Current Stock - K, L (last online update: 11th May 2010)

The longer of two epic poems attributed to Kalidasa, the subject of which is, like the Ramayana, the history of Rama, but here beginning with an account of his ancestors, the ancient rulers of Ayodhya.

Translated by Sir William Jones. The Calcutta edition which preceded this in 1789 (Shaw 136), the first edition in any language, is rare. This second edition was followed by editions in German (1791), Danish (1793) and French (1803).
"Through Georg Forster's translation [of Jones's version] into German, it became one of the most influential translations of all time and probably did more than any other single work or event to arouse that profound interest in Indian religion, literature, and language which was so characteristic of German Romanticism and without which the intense study of Indian languages would hardly have developed with such amazing speed.... It is against this background of scholarly and literary achievement, reputation, and authority that we must understand the impact of Jones's statements on the principles of language study and the affinity of Sanskrit to other languages." (Aarsleff, The Study of Language in England)
Kalidasa, probably India's greatest dramatist and greatest lyric poet, wrote only three plays: Sakuntalá, the Vikramorvasí, and Málavikágnimitra. Of these, Sakuntalá is that which has always, with justice, enjoyed the greatest fame and popularity.
The final leaf carries an apology "to lament that the second, third and fourth sheets...are exceedingly injured by the Hotpresser," and there are indeed occasional curious marks to be found in the present copy.

Standard biography of the Scottish judge, philosopher and agriculturist. Includes several letters from Hume, Franklin, Thomas Reid, Alexander Gerard, Josiah Tucker, and others; it is also a major source for the life of Monboddo. This copy contains the Supplements, which are often missing.
Alexander Fraser Tytler, one of Edinburgh's illuminati, wrote on a variety of miscellaneous subject, including a supplementary volume to Lord Kames's Dictionary of Decisions. In 1780 he was appointed joint professor of universal history at the university and in 1786 sole professor. Lord Cockburn notes that it as professor of history that he was chiefly distinguished, but posterity remembers him best for his writings, and for his association with such notable contemporaries as Kames, Monboddo, Dugald Stewart, Dr. John Gregory, Henry Mackenzie, Robert Burns (whose Poems of 1793 or 1794 he is said to have seen through the press), Drs. Campbell and Beattie at Aberdeen, and others.

presentation copy from Tytler to John Ramsay of Ochtertyre, inscribed on the volume i title verso To John Ramsay Esqr. of Ochtertyre/ as a Testimony of sincere friendship/ and Esteem/ from The Author. The title verso of the Supplement (1809), bound at the end of volume i, is also inscribed, and there is a leaf bearing a manuscript verse eulogy in Latin (eight lines) addressed to Ramsay, signed AFT, bound-in at the front of the volume. Ramsay's assistance.... see PREF AND PP.48, 58.... Ramsay's memoirs of his contemporaries, left in manuscript and published in 1888 as Scotland and Scotsmen in the Eighteenth Century, includes a further substantial chapter on Kames, who was his closest friend and neighbour.
Tytler was another close friend of the subject's, and his biography includes several letters from Hume, Franklin, Thomas Reid, Alexander Gerard, Josiah Tucker, and others; it is also a major source for the life of Monboddo. The important Supplement arose due to the availability of the memoirs of Alexander Carlyle of Inveresk, and some manuscript collections of James Boswell, who at one time was preparing materials for a life of Kames.
Alexander Fraser Tytler, one of Edinburgh's illuminati, wrote on a variety of miscellaneous subject, including a supplementary volume to Lord Kames's Dictionary of Decisions. In 1780 he was appointed joint professor of universal history at the university and in 1786 sole professor. Lord Cockburn notes that it as professor of history that he was chiefly distinguished, but posterity remembers him best for his writings, and for his association with such notable contemporaries as Kames, Monboddo, Dugald Stewart, Dr. John Gregory, Henry Mackenzie, Robert Burns (whose Poems of 1793 or 1794 he is said to have seen through the press), Drs. Campbell and Beattie at Aberdeen, and others.

A cutting from The Observer of January 29, 1933, laid in at the front free endpaper, reads: "Published by the Pegasus Press for the Government of the Irish Free State in a strictly limited edition, none of the copies of which is for sale, 'Hugh Lane and His Pictures,' though appearing under the guise of a biography and magnificently illustrated catalogue raisonné, is in reality a well-considered and skilfully launched move in the propaganda for the return of Lane's modern pictures to Ireland."

From the library of Professor William Montgomery Watt (1909-2006), a distinguished Arabic scholar and one of the leading non-Muslim interpreters of Islam in the West.
Published over a period of thirty years, the last three volumes appearing posthumously (edited and supplemented by his great-nephew Stanley Lane-Poole, who also wrote the primary biography of the author which is prefixed to part vi). It comprises some 3,000 pages in triple-column (a projected "second book," containing rare and obscure words, never saw the light).
"A work of such fundamental importance and of such matchless excellence that praise for it is quite superfluous.... It is a sufficient tribute to its unique greatness, that to this day it remains supreme in the field of arabic lexicography: no scholar or group of scholars has produced anything to supplant it." (A.J. Arberry, "The Lexicographer: Edward William Lane" in Oriental Essays: Portraits of Seven Scholars, Allen & Unwin, 1960). Arberry's words are no less true today, nearly fifty years later.

From the Gladstone library at Fasque, with bookplates.
"Lantier's work of fiction was a tremendous popular success, and of considerable influence.... St. Clair (p.368) comments on the popular knowledge of ancient Greece which was conveyed to the mass of the people in books such as Lantier's and Barthelemy's." (Navari)

A classic on the subject, "still unequalled for knowledge of the material and breadth of approach." (Wittkower)

As with Johnson's famous dictionary, Laveaux provided numerous examples drawn from the best writers.

A volume uniting two fascinating but unrelated books, from the Gladstone library at Fasque, with bookplate.
i. Blackmer 993: "Le Chevalier's survey of the Troad marks the beginning of modern archaeological exploration in that area...."
ii. Todd & Bowden 160A (edited by Sir Walter Scott). This itself publishes two separate works, the first presented to Scott in manuscript by the Rev. John Grahame of Lifford near Strabane. The second, which is by John Graham (no e) of Duchrie, was loaned to the editor by Sir Alexander Don of Newton, representative of the Earl of Glencairn.

From the Gladstone library at Fasque, with bookplates.

Raven et al. 1808/72; Summers Gothic Quest, pp.280-81; not in Todd & Bowden's Scott bibliography.
Uncommon collection of five lively gothic tales in prose, and eight in "nightmare and graveyard" verse; some being free adaptations from German, French and Arabic originals. In the preface, Lewis says it is "difficult to point out exactly, what portion of the following work is my individual property. Even in those Tales, which are least my own, I have made so many and such important alterations, omissions, and interpolations, that it would have been less trouble to write an entire new work." Among the origins cited, "Bill Jones" is a ballad based upon a "wild and singular story...related to me by my friend, Mr. Walter Scott, to whom I am also indebted for the following particulars: Every thing, which falls from the pen of the Author of "Marmion"...must, I am certain, be read with interest by the public." Scott's narrative is on prefatory pages xiv-xviii. The work is dedicated to Scott and Lewis's mutual friend and encourager Lady Charlotte Campbell.

Complete with the supplementary map volume containing a fine and large (5 miles to an inch) map of Scotland, on six sheets with outline colour.

A classic work on all aspects of rural matters including bee-keeping, hunting, fruit trees, domestic architecture, cookery, and (most importantly) vines and wine-making, with ten chapters devoted to the subject.

Willems 747. With a fourth volume, uniformly bound: Joh. Fred. Gronovii ad T. Livii Patavini libros superstites Notæ. Accessit Ismaelis Bullialdi Epistola de solis defectu, cujus Livius lib.xxxvii meminit (Lugd. Batav. Ex Officina Elzeviriorum, 1645), which was originally issued to supplement the 1645 edition.

The tail of each volume faintly affected by damp, there is some cracking and worming to the joints, and the spine of volume v is partly cracked, but this is a good and rather attractive set nonetheless.

Skilfully and sympathetically translated and annotated.

From the Gladstone library at Fasque, with bookplates, inscribed at head of each title: To Mr Gladstone from A.G. whilst in Edinburgh July 1819.
The true first edition, despite the title statement, the author (and John Wilson, alias "Christopher North", who collaborated in volume iii) having reviewed the spurious "first" in Blackwood's Magazine prior to publication. This was Lockhart's first original work, professing to be a series of letters written from Scotland to his friend in Wales by "Peter Morris, M.D." Its satirical reflections upon prominent Scotsmen of the time prompted Scott to write: "[Dr. Morris] ought to revive every half century to record the fleeting manners of the age and the interesting features of those who will be only known to posterity by their works." (Letters v./p.430)
Subjects include the Scottish Bar, Art and Literature, booksellers, the church and clergy, peasantry and gentry, the theatre and Society; individuals portrayed include Jeffrey, Scott, Hogg and Thomas Chalmers (all with portraits), Lord Cockburn, William Robertson, Hume, and Lockhart himself.

Sadleir 1447; Wolff 4173. Armorial bookplate of Frances Mary Richardson Currer, placed by Dibdin "at the head of all female collectors in Europe."
"Lockhart's second novel..., [it] is generally regarded as his best. Based on a true story that he heard from his father, it is a bold portrayal of passion and adultery in the keeper of community virtue, the Presbyterian minister. It is also an unusual story of compassion, forgiveness, and restoration." (Oxford DNB)

From the Collection des Mémoires relatifs a la Révolution Française, and an invaluable document for the study of the psychology of the Revolution.

Macbean p.164.

Eddy & Fleeman Books to which Dr. Samuel Johnson Subscribed 38. Other subscribers include Blackstone, Burney, Charles Fox, Garrick, Hoole (translator of Ariosto etc.), Lowth, Pennant, Reynolds, Philip Thicknesse, and the Wartons. Johnson and Reynolds were among Francklin's personal friends, and he dedicated "Demonax" and "The Portrait" respectively (both in volume ii) to them.