Rare books from Michael Laird Rare Books LLC

Amsterdam: Chez l'honore et fils, libraires, 1748. First Edition. Hardcover. Very good. 2 vols. in one. 8vo. I: [10], cxix, [7], 208 pp. + 1 f. ("Errata" for Tom. 1). II: [2], 231 pp. + 1 f. ("Addition") + 1 f. ("Errata" for Tom 1 [sic]). First title page with unobtrusive paper defect on lower margin, not affecting text; this copy is lacking half-title and Errata leaf for Tom. 2. Very attractive 19th-century French red glazed boards, red morocco spine, lettered in gilt directly (two insignificant worm-holes on lower hinge, leading nowhere; trifle wear to binding extremities. Completely unsophisticated. First printing of "Telliamed," in every way a remarkable book. Disguised as an Oriental fantasy, it contains perhaps the earliest appearance of one of the most important of all evolution speculations, namely the so-called ultra-neptunian theory: that the entire Earth was, and is, a marine deposit, and that all life on land originated from creatures of the sea. Maillet hypothesized that the earth was… Read More

Bethany, Virginia: Printed and Published by the Editor, 1831. First Edition. 2 volumes, 8vo (202 x 120 mm - 8" x 4.75"), contemporary Kentucky sheep, morocco spine labels. COMPLETE unbroken monthly run of the first two volumes, from Volume I, Number 1 (January 4, 1830) to Volume II, No. 12 (Dec. 5, 1831). Volume I with "Millenial Harbinger Extras" nos. 1 & 2 bound at end followed by the index; Volume II with index at end included in the pagination, followed by "Millenial Harbinger Extra" no. 3. [2], 576, 88, 4; [2], 574 (misnumbered 174), 48 pp. Textblock browned and stained, bindings worn but perfectly sound and completely unsophisticated. Rarely found complete. Our copy is distinguished by the fact that it is preserved in its first binding, which is actually SIGNED by the provincial Kentucky binder (see below), and is PRICED by an early owner who may well have been identical with one of the original Mormon pioneers (see below). In the second number of Volume II of the Millennial Harbinger, Campbell… Read More

Together seven three-ring binder notebooks (binders worn, boards on vol. VI broken off) -- retained by us as out of "respect du fonds" -- containing approximately 876 typescript and manuscript pages. TOGETHER WITH: 29 file folders of articles, ideas, proposals, and miscellaneous publishing materials, consisting of approximate 300 typescript and manuscript pages, housed in a new Hollinger box. TOGETHER WITH: two of Lasker's passports (1921 and 1926) and a large b/w studio portrait photograph (undated). An important discovery. This is the private, largely unpublished literary archive of the noted social reformer Bruno Lasker (1880-1965), containing well over a thousand pages of typed and hand-written manuscripts. These writings date from 1923 until the year of his death in 1965. Lasker's social work is well known, and concerned racial prejudice and justice, trafficking and human rights, immigration and immigrants' rights, poverty in America and economic inequality. The present literary archive is… Read More

n.d. (19th or 20th century). Two illuminations on thin India paper some vertical creasing, professionally matted and framed. Ad 1 (priapus): 300 x 250 mm (frame size), 198 x 140 mm (visible), 147 x 93 mm (size of illumination). Ad 2 (she-devil): 306 x 231 mm (frame size), 205 x 140 mm (visible), 150 x 83 mm (size of illumination). Sold as a pair. TWO WEIRD EROTIC INDIAN ILLUMINATIONS, THE LIKES OF WHICH WE HAVE NEVER BEFORE ENCOUNTERED, AND ARE UNLIKELY TO ENCOUNTER AGAIN. Popular in Roman decorative art, the winged priapus is uncommon in Indian iconography. Our illumination is of particularly high quality, and depicts a beautiful Indian woman riding a reined priapus perhas twice her size. The priapus is depicted with avain feet and giant wings. The environment is like a strange dream: in the foreground a grey pool with pink flowers; behind are dark green hills with eerie trees and vegetation. In the sky at sunset are what appear to be rain clouds, touched in white. We have been unable to… Read More

New York: Cassel, 1885. First Edition. Very good. 16mo. [2], 190 pp. Original publisher's brown gilt- and silver embossed decorated cloth, a.e.g. A bright copy in excellent condition, almost flawless. When does a ranching story have nothing to do with ranching? This book "is without either story or ranch; it is about some dilettantish people who go out to a Kansas sheep farm, talk Chopin, and wash their fingers in finger-bowls" (Dobie, p. 116). Also discussed are various types of silver spoons, cameras, violins, portieres, billiards, Oriental carpets, and so forth. While unnamed, herein is described the author's own family of "tenderfeet," i.e. Easterners who decide to experience sheep ranching in Kansas on a ten-thousand acre, ten-thousand sheep ranch, "not only twelve miles from a lemon, but a thousand miles from a strawberry" (Wright 4668). A contemporary reviewer describes the narrative as "a true story, the outcome of the author's own experience on a Kansas sheep ranch, and it is as fresh and… Read More

Philadelphia: E.C. Biddle, 1837. Very good. Hand-colored lithograph by Lehman & Duval after Charles Bird King (445 x 338 mm). Full-length standing portrait of male Sioux chief holding a rifle, wearing brightly colored blankets, feathered headdress, necklace of grizzly bear claws, and red leggings decorated with bird feathers. Very mild uniform age-toning (professionally washed, verso of upper left corner with Japanese tissue repair). Original lithograph - NOT a reproduction! Wa-Na-Ta (ca. 1795-1848) was an influential Sioux (Yanktona, on the Minnesota River) leader who fought against the Americans in the War of 1812, even leading a charge on Fort Sandusky, whence his nickname. For his exceptional heroism he was received at the English court and promoted to Captain. After the war, however, he sided with the U.S. In 1825, he signed the Treaties of Fort Pierre and Prairie du Chien, which established peace and territorial boundaries between the Sioux, Chippewas, Sac and Foxes, and Ioways. He was… Read More

Ad 1-3: The Hague, Nijhoff, 1938-1964. Ad 4: Paris, Fondation Custodia, 1987. Ad 5: Amsterdam and The Hague, Nijhof, 1956 (facsimile reprint of the 1921 edition). Ad 6: Ibid, 1956, 1938. Very good. Together 6 vols., large 4to., all bound in original publisher's cloth. In UNMARKED and UNSPOILED condition. NOT ex-library! BEAUTIFUL SET, RARELY FOUND COMPLETE AND IN SUCH EXCELLENT CONDITION. ¶ REPERTOIRE DES CATALOGUES DE VENTES PUBLIQUES: more than 100,000 sale catalogues of art, furniture, ceramics, bronzes, antiquities and many other collectible areas, arranged chronologically, with details of auctions in Europe, England, and the U.S., as well as recording copies in which prices and/or buyers' names appear in manuscript. Lugt also indicates library locations of the catalogues whenever known. Lugt's "Repertoire" remains UNSURPASSED; it is easily one of the most widely consulted art historical reference works ever created. The complete "Lugt Repertoire" is NOT online. Brill has a pay firewall, but… Read More

Istanbul: Selamet Matbaas, 1928. First Edition in Turkish. Good. 8vo. [2], v, [1], 395 pp. illustrated with line drawings by the author herself. Original wrappers with illustrated cover by JEAN HEE (text evenly browned on account of the paper stock, marginal water staining in last half of the text, most pronounced on lower wrapper which is chipped, spine strengthened with Japanese tissue). Preserved in a four-flap lig-free chemise with paper label. AMERICAN FEMINIST LITERATURE IN TURKISH WHICH -- WITH ITS YOUNG FEMALE PROTAGONIST WHO COMES OF AGE MORALLY, SOCIALLY, AND PROFESSIONALLY -- INSPIRED TURKISH WOMEN IN THE EARLY YEARS OF THE REPUBLIC. THE NOVEL HAS BECOME INFAMOUS FOR ITS SUPPORT OF THE EUGENICS MOVEMENT WHICH WAS OF PARTICULAR INTEREST TO THE TURKISH ELITE AND MEDICAL COMMUNITIES. Originally published in 1915, "Dear Enemy" is set in Dutchess County, New York; in letters written by the protagonist Sallie McBride, the novel describes the life of a decidedly "modern" American woman who… Read More

Philadelphia: W.W. Harding, 1865. Album 5 x 6 x 2.5 in. Title-page (a little foxed, verso blank), Index to portraits (2 pp.), followed by 25 thick cards creating 50 slots; all are filled, with 47 cartes-de-visite, 2 views, and one chromolithograph (a little foxed). Bound in original blue-green roan over deeply embossed carved boards, covers and spine gilt, edges dazzlingly gilt and gauffered, each board with four porcelain beads, two working catches and clasps with luxuriously wrought mounts and two porcelain beads, moire pastedowns and endpapers. Minor scuffing to binding extremities. SUPERB CIVIL WAR ERA PHILADELPHIA BINDING, THE GILT AND GAUFFERED EDGES GLEAM AMAZINGLY. The assemblage of the present album may be localized to Minnesota or neighboring Wisconsin owing to the surprising inclusion of two small views by Benjamin Franklin Upton (1818-1910) of the St. Croix River, which demarks the two states. One of the images is entitled "Views of the Dells on the St. Croix River" (a stereoscopic… Read More

London: Newton and Co, 1909. First Edition. Very good. 8vo. [8], 215, [5] pp. (including index and Price-list). COMPLETE with all 28 plates and requisite 27 printed tissue sheets (there are 2 tissue guards for plate V). Original publisher's green ribbed cloth, spine gold-stamped, patterned-paper pastedowns and endpapers. Some foxing here and there; slight shelf lean; faint traces of damp. The cloth is bright and the hinges are perfect, and there are no objectionable stamps or markings anywhere. NOT ex-library! HARMONOGRAPHIC PERFECTION, ANTICIPATING MATHEMATICAL ART OF EARLY COMPUTER GRAPHICS. The harmonograph is a mechanical apparatus that uses pendulums to draw a geometric image, the result being delicately rendered "analog" line drawings executed in real-time. The present volume introduces newly developed or perfected harmonographs, based on Lissajous curves; these are Tisley's compound pendulum (fully illustrated), and the twin elliptic pendulum of Goold, published here for the FIRST TIME. The… Read More

Washington DC: War Department, 1945. First Edition. Good. 4to (7.5" x 10"). Unpaginated [98 ff.], lithoprinted. Lacking paper wrappers, textblock backed with white and marbled spine (first and last leaves a trifle worn, usual blemishes). Ex-library U.S. Naval Ordnance Laboratory with standard markings (see below); on the title-page is the word "copy" (reproduced from another copy?) possibly cancelled. With faults, correctly priced. Preserved in a cloth protective case. THE MOST HORRIFIC WEAPON DEVISED BY MANKIND: THE FIRST PUBLISHED ACCOUNT OF THE DEVELOPMENT OF THE ATOMIC BOMB. THIS HARROWING U.S. GOVERNMENT DOCUMENT MUST BE SEEN TO BE FULLY APPRECIATED. Issued by the GPO on Aug. 12th, 1945 -- just six days after Hiroshima and three days after Nagasaki -- the "Smyth Report" (as it is familiarly known) describes, with alarming candidness, the development of the Manhattan Project and their discoveries. Then, as now, readers have found the text frightening. The thirteen chapters herein include the… Read More

Madrid: Ruiz de Murga, 1700. First Edition. Small 4to (204 x 146 mm). Bound in contemporary Spanish sprinkled calf, red spine label (extremities somewhat rubbed but perfectly sound). 71 ff. including title-page printed in red and black + 210 pp. + 3 ff. Signatures: [pi]² [par.]⁴ 2[par.]⁴ 2[par.]⁴ 3[par.]⁴ 4[par.]⁴ 5[par.]⁴ 6[par.]⁴ a-c⁴ 7[par.]⁴ 8[par.]⁴ 9[par.]⁴ 10[par.]⁴ *⁴ 2*⁴ 3*⁴ 4*⁴ (+ 1 f. Advertensia, as in the Princeton copy) A-Z⁴ Aa-Dd⁴. (H2 wrongly signed "H3"). Title in red and black; initials; head and tail pieces. The engraved portrait of Sor Juana is here present in facsimile on old paper, OTHERWISE COMPLETE. Faint waterstaining to pp. 121-160 in outer fore-margin (not objectionable), the paper stock strong and clean. Preserved in a protective blue cloth case, leather label. FIRST EDITION of "the first statement in this hemisphere to argue a woman's right to study and teach and learn." (Peden / Stavans). This is, of course, Sor Juana's magisterial… Read More

Edinburgh: Assigns of Alexander Kincaid, 1787. Very good. Two works in two volumes. Large Octavo (211 x 130 mm). Collation: BIBLE: A-4A8, complete. PSALMS: A-E8, complete. Contemporary Scottish bindings: red morocco, elaborately tooled in gilt to a "Chippendale" motif, smooth spines gilt; marbled endpapers, a.e.g. (in vol. 1 the front joint expertly repaired and tape removed from inner hinges). Preserved in a protective cloth case. INNOVATIVE AND HIGHLY UNUSUAL SCOTTISH CHIPPENDALE ROCOCO BINDINGS, COMBINING CHINOISERIE AND NEOCLASSICAL ELEMENTS, EXHIBITING THE INDEPENDENCE OF SCOTTISH WORK AT THIS TIME. The present example is a striking hybrid of late 18th-century decorative art in Britain, the likes of which we have not encountered hitherto. Here "oriental" birds and peacocks are juxtaposed with patriotic depictions of Britannia (uncharacteristically surmounted by a fleur-de-lis), bold anchors, columns, sunbursts, dripping garlands, flowers, sheaves of wheat, and urns. Presented in the… Read More

Boston: Frederick T. Gray, 1827. First Edition. Poor. Large 8vo. [6], 491, [1] + "Proposals for publishing by Subscription the Works of George Washington" by Jared Sparks. Waterstains throughout, some of which are ugly (SEE IMAGES) but the paper is strong. Contemporary American sheep, dry and worn, upper joint cracked and just barely holding (SEE IMAGES). A complete copy albeit with significant faults, and priced accordingly. THIS MUNDANE VOLUME IS OF SIGNAL IMPORTANCE IN AMERICAN LITERATURE AS IT CONTAINS ONE OF ONLY TWO STRICTLY CONTEMPORARY ANNOUNCEMENTS OF THE PUBLICATION OF "TAMERLANE, BY A BOSTONIAN," BOTH OF WHICH WERE IGNORED. NO REVIEWS OF "TAMERLANE" WERE EVER WRITTEN, AND AS IS WELL KNOWN THE BOOK FELL INTO UTTER OBSCURITY. NONETHELESS, THESE WERE THE FIRST NOTICES OF EDGAR ALLAN POE AS A WRITER. The announcement in the present publication (Oct. 1827) was preceded by two months in the "United States Reviewe and Literary Gazette" (Aug. 1827). "Tammerlane [...] made practically no… Read More

S.l.: s.n., 1835. Very good. Collection of seven Chinese gouache paintings on pith paper (sizes vary: ca. 300 x 220 mm, some blank areas in fragile pith paper cracked or with loss, not affecting gouache paintings -- SEE IMAGES), a few retaining their original blue silk border edges. Each painting is hinged onto stiff lig-free board (377 x 277 mm) utilizing existing (old) cloth hinges and very lightly tipped onto backing board using reversable adhesive; light-green vertical cloth "window" mattes, in front of which are protective mylar sheets, the entire ensemble preserved in a protective cloth case. FASCINATING COLLECTION OF SEVEN CHINESE GOUACHE PAINTINGS ON PITH PAPER OF PERUVIAN AND ARGENTINEAN "COSTUMBRISMO." Examples such as ours are not often seen on the market and due to their fragility, and are absent from many relevant museums and research libraries worldwide. Among the rarest and least studied 19th-century Cantonese export watercolors are those depicting South American costumbrisimo (or… Read More