 × 255 mm), contemporary cloth-backed boards, ms. paper

labels (‘1864. Pariser Theater-Zettel’, ‘Le grand Hotel. Gazette des

Étrangers’) to front cover and spine; small section from the first page of

the 30 April issue of L’Orchestre torn out; some light spotting, but still in

very good condition overall, the individual leaves of the journals folded to

fit the volume. £250

A German visitor to Paris evidently retained various contemporary

‘what’s-on guides’ and had them bound up here, allowing a snapshot

into theatre-going at the time. Containing 14 numbers of the Grand

Hotel’s daily Gazette des Étrangers, 17 April – 3 May 1864 (the final

number contains an announcement of Meyerbeer’s death on the front

page, ringed in red pencil), edited by Henri de Pène (1830–1888); nine

numbers of L’Orchestre: revue de la littérature, des théatres et

programme des spectacles, 23 April – 3 May; two numbers of Vert-vert:

programme des spectacles, 25 April – 3 May; individual numbers of the

Journal de tout le monde (28 April) and Figaro-programme (1 May).

20. [Drop-head title:] THE PLYMOUTH Theatrical Spy; or, a

Pair of Spectacles for the Manager … No. 1 Saturday, January 5,

1828 … [– No. 9, March 1, 1828] … [Colophon:] Haviland, Printer,

Plymouth [1828].

9 numbers in one vol., small 8vo (155 × 95 mm), pp. 66; paginated

sequentially; a little foxed and marked in places; contemporary black half

roan and marbled boards, worn, joints weak but holding. £700

A complete run of a very rare provincial weekly, offering a wealth of

information about contemporary Plymouth theatre life.

The anonymous author explains that, as ‘theatrical coroner for the

district’, he hopes ‘to correct many abuses which the partiality or

supineness of the newspaper press has hitherto suffered to prevail

unnoticed’. What follows is a frank and fascinating account of provincial

theatricals, the arch style including weary ‘advice to actors’ about how

best to deliver rhyming couplets, and death-notices for unsuccessful

productions.

The Spy’s increasing popularity—its weekly increase in subscription is

reported with pride—comes to an abrupt end with issue 9, a single leaf

announcing the publication’s suspension, printed within a mourning

border and available gratis. The reason given is the indisposition of the

editor ‘Paul Pry’ (named after one of playwright John Poole’s

protagonists), giving a few tantalising hints towards his real identity in a

farewell address.

Not in COPAC, and only one location in WorldCat, at Harvard (no. 1

only?).

‘THE GODS’ REMOVED

21. POOR COVENT GARDEN! Or, a Scene rehearsed; an

occasional Prelude, intended for the opening of the New Theatre

Royal, Covent-Garden, this Season. London: Printed by T.

Wilkins … 1792.

8vo (200 × 115 mm), pp. 16; the odd mark; modern paper wrappers.

£300

First edition of a satirical piece, decrying the changes

made to Henry Holland’s newly-refurbished Theatre

Royal, including the removal of the shilling gallery.

The action is set in the Theatre’s backstage area, where

members of the cast—among them Covent Garden

veterans William Thomas Lewis (1746–1811) and Isabella

Mattocks (1746–1826)—are intimidated by the vast new

space provided by Holland’s refurbishment, which

drastically increased audience capacity at the expense of

space backstage.

Inspired by recent publications on French theatre design

by Pierre Patte and Étienne Dumont, Holland (1745–1806)

had provided the Theatre Royal with chastely classical interior

decoration and rich furnishing. These designs and their heathen

undertones come under attack in the tongue-in-cheek dialogue: ‘Poor

Covent Garden—thou art as much cut up and mutilated now, as my poor

Farce, which was acted one night for a Benefit—Why, where’s the upper

gallery? How in the devil’s name can they hope for a blessing, who have

excluded the gods?’ In the event, Holland’s incarnation of the theatre

would last for just sixteen years, until the building suffered a catastrophic

fire in 1808 and was wholly reimagined by Robert Smirke.

Lowe, Arnott & Robinson 1178.

ITALIAN OPERA, TRANSLATED BY ‘THE RUSSIAN GARRICK’

22. PORTUGAL, Marcos António. Trubochist kniaz’ i kniaz’

trubochist, komicheskaia opera v odnom deistvii. S Italiianskago

vol’no perevedennaia [The Chimney-sweep Prince and the Prince

Chimney-sweep, a comic opera in one act. Freely translated from

the Italian] … V Sanktpeterburge, s dozvoleniia Upravy

Blagochiniia 1795 goda.

8vo (195 × 118 mm), pp. 93, [1]; some finger-soiling and spotting in

places throughout; contemporary half calf, rebacked. £1200

First edition in Russian of the libretto for Portugal’s opera Lo spazza-

camino principe (1794), by Giuseppe Maria Foppa, based on the

comedy Le ramoneur prince et le prince ramoneur (1784) by Maurin de

Pompigny (1766–1828). The translation is by the leading actor Ivan

Dmitrevsky (1734–1821), ‘the Russian Garrick’.

The opera dates from the period when Portugal (1762–1830) had left

Lisbon for Naples, where ‘he gained instant success with La confusione

della somiglianza (1793, Florence), one of several opere

buffe and farse he wrote over the next seven years which were

subsequently performed throughout Italy and much of Europe’ (New

Grove).

Svodnyi katalog 7864 (sub Foppa, the only entry); Sopikov 7435. Not

found in WorldCat.

23–29. PROMPT BOOKS

As Stephen Orgel recently noted: ‘The playbook as promptbook is

scarcely a book any more. It is a set of notations for production,

and, as such, an archaeological site of evidence about the play’s

physical, auditory, visual, and spatial requirements and

possibilities at a particular moment in theater history. All these are

elicited from the text, to be sure, but the text is endlessly

mutable—as the volume testifies, it changed from production to

production. Publication, in short, does nothing to fix the text of a

play’ (The Reader in the Book, OUP, 2015, p. 83).

23. [PROMPT BOOK.] JERROLD, Douglas. The Housekeeper;

or, the White Rose. A Comedy, in two Acts … Performed at the

Theatre Royal, Haymarket. London: John Miller … 1833.

12mo (180 × 117 mm) in half-sheets, pp. [6], 51, [1]; old paper wrappers,

label numbered in ms. ink, tape repair at foot of spine; early ink

ownership inscription of W. H. Denstone to the title; marginal notes in a

neat contemporary hand throughout. £250

First edition of a comedy by Punch stalwart and the ‘father of domestic

drama’, Douglas William Jerrold (1803–1857).

Jerrold was known for his hugely popular nautical drama Black-Eyed

Susan (1839), and he continued to write prolifically although he would

never emulate that play’s success. He gradually ‘came to be seen as

the father of that most popular Victorian genre the “domestic drama”,

which he referred to as “a poor thing but mine own”’ (Oxford DNB). First

performed on 17 July 1833, The Housekeeper is one such work, replete

with Jerrold’s trademark elaborate dialogue ‘which reads a bit like

bowdlerized Congreve or imitation Sheridan’, delivered by somewhat

forced caricatures. As a country-house tale of mistaken identity and

recaptured love it was nonetheless successful enough to be resurrected

over several seasons.

The present copy is marked for a faithful production, the stage directions

in a neat hand: indicating such detail as when a character is to have his

elbows on or off a table, exits and entrances, sound cues, ‘lights half

down’, notes on props, and a neat diagram of the order in which the

players will take their curtain call.

FINE PROVINCIAL PROMPT BOOK

24. [PROMPT BOOK.] JONES, Richard. The Green Man: A

Comedy, in three Acts. First performed at the Theatre Royal, Hay-

Market, Saturday, August 15, 1818. From the French of M. M.

D’Aubigny et Poujol … London: William Fearman, Library … 1818.

8vo (225 × 145 mm) in half-sheets, pp. [6], 78; single sheet of notepaper

(watermarked 1817), with ms. details of costumes, tipped in with sealing

wax; some light browning and dust-soiling to the initial and final pages,

fore-margin of the first few leaves frayed, waterstaining to the lower

edge of p. 55 onwards; uncut in old paper wrappers, a couple of snags

to rear cover, front cover title in later ms. ink; ink ownership inscription of

‘H. Kelly, 1818, Southampton’ to the title; later ownership stamp of

Arthur William Kelly at head of p. [1]. £1200

First edition, very scarce, of a lively comedy, this copy closely marked up

for a production in Southampton the year of its release.

The play is translated from L’homme gris (1818) by Baudouin d’Aubigny

and Poujol, and is attributed to Birmingham-born comic actor and

playwright Richard ‘Gentleman’ Jones (1779–1851),

although his authorship was disputed (Oxford DNB).

It concerns Sir George Squander, who has gone

against his uncle’s wishes and married the daughter

of a local apothecary. The uncle sets about to ruin

him in the hope that he will abandon his new bride,

in which plan he enlists the help of the enigmatic

‘green man’, who after much comic wrangling is

revealed as the couple’s saviour. The play was an

instant hit, garnering a rave review in the Theatrical

Journal, whose correspondent described it as

‘replete with incident and humour, the sentiments

are natural, affecting, and introduced by

circumstances … it entitles its author (Mr. Richard

Jones, the comedian) to a place among our best

modern dramatists’.

The present copy is fully marked up for a production

at Southampton’s Theatre Royal, which presumably

took place in the autumn of 1818, after its London

premiere at the Haymarket on 15 August. Not only

does this represent a startlingly early production of a

new London play in the provinces—attesting to its

immediate popularity—but is also a good example of

a highly professional marked-up prompt book. The numerous

annotations include stage directions, call notes for players to prepare,

excisions, inserted text, props required (a bowl of soup, glass of wine,

bank notes, paper, necklaces, etc.). Staging is noted explicitly, with ‘Up

Terrace’ indicating a terrace beyond the box set, as well as occasional

entrances ‘through a door in flap’. The timing for each act and the time

for the complete performance is also noted. Finally, a diagram to the

final page shows the order in which the actors were to take their curtain

call.

In addition, this copy includes a sheet of note paper tipped onto the

initial advertisement pages, with extensive notes on costume. We learn

that Mr Crackley wears ‘a light blue modern Dandy coat’ and a ‘French

hat’. French fashions were considered rather foppish at this time, and it

demonstrates that the director sought a particular arch tone to the piece.

This also gives clues to past productions, with Bertha’s costume ‘as

Sophie’ from Road to Ruin, and the character Closefist ‘as you’d dress

Lovegold’, demonstrating the multiple uses and reinvention of costume.

This copy almost certainly belonged to one of the actor-managers of the

theatre. In 1833 these were recorded as Maxfield and Kelly. Maxfield

was the company’s principal actor—he was highly praised in the

Theatrical Magazine for 1822 for his performance as the Constable of

the Night—and he is here down as the Green Man himself. The

annotations to this copy are in the same hand as the inscription ‘H.

Kelly’, no doubt the Kelly who addressed the audience at the close of a

performance in 1822 ‘on behalf of the managers of this theatre, the

performers collectively, and for myself individually’. A Miss Kelly is listed

here in the role of Bertha, suggesting the continuation of the Kelly

dynasty at the heart of the theatre.

With the later ownership stamp of Arthur Williams, a touring actor who

collected prompt books, amassing an extensive collection of nineteenth-

century theatrical ephemera.

COPAC records copies at the British Library, Cambridge, the National

Library of Wales, and Trinity College Dublin, to which WorldCat adds but

two, at Ohio and Virginia.

25. [PROMPT BOOK.] MACKLIN, Charles. The Man of the

World. A Comedy, in five Acts … As performed at the Theatres

Royal. London: Printed for John Lowndes … [1820s?].

12mo (190 × 116 mm) in half-sheets, pp. 84; partially interleaved, with

ms. stage directions and new dialogue, also ms. deletions and marginal

notes; final leaf torn; untrimmed in contemporary paper wrappers, these

somewhat soiled and frayed; contemporary ms. title to cover, and ‘G.B

to DM’ in another hand. £600

An apparently unrecorded early nineteenth-century acting edition of this

controversial anti-Jacobite play.

Ulster-born Charles Macklin (1699–1797) had been a jobbing actor and

playwright for years before he found success with The Man of the World,

first performed (under the title The True Born Scotchman) at Dublin’s

Smock Alley Theatre on 10 July 1764. Despite its success, it was only

in 1781 that Macklin persuaded the Lord Chamberlain to allow The Man

of the World formally onto the English stage, where it appeared with

Kemble in the lead at Covent Garden, and Kean at Drury Lane. This

version was heavily censored, but ‘having judiciously toned down the

ferocious anti-Scots polemic and biting topicality, Macklin found success

for a play which would remain popular well into the next century’ (Oxford

DNB).

The present edition represents the toned-down version, and has neat

marginal annotations, deletions and emphases, some on the interleaved

blanks. The annotations close with the final stage arrangement of

characters, and a running time of two hours and forty-one minutes. It

was evidently not an abridged production.

This Lowndes edition is not listed in COPAC or WorldCat. The British

Book Trade Index lists Lowndes as trading between 1819 and 1827.

26. [PROMPT BOOK.] O’NEILL, Eugene. Liubov’ pod viazami.

P’esa v trekh deistviiakh. Perevod P. Zenkevicha i N. Krymovoi

[Love under the elms. A play in three acts. Translated by Pavel

Zenkevich and N. Krymova]. Izdatel’stvo «MODPiK» Moskva

1927 Leningrad.

8vo (218 × 145 mm), pp. 48; with large photographic illustrations in the

text; some marginal waterstaining/spotting; original printed wrappers,

creased and worn, rear cover finger-soiled. £700

Scarce first edition in Russian of Desire under the Elms (1924),

published by the Moscow Society of Dramatic Writers and Composers.

The photographs show scenes from the production at Aleksandr Tairov’s

Kamerny Theatre in Moscow on 11 November 1926, with Nikolai

Tseretelli as Eben and Alisa Koonen as Abbie.

This copy was evidently used for another production, with copious

markings and pencil annotations throughout.

Brown 1205; Libman 4284. WorldCat locates the Harvard copy only.

27. [PROMPT BOOK.] SELBY, Charles. The Dancing Barber:

A Farce, in one Act … As performed at the Theatre-Royal,

Adelphi, correctly Printed from the Prompter’s Copy, with

Remarks, the Cast of Characters, Costume, scenic Arrangement,

Sides of Entrance and Exit, and relative Positions of the Dramatis

Personæ. Illustrated with an Etching, by Pierce Egan the

Younger, from a Drawing taken during the Representation.

London: Chapman and Hall … 1838.

12mo (190 × 153 mm), pp. 23, [1]; without the etching mentioned in the

title; interleaved as a small 4to and stitched into contemporary brown

paper wrappers, browned, chipped, and now rather fragile, title to front

cover in ms. ink. £150

Scarce first edition of a lively farce in the burlesque tradition by the

prolific playwright Charles Selby (1802–1863).

First performed 8 January 1838, Selby’s burletta focuses on the

misadventures of Narcissus Fitzfrizzle, the eponymous barber, who

inveigles his way into upper-class society in order pursue his one true

love. He encounters stock characters such as prancing upper-class

buffoon Lord Mincington, along with a slew of double entendres and

misunderstandings, but is ultimately able to reveal his true identity and

circulate his business cards. Designed as filler between larger

productions, one-act burlesques often referenced the contemporary

scene, such as the allusion here to Madame Pasta’s celebrated

performance as Medea.

Along with ink deletions to the text, the additional leaves in the present

copy feature musical cues and other sound effects, including ‘noise’,

’music’, ‘band up’, along with ‘W’ (i.e. ‘whistle’) for a change of scene,

and ‘Ring’ for the final curtain. This suggests that this copy was for the

use of the call-boy or other stagehand.

COPAC records copies at Bodley, Cambridge, Senate House, and

Aberdeen. WorldCat adds no copies of this edition.

28. [PROMPT BOOK.] WALKER, Charles Edward. The

Warlock of the Glen, a Melodrama, in two Acts … London:

Thomas Hailes Lacy … [1850].

12mo (175 × 105 mm) in half-sheets, pp. 21, [1]; late nineteenth-century

quarter pebbled cloth and marbled boards, printed label to upper cover;

inscription to title: ‘Exeter fair 1868 / Weights Travelling Theatre’. £200

Acting edition (first published 1820) of a gothic drama of inheritance and

betrayal set in the Scottish Highlands.

First performed at Drury Lane on 2 December 1820, the plot of this

atmospheric piece hinges around Clanronald, the usurping laird of

Glencairn, who meets his comeuppance in the figure of the Warlock of

the Glen, rightful laird Matthew in disguise. The play proved popular—

doubtless capitalising on the vogue for the minstrelsy and Scottish

Romance—and was staged at provincial locations, including Glasgow,

as well as various London theatres.

The Warlock of the Glen evidently also made its way to the South West,

as this copy shows, marked up for performance by an itinerant theatrical

company at Exeter in 1868. It bears significant deletions, most

noticeably the characters of Ruthven and Sandie, along with whole

passages, but most of these have subsequently been marked for

retention, suggesting a lengthier performance at a later date.

29. [PROMPT BOOK.] WILKS, Thomas Egerton. The Wren

Boys; or, The Moment of Peril! An original romantic Drama, in

two Acts … The only Edition correctly marked, by permission, from

the Prompter’s Book; to which is added, a Description of the

Costume—cast of the Character—the Whole of the Stage

Business, Situations—Entrances—Exits—Properties and

Directions as performed at the London Theatres. Embellished

with a fine Engraving, by Mr. T. H. Jones, from a Drawing, taken in

the Theatre. London: Printed and Published by J. Duncombe and

Co. … [1838].

12mo (153 × 105 mm) pp. 36; engraved frontispiece (loose); the

gatherings stitched together amateurishly, and loosely inserted into

coarse paper wrappers, titled in ms. ink. £250

Early acting edition (published the same year as the first) of an Irish

romance, by the Grub Street writer and popular dramatist, Thomas

Egerton Wilks (1812–1854).

Loosely based on a tale entitled ‘The Half Sir’, by the Limerick-born

novelist, playwright, and poet Gerald Griffin (1803–1840)—a debt

acknowledged in the printed advertisement—the play focuses on St

Stephen’s Day (26 December), also known as Wren Day. Various

northern European traditions have some variation on this theme, in

which a ‘hunt’ is staged for a fake wren, which is then mounted on a

decorative pole. Crowds of mummers celebrate the wren by dressing up

in masks and straw suits, and parading through towns and villages.

These ‘Wrenboys’ travel to houses of the nobility and gentry, from whom

they obtain money and liquor; propitiating them is considered good luck,

and it is in this carnivalesque world that Wilks bases his play of love

across class divides.

The production was first performed at the City of London Theatre on 8

October 1838. The present copy is marked for a production, with

deletions, thirty marginal call notes, stage directions underlined, and

directions for ‘lively music’.

INSCRIBED

30. REEVES, John Sims. My Jubilee or Fifty Years of artistic

Life … With six Plates, and a Preface by Thomas Ward …

London The London Music Publishing Company, Limited and

Simpkin, Marshall & Co., and Hamilton, Adams & Co. [1889.]

8vo (218 × 137 mm), pp. viii, 280, [4] advertisements; with a portrait

frontispiece (‘Printed by C. G. Röder, Leipzig’, a well-known lithographic

printer for music) and 6 plates; occasional light spotting; original

publisher’s decorated cloth, upper cover and spine lettered gilt; a little

rubbed; inscribed by Reeves on the verso of the frontispiece, to T. H.

Peirce. £150

First edition. Sims Reeves (1818–1900) was one of the leading English

tenors of the nineteenth century. ‘He made his début at La Scala in

1846 as Edgardo in Lucia di Lammermoor [featured in one of the plates

here, opposite p. 74] and in 1847 he appeared as Zamoro in

Verdi’s Alzira. Returning to London in December that year he sang

Edgardo at Drury Lane, where on 20 December 1847 he created the role

of Lyonnel in Balfe’s The Maid of Honour. In February 1848 he sang

Faust in the first performance in England of Berlioz’s La damnation de

Faust under the composer. From 1848 he sang at Her Majesty’s

Theatre, first under Lumley’s and then Mapleson’s managements. In

1851 he was briefly engaged at the Théâtre Italien, Paris. In London he

sang the title role in Faust in the opera’s first performance in English in

1864, and Huon in the revival of Oberon in 1866. In 1848 he appeared

at the Norwich Festival and sang in Handel’s Messiah at the Sacred

Harmonic Society, and thereafter he appeared regularly at the various

choral festivals. He was particularly admired in Handel oratorios and for

his performance of the Evangelist in Bach’s St Matthew Passion, which

he sang under Sterndale Bennett in 1862 … He made his formal

farewell appearance at the Royal Albert Hall in 1891, but reappeared in

a concert in 1893, and made a tour of South Africa in 1896 with his pupil

Maud Richard, whom he had married the previous year’ (New Grove).

THE FIRST DOG DRAMA

31. REYNOLDS, Frederick. The Caravan; or, the Driver and

his Dog. A grand serio comic Romance, in two Acts … The Music

by William Reeve. London. Printed for G. & J. Robinson … by C.

Lowndes … [1803].

8vo (203 × 125 mm) in half-sheets, pp. 46;

engraved title-page, with an attractive etched and

engraved vignette; some light foxing and finger-

soiling; disbound, first gathering loose;

contemporary ms. ink note at head of title,

shaved. £300

First edition of a hugely successful melodrama,

thought to be the first ‘dog drama’, which began a

vogue for the use of trained animals on the

London stage.

Playwright Frederick Reynolds (1764–1841)

wrote this afterpiece set in bandit-ridden Spain

for Drury Lane, where it was first performed on 5

December 1803. It was a spectacular success,

thanks mainly to the novelty of Carlos the dog

who dived from a rock into a tank of water to

save a drowning child. He is thought to have

saved the Theatre, too, from financial disaster,

and ‘Reynolds enjoyed retailing the story that [theatre manager, Richard

Brinsley] Sheridan regarded the dog—not himself—as “guardian angel”

and “preserver of Drury Lane”’ (Oxford DNB).

With its chorus of pirates and soldiers, the work is typical of the kind of

melodrama which Reynolds made his own. Although now largely

forgotten, he was of sufficiently high profile to have been the subject of

two lines of Byronic satire in English Bards and Scotch Reviewers

(1808).

The title-page vignette shows the drowning boy Julio at his moment of

salvation, played in the production by a young William West (1797/8–

1888), later known as the ‘Father of the Stage’.

32. [SHAKESPEARE.] [DESPRÈS, Jean-Baptiste-Denis]. Le

roi Lu, parodie du Roi Lir ou Léar. En un acte et en vers.

Représenté à Paris … A Paris, chez Brunet … 1783.

8vo (194 × 125 mm) in half-sheets, pp. 24; a nice crisp copy, disbound.

£300

One of two editions issued by Brunet in 1783, the other being pp. 31, [1];

the work is sometimes also attributed to Pierre-Germain Parisau.

Whoever the author was, it is more of a parody of the feeble, if widely-

performed Shakespeare adaptations of Jean-François Ducis (1733–

1816), who had published Le Roi Léar the same year, than the English

original. It certainly proved very popular, with over 30 performances in

1783 alone by Jean-Baptiste Nicolet’s Grands Danseurs du Roi.

THE IRELAND FORGERIES DEFENDED

33. [SHAKESPEARE.] [WEBB, Francis]. Shakspeare’s

Manuscripts, in the Possession of Mr. Ireland, examined,

respecting the internal and external Evidences of their

Authenticity. By Philalethes … London: Printed for J. Johnson …

1796.

8vo (205 × 130 mm), pp. [4], 34; a few marks to the final page; disbound.

£400

First edition of antiquarian Francis Webb’s defence of William Henry

Ireland’s notorious Shakespeare forgeries.

The Ireland Shakespeare ‘discovery’ was a cause célèbre in 1790s

London when author and engraver Samuel Ireland announced the

discovery of Shakespearean manuscripts by his son, William Henry

Ireland, among them the manuscripts of four plays, two previously

unknown.

Ireland prevailed upon heraldic expert Francis Webb to offer a defence

of their authenticity. Acknowledging that the paper was undisputedly

from the sixteenth century, Webb’s central thesis finds it inconceivable

that a contemporary of Shakespeare would create the forgeries and yet

not seek to profit from them. (The notion that someone might have used

a cache of old paper apparently did not occur to him.) Like a number of

other believers, Webb was not entirely comfortable making a public

declaration of support for Ireland’s campaign, and chose to publish

pseudonymously, under the name of a seventeenth-century alchemist.

Webb and others who argued for the manuscripts’ authenticity have

been largely exonerated, as it would have been almost blasphemous to

risk denouncing works from the pen of England’s greatest writer. With

literary heavyweights such as James Boswell and the Poet Laureate

Henry James Pye offering their support—and with Philip Kemble

preparing to stage the new plays at great expense—it would take a critic

of extreme conviction to take on the widely-held belief that they were

real. That critic ultimately took the form of Edmond Malone, widely

regarded as the greatest Shakespeare scholar of his time, who showed

conclusively that the language, orthography, and handwriting were

inauthentic. The supposed discoverer then confessed to the fraud.

Lowe, Arnott & Robinson 3958; Freeman, Bibliotheca Fictiva 556;

Jaggard, p. 683.

34. [SHAKESPEARE.] BISHOP, Henry. “Should he upbraid,”

sung by Miss M. Tree in Shakspeare’s Play of the Two Gentlemen

of Verona, and by Miss Stephens at the Concerts, Festivals,

&c. … London, Printed by Goulding, D’Almaine & Co. … & to be

had at … Dublin [c.1821].

Folio (331 × 234 mm), pp. [1], 75–80, [1]; with Bishop’s monogram

stamp to the title; disbound. £20

35. [SHAKESPEARE.] BRAHAM, John. [Drop-head title:] The

Winter it is past. The celebrated Ballad as sung with

unprecedented Applause by Mr Braham in Shakespeare’s Comedy

of the Merry Wives of Windsor. Partly composed & Partly adapted

by Mr Braham … Edinburgh Printed & Sold by Robt Purdie …

[c.1823].

Folio (331 × 231 mm), pp. 4; some offsetting, small waterstain in upper

margin; disbound. £50

Seemingly the first edition (certainly the earliest separate version listed

in COPAC). The final page contains the song ‘transposed a note lower’.

‘SOMEWHAT REMOVED FROM THE TEXT OF SHAKESPEARE’

36. [SHAKESPEARE.] Olympic Theatre … First Night of

Talfourd’s Not Shakespeare’s Macbeth … Monday, April 25th,

1853, & during the Week.

Large playbill (500 × 735 mm); a little frayed at the edges, with one small

hole, with loss of some text; some oxidation to the ink; withal in very

good condition. £450 + VAT in the EU

A triple bill promoting an extravaganza at London’s Olympic Theatre in

April 1853, the highlight of which was a Macbeth burlesque by Francis

Talfourd (1828–1862).

Multi-production theatricals became increasingly popular throughout the

nineteenth century, and this programme of entertainments follows a

familiar lively format. The evening opened with a one-act comedy

entitled Faint Heart never won fair Lady! by jobbing playwright and

herald James Robinson Planché (1796–1880), whose work was known

for ‘running the entire gamut of dramaturgic taxonomy from burletta and

masque to high drama and grand opera’ (Oxford DNB). This was

followed by Uncle Crotchet by Mrs Alfred Phillips, who appeared as Lady

Macbeth in the following production, and two final one-act vignettes.

The highlight of the evening, Talfourd’s Macbeth ‘somewhat removed

from the Text of Shakespeare’, was originally performed as Macbeth

Travestie at the Henley Regatta in June 1847, and afterwards opened at

the Strand Theatre in January 1848. The present playbill advertises its

second London production, and provides an amusing scene-by-scene

synopsis, along with an irreverent list of dramatis personae. The final

section features an arch-comic piece offering spurious justification for

what was evidently an eccentric array of costume: ‘I have introduced the

tunic, mantle, cross gartering and ringed byrne of the Danes and

Saxons, between whom it does not appear that any material difference

existed … Harold Hardrada, King of Norway, is described by Snorre as

wearing A.D. 1066 a blue tunic and handsome helmet; but, as

gentlemen of this period were not remarkable for honesty, it is by no

means impossible that they properly belonged to someone else.

Roderick, King of Strathclyde, is mentioned as sleeping on a feather

bed, proving, somewhat paradoxically, that, however downy the pillow

might be, he was sufficiently wide awake to be down upon it.’

An alumnus of Eton and Christ Church, Oxford (where he co-founded

the Oxford Dramatic Amateurs), Talfourd was notionally engaged in

practising law, but was known chiefly as the writer of classical and

Shakespearean burlesques such as the one advertised here. His

obituary in The Athenaeum noted that ‘Talfourd … has left the world with

little or no adequate witness of his powers—the travestie and burlesque

in which he revelled showing but one, and that the poorer, side of his

gay and brilliant intellect.’

37. [SHAKESPEARE.] RUSSELL, Edward Richard. The true

Macbeth. A Paper read before the Literary and Philosophical

Society of Liverpool, November 29th, 1875. Liverpool: Printed by

D. Marples & Co. … 1875.

8vo (213 × 135 mm), pp. [2], 52; vertical crease where previously folded;

original light blue printed wrappers, rather worn and dust-soiled. £80

First edition, scarce. Presentation copy, inscribed on the front wrapper

to Charles Ross, ‘with the author’s kind regards’. Russell (1834–1920),

later Lord Russell, was a Liverpool newspaper editor and ‘a

perspicacious literary and theatre critic’ (Oxford DNB).

Jaggard, p. 271; Lowe, Arnott & Robinson 4027.

FALSTAFF IN FRANCE

38. [SHAKESPEARE.] VACQUERIE, Auguste, and Paul

MEURICE. Falstaff – Scène de la Taverne – Paris Librairie du

Victor Hugo Illustré … [1895].

8vo (240 × 168 mm), pp. 24; printed on papier de Hollande; a fine copy,

untrimmed in contemporary quarter cloth and marbled boards,

preserving the original printed wrappers, leather spine label. £175

First edition, scarce: a Shakespearean scene—written by a friend of

Victor Hugo—for the retirement performance of celebrated French comic

actor Edmond Got (1822–1901).

Got enjoyed an illustrious career; he entered the Conservatoire in 1841,

winning the second prize for comedy that year and the first in 1842. He

celebrated his golden jubilee at the Théâtre Français in 1894, and made

his final appearance the following year as Falstaff in this piece written by

Auguste Vacquerie (1819–1895) and Paul Meurice (1818–1905).

The playwrights had worked together previously on a translation of

Antigone (1844) and on Théatre: études et copies (1864)—in

collaboration with Dumas—which included a reinterpretation of Hamlet,

alongside a play entitled ‘Falstaff (tiré de Henri IV)’. The present work is

a variation on a scene from that piece, edited to emphasise Falstaff’s

loquaciousness. It was timely, as Verdi had premiered his operatic

Falstaff in 1893 to great acclaim, and Falstaffian parodies had become

popular.

39. [SHAKESPEARE.] Game of Shakespeare. Copyrighted,

1900, by The Fireside Game Co., Cincinnati, O[hio]., U.S.A.

52 illustrated cards (each 88 × 62 mm), plus title and advertisements

cards; some finger-soiling, the title card with a couple of nicks; in the

original gilt-letter box, soiled and creased, a few chips, with 3-page

Rules for Playing the Game of Shakespeare pasted into the lid.

£60 + VAT in the EU

‘The playing of the Game of Shakespeare by Rules No. 1 will familiarize

the players with many quotations from the best known works of the Bard

of Avon. Where mere amusement is desired and the educational not

cared for, Rules No. 2 or No. 3 may be used.’

40. TOMLINS, Frederick Guest. Remarks on the present State

of English Drama … London: Hailes Lacy … 1851.

8vo (160 × 103 mm), pp. 15, [1]; title and final pages browned; paper

wrappers. £250

First edition of an overview of London theatres by critic, founder of the

Shakespeare Society, and one-time tragedian, Frederick Guest Tomlins

(1804–1867).

Inspired by a visit to Drury Lane at the age of ten, in which he saw

Edmund Kean as Shylock, Tomlins forged a career as a champion and

critic of drama. He was a co-founder of the Shakespeare Society, and

published various works in which he decried what he perceived as

theatres’ decreasing standards, and an increasing disinclination of the

public to attend. In the present work he writes that ‘it is quite certain that

the refined and courtly portion of society do not now consider the English

drama as one of their habitual amusements’.

Most interestingly here, Tomlins offers commentary on the principal

London theatres. Drury Lane is ‘high towering in historic grandeur, but

in present decay’; in the case of the Haymarket, ‘the management has

been spirited and liberal; but there has been an insufficiency of purpose’.

The Princess’s theatre—known for staging French drama— ‘commits the

commercial fault of supposing that the plays of one nation can be

transferred bodily to that of another’. The Olympic evidences nepotistic

management, Sadler’s Wells suffers ‘a want of variety, and some

disadvantages of locality’ and the Adelphi ‘gives coarse, but forcible

exaggerations of life as it is’.

What emerges is a thorough picture of London’s theatrical world,

including a tantalising view of smaller institutions and those which have

not stood the test of time, such as the Surrey, the Victoria, the City of

London and the Standard theatres, as well as the ‘Grecian Saloon,

connected to a tavern’.

Lowe, Arnott & Robinson 933.

41. [VERONA and TRIESTE.] A bound volume of six playbills.

Verona, Pietro Bisesti, and Trieste, Michael [Michele] Weis,

March–April 1852.

Large 4to (333 × 260 mm), contemporary marbled boards, ms. paper

label (‘Theater Zettel von Verona & Triest’; some waterstaining) to front

cover, containing six folded playbills: three for the Teatro Filarmonico,

Verona (one chipped in the lower margin; the first annotated in a

contemporary German hand, commenting on the performers: ‘Gut’, ‘Sehr

gut’, etc.), and one each for Trieste’s Teatro Filodrammatico

(waterstained), Teatro Grande, and Teatro Mauroner (this the largest:

1118 × 570 mm). £300

42. VERMORCKEN, Édouard. A series of illustrations,

numbered I–XI, inspired by operas and songs. ?Belgium, mid

nineteenth century.

4to (250 × 226 mm), pp. [44], comprising 22 pages of text and 11 full-

page facsimile wood engravings on the subsequent leaves; some foxing

at the beginning and the end, waterstain to upper corner of the first four

leaves, old paper repairs in the gutter of some leaves, four leaves (two

bifolia) loose; old textured paper wrappers. £200

The illustrations are for five operas: Halévy’s La Juive (1835), La Reine

de Chypre (1841, two illustrations), and Charles VI (1843, two

illustrations), Hérold’s Le pré aux clercs (1832), and Nicolas [‘Nicolò’]

Isouard’s Joconde (1814); and four romances: La négresse by Labarre,

Le songe by Beauplan, Beim Abschied by Gyrowetz, and La folle by

Grisar.

Vermorcken (1820–1906) was a pupil at the Koninklijke Academie voor

Schone Kunsten in Antwerp, and worked from 1840 to 1895 for journals

and magazines.

I have been unable to trace the publication in any of the usual

databases.

SCARCE PROVINCIAL FARCES, INSCRIBED

43. [WILKIE, Robert]. Yalla Gaiters; or, a rare Discovery on the

Banks of the River Moy. A Farce in one Act. Berwick: Printed by

J. Weatherly … 1839. [Bound with:]

[—————]. The Useful Man; or, a Trip to America. A Farce in

two Acts. Dedicated by permission to William Hay, Esq., of Dunse

Castle. Berwick: Printed by J. Weatherly … 1840. [And:]

[—————]. The Moderate Man, a Farce. In one Act. Berwick:

Printed by J. Weatherly … 1839. [And:]

[—————]. The Post Office; an Interlude for theatrical

Representation … Berwick: Printed by J. Weatherly … 1840.

[And:]

—————. Appendix to a Continuation of Newspaper

Extracts … Illustrated with Engravings on Wood, by J. Weatherly.

Berwick: Printed by J. Weatherly … [18??]. [And:]

SHAKESPEARE, William. As you like it; a Comedy, in five

Acts … As performed at the Theatres Royal, Drury-Lane and

Covent-Garden. Berwick: Printed by J. Weatherly … 1838.

6 works in one vol., 12mo (170 × 100 mm), pp. 12 + woodcut

frontispiece; vignette to title verso; 14, including wood-engraved

frontispiece; 7, [1] + woodcut frontispiece; vignette to final page; 4

(apparently complete); 14, including wood-engraved frontispiece; [2],

[15]–72 (ending with G6, thus possibly lacking the final scene), some

mild foxing; contemporary calf, boards with gilt and blind tooling and

fillets to form wide borders, spine gilt in compartments with raised bands,

blue marbled endpapers, all edges gilt; a little rubbed at extremities, but

still very good; inscribed on the front flyleaf: ‘To Wm Logan Esqr with Mr.

Wilkie’s best regards’ (a little smudged). £1100

Only known edition of Yalla Gaiters, a one-act play based on an Irish

tale, bound with four other works by the author. All are very rare, and

The Moderate Man is apparently unrecorded.

Yalla Gaiters, a farce set in Ireland, is based around a verbal

misunderstanding in which ‘yalla gaiters’—a magistrate’s yellow shoes—

become confused with ‘alligators’. The former, having been lost, are

found on the banks of the Moy, whilst the latter are to be found on the

banks of the Nile. Much hilarity ensues.

The other works in this volume are similarly light and comic; The

Moderate Man is a brief vignette based around a rather lavish meal

served at the Queen’s Hotel in Oxford, enjoyed by two gentlemen

professing their moderation. The bill of fare is produced here in full, an

example of the careful typography demonstrated throughout the volume,

which is attractively illustrated.

Wilkie’s farces have a curious publication record. Yalla Gaiters is

recorded at the British Library and National Library of Scotland only.

COPAC records only seven books printed by John Weatherly, all bound

in a single volume at Aberdeen University. The seventh is a piece of

civic printing (Bodley only). The Useful Man was reprinted at Alnwick in

1841.

From item 24, Jones’s Green Man

Simon Beattie

84 The Broadway, Chesham

Buckinghamshire HP5 1EG

United Kingdom

Tel. +44 (0)1494 784954

Mobile +44 (0)7717 707575

simon@simonbeattie.co.uk