Volume 29 · Issue 4

Blake in the Marketplace, 1995, Including a Survey of Blakes in Private Ownership

by Robert N. Essick

Joseph Holland, formerly of New York, Los Angeles, and Santa Fe, died on December 28, 1994. With his friend Vincent Newton, Joe formed a small but impressive collection of original prints and drawings by Blake, supplemented with standard bibliographies, editions, and criticism. Both men attended the legendary A. E. Newton auction in 1941, where Joe purchased a color-printed and richly hand-colored impression of The Book of Urizen pl. 22 from copy B of A Small Book of Designs (illus. 2) and one of only four known impressions of the tailpiece (pl. a) for Songs of Innocence and of Experience. Other treasures in the collection included a good, uncolored impression of Little Tom the Sailor, once in the W. E. Moss collection, and two Visionary Heads. A fine Shakespearean actor, a founding member of the Mercury Theatre with Orson Welles, and a true lover of Blake, Joe Holland will be deeply missed by all those fortunate enough to have known him.

The sale of the Newton collection was handled by John Windle Books of San Francisco, now the world’s leading dealer in Blake and Blakeana. The resulting catalogue 26, issued in December 1995 as a memorial to Joe Holland and entitled The Blake Collection of Joseph Holland & Vincent Newton, is the most impressive Blake sales catalogue issued by a book or art dealer (as distinct from an auction house) since the Quaritch Blake lists of 1885-86. The catalogue also includes many volumes and a few prints from sources other than the Holland collection and a retrospective listing of important works by Blake acquired by Windle for private clients over the last few years. All the lots of original Blake materials actually offered for sale are included in the listings below.

To have the Holland color print of Urizen come on the market is a signal event. To have two further prints also from copy B of A Small Book of Designs become available in the same year is enough to make a Blake collector’s head spin. The design only from The Book of Urizen pl. 3, color printed and delicately hand tinted, appeared on the auction block at Christie’s London on 25 April (illus. 1). My own pre-sale guess was that the print would fetch bids well beyond the estimate range of £30,000-50,000 and would very probably be won by the American private collector who, over the last 15 years, has amassed an outstanding collection of Blake’s illuminated prints (for a tentative handlist, see Blake 27 [1994]: 104). I was wrong as to both price and purchaser. Although this anonymous collector knew of the sale, she/he failed to bid. Indeed, there seems to have been only one bidder in the room—Windle, acting on behalf of the artist and author Maurice Sendak. Windle apparently bid only against the reserve—that is, the price (in this instance, probably £25,000) beneath which a lot will not be sold—and won the print at just £28,000 (with the addition of the purchaser’s premium, £32,200).

The third color print from the Small Book copy B, the Leviathan from The Marriage of Heaven and Hell pl. 20, appeared at Sotheby’s London less than three months later (illus. 3-5). Windle was once again the winning bidder at £32,000 on an estimate of £20,000-30,000. But this time, Windle was acting for Essick rather than Sendak. The underbidder (that is, the party with the bid just prior to the winning bid) was an anonymous presence on the telephone. The long captions to illus. 2 and 3 offer some speculations about how these and other prints in the Small Book of Designs were produced. The captions to illus. 3-4 record the sad history of the Leviathan’s mistreatment over the years; illus. 5 presents its restoration.

The sale of all three prints from either the Small or Large books of designs still possessed by individual collectors—excluding three still in the Keynes Family Trust, but destined for the Fitzwilliam Museum—prompted me to make a rough survey of all original Blakes remaining in private ownership. Absent a deaccession by an art museum or institutional library, only such works, plus new discoveries, are likely to come on the market. I have of course excluded commercial book illustrations and such relatively common prints as the Job, Dante, and Canterbury Pilgrims engravings, but I have included all drawings and paintings, illuminated prints, manuscripts, texts first printed in letterpress in Blake’s lifetime, and the rarer separate prints designed and executed by Blake. These I have grouped by medium and genre, in accord with the perceptions of the market as to the relative value of (for example) paintings versus pencil sketches, or prints versus water colors.

The Visionary Heads constitute by far the largest category of Blake’s work still in private ownership. All 50 sheets still in the Larger Sketchbook are privately owned, along with 20 sheets from the dismembered and dispersed Smaller Sketchbook and 28 miscellaneous sheets, for a total of 98 examples. Some of these are counterproofs and many are rather faint or slight. Barring the discovery of a large cache of unrecorded works by Blake, the Visionary Heads should appear on the market more frequently than anything else of interest to Blake collectors and scholars.

If we exclude the Visionary Heads, the list of drawings in private hands shrinks dramatically: 30 pencil sketches, four in pen and ink, 30 monochrome wash drawings, and 30 water colors (including 10 from the great series of Bible illustrations Blake sold to Thomas Butts). Tempera paintings are rarer still, with only nine still privately owned. We should also expect a few of the once-recorded but now untraced drawings and paintings—in all, 184 listed by Butlin—to turn up over the decades and eventually make their way to the marketplace.

There are 32 privately-owned detached leaves from Blake’s illuminated books, but only 19 complete (or near-complete) copies printed by Blake himself. Posthumously-printed copies are rarer, with only four still owned privately. The “untraced” category again offers the collector some hope: eight copies printed by Blake, two posthumous, and 38 individual leaves.

Separate prints must be divided into several different categories. As previously mentioned, there are only three privately-owned prints from the Small Book of Designs copy B. There are three further illuminated-book plates probably printed as separate prints by Blake (as distinct from those printed for inclusion in books) and still in private hands. All but three of the begin page 109 | ↑ back to top

1 The Book of Urizen, pl. 3, design only, color printed and hand colored by Blake, probably as part of a second copy (B) of A Small Book of Designs, 1796.   Trimmed to the image, 6.1 × 9.9 cm., with a slight sketch by Blake on the verso. Collection of Maurice Sendak. For comments on this impression, and reasons for believing that it is the second of three pulls from the plate, see Martin Butlin, “Another Rediscovered Color Print by William Blake,” Blake 27 (1993/94): 68 (verso drawing reproduced, with an enlargement of the print reproduced on the journal’s cover). The breast, visible beneath the left shoulder and apparently gendering the figure as female, was not printed but added during hand coloring.

The illustration presented here began as a 4 × 5 inch color transparency. This was digitalized at the Huntington Library and printed as a black and white glossy image. Those interested in the relationship between purely photographic and photo/electronic media may wish to compare this illustration with the two accompanying Butlin’s essay. For some general observations on the production history of A Small Book of Designs, copy B, see the captions to illus. 2 and 3. Photo courtesy of Christie’s London.

Only six of Blake’s letters are still privately owned, but there are some 37 once recorded but now untraced. It is difficult to count other sorts of Blake manuscripts; all but one (the Riddle Manuscript) among those in private collections are inscriptions on drawings or prints included in the accountings above. Ironically, the rarest genre of all is Blake’s writings printed in conventional type during his lifetime—just one copy of Poetical Sketches, plus one untraced.

My survey prompts a few general conclusions. A good deal of original Blake materials will appear on the market for years to come. We will see for sale more Visionary Heads than any other type of drawings or paintings, other sorts of drawings more than important individual prints, individual prints and single plates from the illuminated books more than complete books, and illuminated books more than lifetime letterpress volumes. Parts of this declining scale of potential availability are the reverse of what one would normally expect of an artist/poet—for example, that drawings are much more common than lifetime letterpress publications. Only a very few examples of Blake’s finest work—the kinds of things we can all see in the Tate or Fitzwilliam or Huntington—will be within the reach of future collectors, no matter how wealthy.

Besides Windle’s most impressive contribution, two further dealers’ catalogues devoted to Blake and his circle deserve special notice. Adam Mills Rare Books continued its recent interest in Blake with a June “Occasional List” devoted to eight Muir facsimiles (including The Book of Thel executed completely by hand without a lithographic base), the 1877 Pearson uncolored facsimile of Jerusalem (mis-identified as an Andrew Chatto publication), the hand-colored issue of the E. J. Ellis 1893 facsimile of Songs of Innocence and of Experience, and a few odds and ends. Prices were steep, with the Pearson facsimile offered at £800 and Ellis’s production at £1250. I believe that all these volumes emerged from the same private British collection. In the listing under “Muir” below, I have provided information on copy numbers and paper types not recorded in Mills’s catalogue.

In July, The Antique & Book Collector (Marlborough, Wiltshire) exhibited and offered for sale a group of Blake’s commercial book illustrations detached from their volumes, three begin page 110 | ↑ back to top prints from posthumous copy o of Songs of Innocence and of Experience (probably in partnership with N. W. Lott), some Job and Virgil prints, and a selection of prints by Calvert, Palmer, and a few twentieth-century artists influenced by the Blake followers. The handlist for the exhibition, which doubled as a sales catalogue, is remarkable for its lack of scholarship (hardly any information on states, paper, editions, etc.) and its extremely high prices for Blake’s copy engravings. All these materials are listed under the appropriate sections below.

I have made one change in the format of the following sales lists. In past versions, I have included Blake’s engravings extracted from typographic books in the section headed “Separate Plates and Plates in Series.” My rationale was that the print market treats such extracts as, indeed, separate (or at least separated) plates. But as one of my most loyal readers, Jerry Bentley, has suggested, it would make more sense, from the scholar’s perspective, to group these extracts under the books from which they were removed in the section headed “Letterpress Books with Engravings by and after Blake.” This new arrangement is used here, with of course explicit indications when extracted plates rather than whole volumes were on offer.

The year of all sales and catalogues in the following lists is 1995 unless indicated otherwise. The auction houses add their purchaser’s premium to the hammer price in their price lists. These net amounts are given here, following the official price lists. The value added tax levied against the buyer’s surcharge in England is not included. Late 1995 sales will be covered in the 1996 review. I am grateful for help in compiling this review to Candace J. Adelson, G. E. Bentley, Jr., Warren Cariou (who can find Blakes even in Wiltshire), Andrew Clayton-Payne of Christie’s London, D. W. Dörrbecker (once again, my Continental spy), Morris Eaves, Jenijoy La Belle, Thomas V. Lange, Nicholas Lott, Jerome J. McGann, Adam Mills, Jane Munro, Vincent Newton, Lawrence Salander, Justin Schiller, Maurice Sendak, John Trotter, Joseph Viscomi (for several helpful suggestions about Blake’s techniques and their dating), Mark Watters, David Weinglass, Henry Wemyss of Sotheby’s London, John Windle, and Andrew Wyld of Agnew’s. Once again, Patricia Neill’s editorial assistance has been invaluable. For digital imaging at the Huntington Library, I thank John Sullivan, whose learning-curve in hyperspace is steeper than mine.

2 The Book of Urizen, pl. 22, color printed and hand colored by Blake, probably as part of a second copy (B) of A Small Book of Designs, 1796.   Butlin #261.11. Essick collection. Framing lines and inscription (““Frozen doors to mock” / “The world: while they within torments up lock.””) added with pen and black ink c. 1818 or later. Image 15.4 × 10 cm. on sheet 25.6 × 18 cm. showing the top half of a “1794” watermark along the left margin. With 3 stab holes along the left margin, 3.9 cm. and 4.4 cm. apart (measuring from top to bottom). Bentley 357 records that four other prints from copy B of A Small Book of Designs—Urizen pls. 2, 5, 10 and Marriage of Heaven and Hell pl. 11—have stab wholes with distances within 1 mm. of those recorded here. At least these 5 pls. appear to have been bound together at some point. According to provenance records of individual plates (see Bentley 358), this hypothetical volume must have been broken up no later than 1831.

The innermost of the four framing lines on the print reproduced here is contiguous with the margin of the central image; there is a pale blue wash between the second and third framing lines. This same style of framing, including light washes between the second and third of four framing lines, appears in Songs of Innocence and of Experience copy V, printed on paper with an 1818 watermark (Bentley 369) in 1821 (according to Joseph Viscomi, Blake and the Idea of the Book [Princeton: Princeton UP, 1993] 380). Thus it seems probable that the framing lines and the inscription in the same black ink were added to this Urizen print c. 1818 or later. At that time, the central image may have also been touched up. For further observations on the production history of A Small Book of Designs, copy B, see the caption to illus. 3. For color illus. of this print, see A. Edward Newton, A Magnificent Farce and Other Diversions of a Book-Collector (Boston: Atlantic Monthly, P, 1921) frontispiece, and the cover of John Windle’s catalogue 26 of Dec. 1995.

Abbreviations

Illuminated Books

The Book of Urizen, design only from pl. 3, trimmed to the image, 6.1 × 9.9 cm., color printed and hand colored, probably for a second copy (B) of A Small Book of Designs. CL, 25 April, #52, illus. color (£32,200 on an estimate of £30,000-50,000 to J. Windle acting as agent for Maurice Sendak). See illus. 1.

The Book of Urizen, pl. 22, image 15.4 × 10 cm., color printed and hand colored, probably for a second copy (B) of A Small Book of Designs. Butlin #261.11. John Windle, Dec. cat. 26, #1, from the Joseph Holland collection, illus. color (price on inquiry; acquired by R. Essick). See illus. 2.

Jerusalem, copy C. Probably in an American private collection since shortly after the Frank Rinder auction, 30 Nov. 1993. For a tentative handlist of this remarkable collection of Blake’s illuminated prints, see Blake 27 (1994): 104.

The Marriage of Heaven and Hell, pl. 20, image 5.5 × 10.5 cm., color printed and hand colored, probably for a second copy (B) of A Small Book of Designs. SL, 13 July, #71, illus. color (J. Windle acting for R. Essick, £36,700 on an estimate of £20,000-30,000). See illus. 3-5.

Songs of Experience, copy H. Acquired August 1994 by Maurice Sendak.

Songs of Innocence and of Experience, pl. a. Printed in dark brick-red, image 6.3 × 5.2 cm. on a sheet of wove paper, 10.4 × 8.5 cm., without watermark. John Windle, Dec. cat. 26, #2, from the Joseph Holland collection, with a color illus. of the Holland bookplate made from the original (price on inquiry; acquired by Justin Schiller). One of only 4 known impressions; the others are in Songs of Innocence and of Experience copies B (British Museum), C (Library of Congress), and D (private American collection). The examples included in these copies of the combined Songs are printed in yellow ochre or raw sienna ink, probably in the same print-run in 1794. The etching borders are not printed in copies B and C; I have not been able to inspect copy D, but it too is probably printed without borders, given Blake’s typical practice in the mid-1790s. The Holland impression is in a distinctly different ink color and the etching borders are boldly printed.

Joseph Viscomi has suggested that pl. a was one of Blake’s early experiments in relief etching—see Viscomi, Blake and the Idea of the Book (Princeton: Princeton UP, 1993) 194-95. Let me add to Viscomi’s dating the speculation that the pl. may have originally been executed for There is No Natural Religion, series b, but rejected. The plate size is right for that book, and the design (an adult male, assisted by winged putti, ascending heavenward) would make a fitting visualization for the second half of Blake’s concluding epigram: “God becomes as we are, that we may be as he is” (pl. b12).

Songs of Innocence and of Experience, posthumous copy o, 3 pls. only. The Antique & Book Collector, July cat., #25, “Nurse’s Song” in black ink from Innocence; #26, “The Divine Image” in black ink; #27, “Nurse’s Song” in red ink from Experience (£2250 each). Previously offered privately by N. W. Lott, Dec. 1993.

Drawings and Paintings

Boadicea. A Visionary Head, pencil, approx. 20.5 × 16 cm., Butlin #717. John Windle, Dec. cat. 26, #5, from the Joseph Holland Collection, illus. (price on inquiry; sold to a private San Francisco collector).

Christ the Mediator. Tempera, 26.4 × 37.8 cm., c. 1799-1800. Butlin #429. On long-term loan to the Tate Gallery from the collection of George Goyder.

The Flight into Egypt. Tempera, 27.2 × 38.3 cm., 1799. Butlin #404. On long-term loan to the Tate Gallery from the collection of George Goyder.

Lais of Corinth. Pencil, 21.5 × 18 cm. on paper with an 1816 watermark. Butlin #712. One of Blake’s Visionary Heads, with a study of a foot and ankle on the verso. SL, 10 July, #94, illus. (£2070). Previously sold CL, 22 Nov. 1977, #155 (£550).

Richard Coeur de Lion. A Visionary Head, pencil, 17.8 × 16.3 cm., Butlin #729. John Windle, Dec. cat. 26, #6, from the Joseph Holland collection, illus. (price on inquiry; sold to a private Southern California collector).

Sketches for the Cover of Thomas Commins’s An Elegy. Pen and gray ink, gray wash over pencil in an oval (recto); pencil (verso). Sheet 30.7 × 46 cm., perhaps Butlin #98 (“untraced since 1913”). CL, 7 Nov., #73, recto illus. (£4025 to Agnew’s acting for R. Essick). Previously sold CL, 17 Nov. 1992, #18 (£7150). In Blake 26 (1993): 142, I noted that the purchaser at this 1992 auction was the Salander-O’Reilly Galleries. This now appears to have been an error. For comments and illus. of recto and verso, see Martin Butlin, “Two Newly Identified Sketches for Thomas Commins’s An Elegy: A Postscript,” Blake 27 (1993): 42-44.

Manuscripts

Receipt signed by Blake, 5 July 1805 to Thomas Butts for £5.7s. John Windle, Dec. cat. 26, #9, pasted to the inside front cover of A. E. Newton’s copy of Geoffrey Keynes, A Bibliography of William Blake (New York: Grolier Club, 1921), from the Joseph Holland collection, illus. (price on inquiry).

3 The Marriage of Heaven and Hell, pl. 20, design only, color printed and hand colored by Blake, probably as part of a second copy (B) of A Small Book of Designs, 1796.   Before Restoration; see illus. 5 for the restored print. Image 5.5 × 10.5 cm. on a sheet trimmed to 13 × 18.9 cm., with a lower portion of the sheet, 2.5 × 18.9 cm., bearing part of the outermost framing line and Blake’s caption (““O revolving serpent”/ “O the Ocean of Time & Space””), retained and pasted to the verso (see illus. 4) of the backing cardboard mat (17.9 × 23.1 cm). Inscribed “16” by Blake, upper right recto. First described and reproduced in Martin Butlin, “A New Color Print from the Small Book of Designs,” Blake 26 (1992): 19-21. Provenance: John Varley; Adam White, the gift of Mrs. John Varley, 1856; the artist Sir Joseph Noel Paton; by descent from Paton to the vendor at Sotheby’s on 13 July 1995; Essick collection.

Blake seems to have taken advantage of the commission from Ozias Humphry for the copy of A Small Book of Designs now in the British Museum to pull one or two additional impressions of most or all of the images printed for his patron. From these impressions, plus some prints not in the copy printed for Humphry, Blake created a second copy of the book of designs from his illuminated books without the accompanying texts. Subsequent trimming of the sheets has obscured much valuable evidence, but a few reasonable suppositions can be gleaned from those not trimmed to the very edge of the image. The leaves, relative to the size of the prints, may have been quite large, as demonstrated by the 26.5 × 18.5 cm. sheet bearing The Book of Urizen pl. 1. It is of course also possible that the sheets were never uniform in size. At a much later date, probably not before 1818 (see caption to illus. 2), he returned to this still-unsold second copy, drew multiple black-ink framing lines around the images, and inscribed most or all with captions in the same black ink. At some time prior to 1831, at least five of the prints were bound, as indicated by stab holes (see caption to illus. 2); five prints still bear numbers in Blake’s hand in the top right corner. The resulting album or series of numbered prints, with its original captions, might be thought of as constituting a new illuminated book, with printed designs and manuscript^[e] texts, worthy of study as such.

Each line of the extant one- or two-line inscriptions in Blake’s hand is placed, rather unconventionally for the time, within double quotation marks. Although Erdman believes that some of these double-quotation inscriptions are not by Blake (see E890), I think that all those within the double quotation marks are in his hand. The verso inscriptions on Urizen pls. 3 and 12 lack the double quotation marks. Butlin notes that these verso inscriptions are not in Blake’s hand (#261.4, 261.10), but they may have been quoted or paraphrased from Blake’s inscriptions now trimmed off. An inquiry from Dawson Turner about the book produced for Humphry, to which Blake replied on 9 June 1818 (E771), may have prompted Blake to return to and dress up the prints he still owned. The impression from The Marriage pl. 20 reproduced here has been treated in cavalier fashion, but it has not been trimmed to the image (as claimed in Butlin’s essay cited above and in Sotheby’s sale catalogue). Almost certainly after the work left Blake’s hands, someone cut the sheet and pasted the two pieces to the recto and verso (illus. 4) of the backing mat, as described above. Apparently a cover mat with a window to show the image was then pasted over the backing cardboard. This cover mat was unfortunately discarded just prior to Sotheby’s auction, but its existence is indicated by the old paste used to attach it to the recto of the backing mat and now making such a mess in the illustration.

These injuries are explainable, although certainly lamentable. It is more difficult to account for the oddest feature of the work. Blake’s sheet bears on its recto three fragments of thin, light pink paper. One fragment, upper right, obscures part of the inscribed number and outer framing line. The fragment on the left also covers a small portion of the outer framing line. The largest fragment, approx. 8 × 13 cm., surrounds Blake’s image. Its outer margin is ragged, but the window cut in it to reveal the image was carefully sized to the margins of the image. Apparently this pink paper at one time covered all or a good portion of Blake’s sheet of paper, including the framing lines and number and excluding only the image itself, and then was partly ripped off. It seems improbable that Blake would have covered up his work in this way and left disfiguring fragments behind.

The pink-paper frame surrounding the image bears, along all four inner edges, dull grey washes. These match the color of Blake’s print along the lower margin, but do not match colors in other areas (e.g., the reddish-brown in the print upper left). These washes were added after the paper frame was glued to Blake’s print, as indicated by very slight strips of gray wash along the bottom margin, right center margin, and top left margin of Blake’s image. It thus seems probable that the pink paper was pasted over Blake’s sheet to protect it while making the margins of the image slightly more even. Yet this would hardly seem worth the trouble; the added washes are clearly visible only under magnification and do little to change the margins. This additional work on the image might have been undertaken by Paton—see the inscription tentatively attributed to him and recorded in the caption to illus. 4.

Other than the slight touches at the edges, I can see no evidence that Blake’s work has been compromised by any other additions by another hand. The glue used to paste down the pink paper appears to be different from that used for the cover mat, and thus the application of the pink paper may have been prior to the addition of the back and front mat boards described above. By matting the print to the edge of the image, the framer had no reason to remove the remaining fragments of pink paper.

4 The Marriage of Heaven and Hell, pl. 20, verso of the backing mat before restoration.   See illus. 3 for the unrestored recto and illus. 5 for the restored recto. The strip containing Blake’s inscription and one of his framing lines, originally part of the recto of the print, has been pasted to the lower portion of the backing cardboard mat. In addition to Blake’s inscription (““O revolving serpent”. . .”), the lower portion of this sheet bears, in 3 different hands, the number “8623” (lower left, probably just a lot or inventory number written by a dealer or former owner), “Drawing of Blake’s given to A[dam] White by M^rs [John] Varley March 31 1856” (left side of lower margin, probably written by White), and “evidently printed in oil [sic] & touched with colour afterwards” (right side of lower margin, perhaps written by Paton, according to Sotheby’s auction catalogue—see provenance in caption to illus. 3). “Touched with colour afterwards” is probably a reference to Blake’s own procedure of adding water colors and pen and ink work to color-printed designs; but these words might refer to the very small areas of wash added to the margins of the image by another hand, possibly Paton himself, as described in the caption to illus. 3. Sadly, all these inscriptions not by Blake were lost during the heavy cleaning of the paper strip necessary for preserving it from further decay and returning its color to match the portion of the sheet bearing Blake’s print. I hope that the reproduction here will serve as a permanent record of the existence of these now-vanished inscriptions.

The larger piece of paper on the verso, pasted above the clipping from Blake’s print, contains yet another inscription: “Original Drawing by Blake / See Rossetti’s [i.e., Gilchrist’s?] “Life and Works of Blake [lacking closing quotation mark and period].” This unattributed inscription has been preserved.

Separate Plates and Plates in Series

“Calisto,” Blake after Stothard, 2nd st. Campbell Fine Art, April private offer, printed in brown on laid paper, cut close right and left to 24.9 × 20.8 cm. but with the imprint, from an album of prints after Stothard, some leaves of the album showing an 1850 watermark (acquired by R. Essick).

“Chaucers Canterbury Pilgrims.” Brick Row Book Shop, March private offer, 5th st., printed in dark sepia on laid India, very probably a Colnaghi impression, good condition ($9500). John Windle, April cat. 24, #42, 5th st., Sessler impression, a few slight abrasions ($7500); same impression, Dec. cat. 26, #195 ($8500 to a private Chicago collector).

Dante engravings. Heritage Book Shop, April cat. for the New York Book Fair, #17, very probably the c. 1892 printing, showing part of a watermark (“N”?) on 1 sheet, slight foxing on 1 pl., with the printed label and the bookplate of Philip Hofer, green morocco folding case ($45,000; previously sold CNY, 7 Oct. 1994, #49, for $21,850). John Windle, Dec. cat. 26, #197, probably the c. 1892 printing, 2 pls. slightly browned, morocco folding case, from the Moncure Biddle collection ($60,000).

“Fall of Rosamond,” Blake after Stothard, 1st st., 1783. N. W. Lott, Aug. private offer, printed in brown and pink, no hand coloring, imprint and title trimmed off (acquired by R. Essick).

“George Cumberland’s Card,” 1827. John Windle, Dec. cat. 26, #8, from the Joseph Holland collection, morocco folding case, illus. (price on inquiry).

“The Idle Laundress,” Blake after Morland, 1803. John Windle, Dec. cat. 26, #196, 3rd st., color printed and hand colored ($3000).

Job engravings. Heritage Book Shop, Feb. private offer, complete issue of 1826 on J Whatman paper after removal of the “Proof” inscriptions, original label attached to front free endpaper, trimmed to 33.5 × 25 cm., top edge gilt, fine condition (perhaps cleaned when last bound), with the bookplate of Pamela Lister, late 19th- or early 20th-century full morocco, recent folding case ($45,000). Buddenbrooks, Feb. cat. “Sarmassa,” unnumbered item, published “Proof” issue complete on laid India, apparently loose in a morocco “chemise,” pls. 6 and 18 illus. ($55,000); same copy?, June cat. “Bandoline,” #10, now described as the “original sheets trimmed and remounted on 22 folio sheets,” no mention of the “chemise” ($30,000). Estates of Mind, April cat. 10, #7, published “Proof” issue complete on laid India, loose in morocco portfolio—perhaps the same copy as the previous one listed here, jointly owned ($55,000). SNY, 12 May, #9, complete issue of 1874 on laid India, several pls. with defects in the India, title page foxed, marginal defects, linen-covered box with the 1826 typographic label on the inside front cover, pl. 14 illus. ($11,500); #10, pls. 2 and 14 only from the 1874 printing, pl. 14 foxed ($690). F. Dörling auction, Hamburg, 10 June, #32, complete issue of 1874 on laid India, 2 pls. illus. (estimate DM25,000). CL, 28 June, #233, published “Proof” issue complete on laid India, backing leaves 32 × 25.4 cm., light marginal foxing, contemporary brown cloth rebacked, pl. 3 illus. (£12,075); same copy, John Windle, Dec. cat. 26, #198, pl. 15 illus. ($38,750). CL, 29 June, #405, complete issue of 1874 on laid India with heavy backing paper, minor tears and other defects, in the original brown paper portfolio titled “The Book of Job by William Blake,” pl. 5 illus. (J. Windle, £6325). The Antique & Book Collector, July cat., #32-37, pls. 1, 4, 5, 6, 7, 21 from the 1874 printing, no information given on paper, sheet size, or condition (£1500 each). SNY, 1 Nov., #31, published “Proof” issue complete on laid India, original printed label preserved, 19th-century morocco, pl. 15 illus. ($29,900 on an estimate of $12,000-15,000). CL, 29 Nov., #44, complete issue of 1874 on laid India, slight foxing on some pls. (£8970). Pacific Book Auction Galleries, San Francisco, 30 Nov., #55, published “Proof” issue complete on laid India, backing sheets trimmed to 26 × 19.7 cm., loose in modern box, pl. 15 illus. (not sold; estimate $20,000-25,000).

5 The Marriage of Heaven and Hell, pl. 20, design only, color printed and hand colored by Blake, probably as part of a second copy of A Small Book of Designs, 1796.   After Restoration; see also illus. 3 and 4 (both before restoration) and the captions thereto for discussion. The detached bottom portion of the sheet has been restored and the pink paper window around the central image removed and preserved. The two other pink paper fragments (also preserved) and all glue have been removed to reveal Blake’s framing lines and number. The pink paper frame had totally obscured the second of four framing lines. As in Urizen pl. 22 (illus. 2), the innermost framing line is contiguous with the margins of the image—except that, in this print, the framing line along the left margin is about 1 mm. inside the image (perhaps just a slip on Blake’s part?). I believe that the restored work now bears only Blake’s own work—except for the slight marginal washes described in the caption to illus. 4—unmasked from several stages of mistreatment by later owners, restorers, or framers.

“Wilson Lowry,” Blake and Linnell after Linnell, 1824-25. N. W. Lott, Aug. private offer, 3rd st. before all letters on laid India, with an impression of a st. between the 3rd and 4th, also before all letters and on laid India (both acquired by R. Essick).

Letterpress Books with Engravings by and After Blake, Including Prints Extracted From Such Books

Allen, Roman History, 1798. John Windle, Dec. cat. 26, #203, trimmed close with the imprints removed from 2 pls., half calf ($1250).

Ariosto, Orlando Furioso. Stuart Bennett, Feb. cat. 2, #8, 1799 ed., 5 vols., contemporary calf rebacked ($200). Swann, 18 May, #1, 1783 ed., 5 vols., minor stains, contemporary calf worn ($230). John Price, Sept. “Autumn Miscellany,” #3, 1799 ed., 5 vols., contemporary morocco rebacked, little worn (£175). The Poetry Bookshop, Oct. “Author List 1,” #4, 1791 ed., 2 vols. (£135).

Blair, The Grave. William Reese, Jan. cat. 141, #107, 1808 quarto, scattered foxing, full russia rebacked and slightly worn ($1000). Charles Parkhurst Books, April Los Angeles Book Fair, the pls. as in the 1808 folio issue and on the same laid paper, lacking the text of the poem but bound with a trimmed copy of “Of the Designs” and the prospectus for Stothard’s Canterbury Pilgrims pl., both letterpress texts from the 1808 quarto printing as indicated by the signatures (“F” on the first leaf of “Of the Designs” rather than the “K” of the folio; no signature on the first leaf of the prospectus rather than the “L” of the folio), the pls. trimmed tall and narrow (43.6 × 29.7 cm.), contemporary (or at least near-contemporary) quarter calf over marbled boards rebacked ($1600 to R. Essick). Swann, 20 April, #45, 1808 quarto, uncut in “original boards” (Hirsch, $1840); same copy, Daniel Hirsch, Oct. Santa Monica Book Fair, 1808 “folio” (actually the quarto), uncut in “original boards” (actually fairly new replacement boards), “original spine label” (the original printed label appears on the front cover, not the spine), new endpapers, internally very fine condition ($3900). When informed of these problems, Mr. Hirsch withdrew the vol. from the market and will try to return it to Swann. Pickering & Chatto, May cat. 730, #15, 1813 quarto, slightly later German binding (as issued in Germany?), a copy with this dealer for about 2 years, pl. 11 illus. ($1750). Chapel Hill Rare Books, Oct. cat. 99, #141, 1808 quarto, contemporary boards rebacked with half calf, worn (“was $2,000, now $1,750”). Jeffrey Thomas Books, Aug. private offer, 1808 quarto, later boards rebacked but retaining original front cover label, leaves trimmed ($1500). Kane Antiquarian Auction, Pottstown, PA, 1 Oct., #68, 1808 “folio” (but probably the quarto), some foxing, later calf in cloth case ($800). Swann, 19 Oct., #44, 1808 quarto, offsetting and foxing, half sheep rebacked and worn (not sold; estimate too high at $800-1200). SNY, 1 Nov., #40, 1808 folio, light marginal soiling and foxing, contemporary morocco, pl. 5 illus. ($3737 on an estimate of $1500-2000). BBA, 16 Nov., #161, 1808 quarto, 1 pl. missing, foxed, modern half morocco (Besley, £92). John Windle, Dec. cat. 26, #7, pls. only on sheets of the same laid paper used for the pls. in the 1808 folio, 50.8 × 34.9 cm., 2 or 3 edges showing deckle, the trimmed and bent inner edges on all sheets indicating that the pls. were once bound, the engraved title page in a previously unrecorded proof st. before imprint and “Proof Copy” inscription, begin page 115 | ↑ back to top

6 Little Tom the Sailor, text by William Hayley, etched in relief and white line by Blake.   Printed in black ink, uncolored. Reproduced here are the tailpiece (11.2 × 16 cm.) in white-line etching and the colophon in relief etching. “Woodcut on Pewter,” as described by Blake in his Notebook (E694), would seem to be the predominant technique in both the headpiece and tailpiece. The poem and the colophon (the latter printed from its own plate, 3.5 × 12 cm.) were almost certainly etched on copper; the two design plates might have been pewter (although the “Woodcut on Pewter” process can be applied to other metals, including copper). In the impression reproduced here, the full sheet of wove paper without watermark measures 51.5 × 18.7 cm. The text of the colophon was step-etched, as revealed in this copy by the lower edge of the step that caught the surface of the inking ball and printed as a fine shadow line (perhaps just barely visible in this reproduction). Provenance: W. E. Moss (his collection stamp on the cloth portfolio still with this copy); Moss sale, Sotheby’s London, 2 March 1937, #191 (“Withdrawn” according to the printed price list, but “mislaid” and thus not sold according to Geoffrey Keynes, Blake Studies, 2nd ed. [Oxford: Clarendon P, 1971] 108); offered again at Sotheby’s London, 20 Dec. 1938, #458 (Robinson, £48), and then by the London dealer Robinson in Dec. 1939 (£84), according to Keynes as cited above; apparently acquired by the Scribner Book Store of New York, as indicated by an undated and unpriced typescript advertisement retained with this copy; Parke-Bernet Gallery auction, New York, 9 Dec. 1952, #87 (Joseph Holland, $130, according to the Parke-Bernet invoice retained with this copy); inherited from Holland by Vincent Newton, Jan. 1995; the San Francisco dealer John Windle, offered in his “Blake” cat. of Nov. 1995, # 3; R. Essick.
[View this object in the William Blake Archive]

A note on 1808 issues of The Grave: The sets listed above of the pls. in the 1808 folio “Proof” sts. now in my collection, both lacking the text of the poem, suggest that Blake’s designs may have been issued by Cromek in 1808 as a suite of pls. A purchaser of such a set of pls. may have also been given the opportunity to acquire a pamphlet-like copy of “Of the Designs” to accompany the prints. The fact that the description of the designs in the copy I acquired from Parkhurst, along with the Chaucer prospectus printed as part of the same gathering, are from the 1808 quarto printing makes this scenario possible. If the copy of the pls. without the poem was extracted, at a later begin page 116 | ↑ back to top

The Illustrated Book of Songs for Children, London, Edinburgh, and New York, T. Nelson and Sons, preface dated August 1863.   Opening showing pp. 128-29, containing Blake’s “The Chimney Sweeper” from Songs of Innocence with a musical score beneath which the first verse is printed. With the poem’s title changed to “Chimney Sweeper’s Song,” the word “left” added after “I was” in the first line, other startling alterations in wording in the first and third verses, and “Tom Dacre” changed to “Tom Teddy” in the second verse. As far as I can determine, this is the first published musical setting for the poem, perhaps even the first for any work by Blake (nothing earlier listed in Donald Fitch, Blake Set to Music: A Bibliography of Musical Settings of the Poems and Prose of William Blake [Berkeley: U of California P, 1990]). Essick collection.

Bryant, New System . . . of Ancient Mythology, 2nd ed., 1775-77. P & P Books, Jan. cat. L10, #23, 3 vols., full calf ornately gilt, some splitting of joints (£425).

Bürger, Leonora, 1796. D & D Galleries, April New York Book Fair, bound with the German text of the poem (as usual) and another work bound in, slight foxing, the frontispiece stained, contemporary half calf ($2750); same copy and price offered by Daniel Hirsch, Oct. Santa Monica Book Fair. John Windle, Dec. cat. 26, #204, frontispiece only (Perry after Blake), from the Keynes collection ($1250).

Cumberland, Thoughts on Outline, 1796. Ken Spelman, May cat. 30, #22, some light foxing, uncut in original limp boards, pl. 2 illus. (£850). Phillip Pirages, July cat. 34, #199, some foxing, “from the author” inscribed on leaf before title page, uncut and unopened in original boards rebacked ($2250).

Darwin, The Botanic Garden. Titles, May cat. 76, #77, 1791 (1st or 2nd) ed. of Part 1, 4th of Part 2 (£200). Wheldon & Wesley, July cat. 210, #31, 3rd ed. of Part 1, 4th of Part 2, contemporary calf rebacked (£325). The Antique & Book Collector, July cat., #16, pl. 1 only, “Fertilization of Egypt” (£295); #17, pl. 6 only, “Tornado” (£395). N. W. Lott, Aug. private offer, proof of “Tornado” only, lacking finishing work in the image but with all letters (price on application). Peter Murray Hill, Oct. cat. 185, #47, 1799 ed., 2 vols., contemporary calf (£200). Grant & Shaw, Nov. cat. 29, #37, 1st ed. of Part 1, 2nd of Part 2, 2 vols., morocco rebacked (£795). Thomas Goldwasser, Dec. cat. 8, #61, 1 pl. only, “Fertilization of Egypt,” Blake after Fuseli, from the 1st ed. ($200). John Windle, Dec. cat. 26, #28, 2nd ed. of Part 1, 3rd of Part 2, the only large-paper copy of these eds. I have ever seen, early quarter calf over marbled boards, amateurishly rebacked with the original spine laid down, from the Joseph Holland collection ($650).

A note on large-paper copies of The Botanic Garden: Large-paper copies of both the 1st and 2nd eds. of Part 1 can be distinguished on the basis of paper type as well as size. Small-paper copies are printed on an unwatermarked wove paper with a distinctive checkered pattern (when viewed in a backing light) created by a bold wire mesh used in the paper mold(s). Large-paper copies are printed on a heavier wove paper lacking the checkered pattern and showing, in at least a few gatherings, an “E & P” (Edmeads and Pine) watermark.

Euler, Elements of Algebra, 1797. David Bickersteth, June cat. 134, #133, 2 vols., signature C in vol. 2 duplicated, half calf over marbled boards, rubbed, title page to vol. 1 and facing frontispiece portrait of Euler engraved by Blake illus. (£950).

Flaxman, Iliad designs, 1805. Jane & John Kinnaird, May cat. 18, #202, foxed (some pls. heavily), calf spine and boards (given the condition, overpriced at £250).

8 Henry Fuseli, Edgar, Feigning Madness, Approaches King Lear.   Pen and ink, brown and gray washes, 62.5 × 96 cm. (Fuseli’s largest known drawing), dated to c. 1772. The design illustrates Act 3, scene 4, of Shakespeare’s King Lear. Edgar’s gigantic proportions, perspectivally out of scale with the distance (indicated by the landscape) between him and the group of three on the right, approaches Blake’s technique of representing figures of vastly different sizes apparently at the same distance from the viewer. Photo courtesy of Sotheby’s London.

Fuseli, Lectures on Painting, 1801. Adam Mills, March cat. 32, #98, engraved title spotted, “original blue paper boards, modern white paper spine with remains of original paper label” (£500; acquired by D.W. Dörrbecker). Alan Rankin, July cat. 44, #8, the leaf with Blake’s pl. cleaned and “mounted between tissue,” illus. (£150).

Gay, Fables, 1793. Ursus Rare Books, March private offer, 2 vols., early 19th-century half calf ($1500). Appelfeld Gallery, March cat. 55, #88, 2 vols., minor foxing on pls., tissue guards, contemporary calf rebacked ($600). Hartfield, April cat. 48, #1-33, 2 vols., “thick-paper edition,” tissue guards, later three-quarter morocco, marbled boards, spines faded ($1295). Between the Lines, April Los Angeles Book Fair, 2 vols., contemporary morocco ($425). Adrian Flühmann GmbH, April cat. 4, #37, with #38, Fables of Aesop (1793), 4 vols. in all uniformly bound in contemporary (and very fancy) morocco (6500 Swiss francs—about $5700!). BBA, 6 July, #200, apparently 1st ed., 2 vols., some foxing, contemporary calf rebacked, rubbed (Ginnan, £207). The Antique & Book Collector, July cat., #4-15, all 12 Blake pls. extracted from the 1st ed. and sold individually (£75-£125). John Windle, Dec. cat. 26, #35, 1st ed., 2 vols., original boards uncut, the vol. and p. references on each plate just outside the lower gutter clearly visible, Blake’s pl. 1 slightly spotted and showing some wear, otherwise fine impressions, the pls. from the 1738 1st ed., re-engraved and considerably modified in this ed., laid-in for Blake’s pls. only in vol. 1, from the collections of Donald Heald (see his cat. 1 of July 1976, where this copy is illus. and offered as #20 for £260) and Joseph Holland ($1750).

Gough, Sepulchral Monuments, 1786-96. CSK, 10 Feb., #149, 2 vols., some spotting, contemporary half calf (£352); same copy?, CSK, 7 April, #61 (£123). Ken Spelman, May cat. 30, #215, 2 vols. bound in 3, later half morocco (£600). CSK, 8 Sept., #52, 2 vols. bound in 4, contemporary calf worn (not sold; estimate £200-300).

Hayley, Ballads, 1805. Pickering & Chatto, May cat. 730, #137, apparently 1st sts. of the pls., browned in part, mostly confined to the margins of the pls., few leaves with repaired tears, contemporary calf, pl. 1 illus. (not a very attractive copy, but still a good buy at $300). Jarndyce, July cat. 106, #1623, apparently 1st sts. of the pls., some browning, contemporary calf rebacked, pl. 1 illus. (£1500). N. W. Lott, Sept. private offer, pl. 5 only, “The Horse” (not priced). In Roger R. Easson and Robert N. Essick, William Blake: Book Illustrator, vol. 1 (Normal: American Blake Foundation, 1972) 43, the pl. offered by Lott, then in the collection of Raymond Lister, is described as a prepublication proof. I now concur with Lott that it is simply a late and/or poorly-inked impression showing only fragments of the signature and with some of the fine hatching patterns worn away.

Hayley, Life of Cowper, 1803-04. John Price, Jan. cat., #81, 1st ed., 3 vols., recent marbled boards (£200). The Antique & Book Collector, July cat., #18, pl. 1 extracted from the 1st ed. (£125); #19, pl. 2 extracted from the 1st ed. (£75). Jeffrey Thomas Books, Aug. private offer, 1st ed., 3 vols., 2nd st. of pl. 4, full calf, with the supplement uncut in original boards ($1250). Sims Reed, Oct. cat., #41, apparently 1st ed., 3 vols., contemporary half calf (£450). The Poetry Bookshop, Oct. “Author List 1,” #3, 3 vols., with the supplement bound in the 3rd vol. (£125). John Windle, Dec. cat. 26, #42, 1st ed., 3 vols., pl. 4 in the 1st st. (one of 3 traced copies with this st.), full calf, vol. 1 crudely rebacked, others worn and water stained, from the Joseph Holland collection ($675).

Hayley, Life of Romney, 1809. Heritage Book Shop, Feb. private offer, small-paper issue slightly trimmed, Blake’s pl. thinly printed but clean, full calf by R. De Coverly ($1350). Adam Mills, March cat. 32, #117, contemporary ink signature of “William Bayly, Junr,” and a later pencil note (“a friend of Blake’s—and Johnson Cowper’s editor”), some pls. spotted or stained in margins, contemporary half calf, joints cracking (£500); same copy and price, July cat. 33, #23, Oct. cat. 34, #20. I can find no other reference to Blake having a friend named “Bayly,” but a “William Bayley” was a member of the jury that found Blake innocent of sedition and assault on 11 Jan. 1804 (G. E. Bentley, Jr., Blake Records [Oxford: Clarendon P, 1969] 140). Did Blake have a “friend” on the jury? I can find no record of Bayly/Bayley having been involved in editing Cowper. Perhaps whoever wrote the reference to Blake was confusing “William Bayly” with William Hayley, Blake’s patron and the author/editor of The Life, and Posthumous Writings, of William Cowper, published by Joseph Johnson in 1803-04. The Antique & Book Collector, July cat., #24, Blake’s pl. only extracted (£225). CE, 27 Sept., #138, some soiling, 19th-century half morocco worn ($58). John Windle, Dec. cat. 26, #43, half calf, hinges repaired, from the Joseph Holland collection ($450).^[e]

Nicholson, An Introduction to Natural Philosophy, 1782. John Windle, Dec. cat. 26, #209, 2 vols., contemporary calf ($1250).

Novelist’s Magazine. BBA, 8 June, #157, vol. 8 (Don Quixote), 1782, with vols. 1-2, 18 (none of which contains pls. by Blake), “one volume lacking both text and frontispiece [leaving only a few pls.?],” contemporary calf very worn (Hilton, £46). John Windle, Dec. cat. 26, #211, vols. 10-11 (Sir Charles Grandison), 1783, contemporary calf, hinges repaired ($675).

Rees, Cyclopaedia, 1819-20. Robert Frew, April cat. 5, #131, 45 vols. including the 5 pl. vols., contemporary half morocco slightly rubbed (£2500); same copy and price, Nov. cat. 6, #243. BBA, 19 Oct., #263, 45 vols. including the 5 pl. vols., contemporary calf very worn (Lynn, £690). Charles Traylen, Dec. cat. 118, #21, 45 vols. including the 5 pl. vols., slight foxing, contemporary calf (£1900).

Salzmann, Elements of Morality. CL, 28 June, sale of the Marjorie Moon collection, #54, vol. 1 from the 1799 ed., vols. 2-3 from the 1791 ed., a few leaves of text lacking, some leaves browned, modern half morocco, pl. numbered “5” illus. (£345). John Windle, Dec. cat. 26, #212, 1791 ed., 3 vols. in 1, washed and pressed “and generally mucked about with,” later full morocco by Riviere ($850).

Scott, Poetical Works, 1782. Adam Mills, March cat. 32, #206, contemporary half calf rebacked (£400); same copy and price, July cat. 33, #22, and Oct. cat. 34, #19. John Windle, Dec. cat. 26, #214, early calf rebacked ($600).

Shakespeare, Dramatic Works, Boydell ed., 1802. Weissert, Jan. cat. 59, #13, 9 vols. (DM4200). Swann, 19 Oct., #241, 9 vols., 96 pls. only, no mention of Blake’s pl., some foxing and heavy offsetting of pls., contemporary morocco ($1955).

Shakespeare, Plays, ed. Steevens. Robert Clark, Oct. cat. 41, #246, 1811 ed., 9 vols., some pls. foxed, “original green cloth-backed boards,” printed paper labels, minor wear (£220). John Price, Nov. cat., #101, 1805 ed., 9 vols., contemporary calf rebacked and worn (£130).

Stedman, Narrative. Chapel Hill Rare Books, March cat. 94, #367, “1806-13” (and thus a mixed set of the 2nd and 3rd eds.?), 2 vols., pls. hand colored, contemporary morocco ($2000); Oct. cat. 99, #140, 1806 ed., lacking one pl. not by Blake, pls. hand colored, contemporary calf worn (“was $3,500, now $2,500”). Beeleigh Abbey Books, June cat. BA/56, #240, 1813 ed., 2 vols., pls. (mis-described as “aquatints”) hand colored, half modern morocco over marbled boards, hinges cracked (£3,500). CE, 14 June, #161, 1796 ed., 2 vols., scattered light foxing, contemporary calf rebacked ($920). CL, 28 June, #280, 1796 ed., 2 vols., some spotting on pls., uncut in original boards, backstrips repaired but with the letterpress labels retained, modern cloth box (£782 to J. Windle for R. Essick). William Reese Co., Sept. cat. of “Blacks in America,” #88, 1796 ed., 2 vols., some scattered foxing, contemporary calf rebacked ($3000). John Windle, Dec. cat. 26, #215, 1796 ed., 2 vols., early calf rebacked ($1875). Between the Covers Rare Books, Dec. cat. 45, #403, 1813 ed., 2 vols., “wide margins,” contemporary half calf over marbled boards worn ($2500).

Henry Fuseli, Martha Hess as Silence.   Pencil and white chalk on buff paper, 54.5 × 33 cm. Martha Hess of Zurich died in 1779, but Fuseli continued to draw her from memory as late as 1790. She may personify silence, as the title indicates, but the dramatically upturned eyes suggest a state of transcendental meditation. Collection of Maurice Sendak; photo courtesy of Christie’s London.

Stuart and Revett, Antiquities of Athens. Robert Frew, Aug. private offer, Blake’s 4 pls. only on Whatman 1806 paper (D. W. Dörrbecker, £120); Nov. cat. 6, #604, 5 vols., 1762-1830, minor spotting, vols. 1-4 contemporary russia rebacked, vol. 5 recent russia to match (£12,000). SL, 25 Oct. 1994, #301, 3 vols., 1762-99, some tears and discoloration, later cloth (Frew, £1265).

Virgil, Pastorals, 1821. The Antique & Book Collector, July cat., #28-30, cuts 2-4 only, probably Linnell impressions rather than extracts from the 1821 vol. (£485 each); #31, cut 6 only, probably a Linnell impression (£600). John Windle, Dec. cat. 26, #217, 2 vols. complete, original sheep ($17,500); #218, 9 of Blake’s wood engravings, Linnell impressions ($500 each).

The Wit’s Magazine, 1784. Campbell Fine Art, April private offer, pl. 1 (“The Temple of Mirth”) only, 1st st. of the earlier pl. of the design, cut close to the image with all inscriptions trimmed off, without folds and thus perhaps an impression sold separate from the magazine in which the pls. are folded, foxed (£750). Only the 2nd impression of the 1st st. known to me.

10 Henry Fuseli, The Three Witches, or The Weird Sisters, from Shakespeare’s Macbeth.   Oil on canvas, 60.3 × 75.5 cm. Inscribed in Greek on the lining canvas and frame, probably repeating a now-covered inscription on the original canvas, “Women? Nay, never women! Gorgons more” (from Aeschylus, Eumenides). The auction catalogue entry claims that these witches are men, whereas in all other versions by Fuseli (including the 1785 mezzotint by J. R. Smith), they are women. I fail to see how these figures are more masculine than other versions, particularly since Fuseli’s point would seem to be the transgression of gender boundaries in accord with Shakespeare’s text: “You should be women,/ And yet your beards forbid me to interpret/ That you are so” (Macbeth, Act I, scene 3). Photo courtesy of Christie’s London.

Wollstonecraft, Original Stories, 1791. Kane Antiquarian Auction, Pottstown, PA, #71, contemporary calf rebacked ($1500).

Young, Night Thoughts, 1797, uncolored. Jeffrey Thomas Books, Feb. private offer, with the Explanation leaf, the title page to Night the Second in the 2nd st., considerable offsetting from the pls., original gray-green boards worn, back cover detached, folding box stained and worn ($12,500); same copy and price, John Windle, Dec. cat. 26, #219. Heritage Book Shop, Feb. private offer, top edge gilt, others uncut, with the “Explanation” leaf bound at the end, quarter calf ($10,000). Frederick Mulder, April private offer, with the Explanation leaf, uncut in original blue boards, the title page to Night the Second in the 2nd st., the same copy previously offered by Donald Heald (£12,000). Swann, 20 April, #46, some borders cropped, some offsetting, half morocco worn (not sold; estimate $5000-7000). Sims Reed, Oct. cat., #45, with the Explanation leaf, uncut in “original cloth backed blue boards,” title page to Night the Third illus., possibly the same copy offered by Mulder, above (£12,000). Simon Finch, Oct. cat. 26, #149, lacking the Explanation leaf, some light offsetting, contemporary morocco worn (£3500); same copy and price, Dec. “Occasional List” 13, #125). Pacific Book Auction Galleries, San Francisco, 30 Nov., #57, trimmed to 42 × 31.1 cm., slight foxing and offsetting, later morocco over marbled boards, title page to Night the Third illus. ($4000).

Interesting Blakeana

Chaucer, The Works, ed. Speght, 1687. James Burmester, Nov. cat. 30, #6, contemporary calf (£1250). Probably the ed. used by Blake.

“The Distribution of His Majesty’s Maundy, by the Sub-Almoner in the Chapel Royal at Whitehall.” Engraving by James Basire after Samuel Hieronymus Grimm, 1777, 46.5 × 62 cm. The Print Room, May cat. 15, #6, trimmed within platemark, 2 repairs, traces of old fold, illus. (£120). One of the larger, more important pls. engraved by Blake’s master (with the assistance of others in his shop?) during Blake’s term of apprenticeship.

E. Swedenborg, A Treatise Concerning Heaven and Hell, 2nd ed., 1784. Alex Fotheringham, Feb. cat. 22, #112, some ageing of paper, calf rebacked (£140). The ed. annotated by Blake.

J. Flaxman, letter to W. Hayley of 19 March 1802, with previously-unrecorded references to Blake. See under Flaxman, below.

J. Hassell, Memoirs of the Life of the Late George Morland, 1806. Sims Reed, April cat. of “Fine and Applied Arts,” #660, full morocco by Zaehnsdorf (£250). Grant & Shaw, Aug. cat. 28, #81, some foxing, contemporary half calf (£100). Early references to Blake’s two stipple prints after Morland, “The Idle Laundress” and “Industrious Cottager.”

W. Carey, Critical Description of the Procession of Chaucer’s Pilgrims Painted by Thomas Stothard, 1808. Marlborough Rare Books, Aug. cat. 163, #44, half roan rubbed (£150). With a brief mention of Blake’s designs for Blair’s The Grave (p. 10) and an advertisement (bound at the end) for Cromek’s 1808 ed. of the poem with the engravings after Blake.

R. P. Forster, A Collection of the Most Celebrated Voyages & Travels, 1816, with re-engravings of 2 designs originally engraved by Blake for Stedman’s Narrative (1796), inscribed in Forster “Execution of a Negro in Surinam” and “The Skinning of the Boa Snake” (pls. 2 and 14 in Stedman). John Windle, Dec. cat. 26, #205, 80 parts in 4 vols., some foxing, contemporary half calf worn ($550).

J. and A. Taylor, City Scenes. Marlborough Rare Books, May cat. 162, #209, 1823 ed., (original?) half roan over boards (£250). John Windle, Dec. cat. 26, #216, 1828 ed., new calf spine over old boards ($575). Contains Blake’s “Holy Thursday” from Songs of Innocence, illustrated with a pl. unrelated to Blake’s own design.

J. Montgomery, ed., The Chimney-Sweeper’s Friend, 1824. CL, 28 June, sale of the Marjorie Moon collection, #206, full calf, with Blake, Songs of Innocence and of Experience, Pickering ed., 1839, issue without “The Little Vagabond,” presentation inscription from W. M. Wilkinson to his sister Elizabeth, original cloth (£506 on an estimate of £800-1000). The Montgomery vol. contains Blake’s “The Chimney Sweeper” from Songs of Innocence.

11 Samuel Palmer, A Cornfield, Shoreham, at Twilight.   Pen and brush and brown ink, 14.5 × 16 cm. Possibly the work, or a study for the work, exhibited by Palmer at the Royal Academy in 1832 (no. 614) under the title A Harvest Scene. One of the very few Shoreham-period Palmers to come on the market in the last 20 years. Photo courtesy of Sotheby’s London.

T. Edwards, Catalogue. . .of Books. . .of Mr. Thomas Edwards, auction cat., Halifax, 1 May 1826 and following days. Quaritch, Oct. cat. 1219, #67, bound with the 16 May 1826 sale cat. of Edwards’s engravings, drawings, pictures, etc., and the broadside announcing Edwards’s withdrawal of the books from auction, modern half calf (£350). Lot 1076 in the book auction is Blake’s Night Thoughts water colors. See also the 1828 Edwards auction cat., below.

W. Hazlitt, The Plain Speaker, 1826. Jarndyce, July cat. 106, #839, 2 vols., contemporary half calf (£150). Blake is included in a list of artists “who seem to relieve the literalness of their professional studies by voluntary excursions into the regions of the preternatural. . .!” (1: 223-24).

Annual Register, 1827. Ian Harkness, April Los Angeles Book Fair, later quarter calf ($35). Contains an obituary notice on Blake, copied without due credit and with substantial omissions from the Gentleman’s Magazine, 1827.

G. Richmond, letter of 15 Aug. 1827 to S. Palmer describing Blake’s death. Given to the Huntington Library in Aug. by Vincent Newton in memory of Joseph Holland.

T. Edwards, Catalogue of. . .Books. . .the Property of the late Thomas Edwards, auction cat., London, 15 May 1828 and 8 following days. Quaritch, Oct. cat. 1219, #68, modern boards (£225). Lot 940 is Songs of Innocence and of Experience copy U, and lot 1130 is Blake’s Night Thoughts water colors. See also the 1826 Edwards auction cat., above.

J. T. Smith, Nollekens and His Times, 1828. John Windle, Dec. cat. 210, 2 vols., full calf ($450). With a biography of Blake, 2: 454-88.

W. Lowndes, Bibliographer’s Manual of English Literature, 1834. Claude Cox, March cat. 107, #198, 4 vols., 1 of 50 large-paper copies, water staining in margins, cloth-backed boards worn, prospectus bound in (£220). In this 1st ed. of Lowndes, the Blake entry lists only Silver Drops (1: 205), a work no longer attributed to Blake as either the author or the engraver of the 4 pls. In the entry for Robert Blair (1: 204-05), Blake is properly credited as the designer of the illustrations in the 1808 ed. of The Grave. Blake is also named as the illustrator of the 1797 ed. of Young’s Night Thoughts; “some copies have coloured plates” (entry for Edward Young, 4: 1999).

W. Blake, Songs of Innocence and of Experience, pub. Pickering, 1839. SL, 22 March, #91, original cloth, spine faded, issue not noted (£414); same copy?, Pickering & Chatto, May cat. 730, #12, issue without “The Little Vagabond” ($1500). John Windle, July “Summer” cat., #30, issue without “The Little Vagabond,” lacking the final 2 leaves (apparently never present in this copy), original cloth, backstrip lacking ($600); same copy, Dec. cat. 26, #202 ($400). Lame Duck Books, Sept. cat. 21, #121, issue without “The Little Vagabond,” apparently bound in the original cloth ($3500). The first typographic printing of the Songs. See also Montgomery, above.

J. Jackson, A Treatise on Wood Engraving, 1839. Thomas Thorp, May cat. 491, #121, some foxing, contemporary half morocco rebacked (£120). Contains one of the earliest attempts to describe Blake’s relief etching and printing procedures.

A. Raimbach, Memoirs, 1843. Questor Rare Books, April cat. 15, #332, recent cloth-backed boards (£125). Contains a passing reference to Blake.

A. Gilchrist, Life of Blake, 1863, annotated copies only. Korn & Towns, Feb. San Francisco Book Fair, 2 vols., original cloth, with the bookplate of Frederick Locker in each vol., 3 inserted letters from Anne Gilchrist seeking information for the 2nd (1880) ed. of the biography, 1 inserted letter from William Bell Scott on the same subject, and Francis Turner Palgrave’s unsigned 27 pp. review of the 1863 ed. from The Quarterly Review ($800 to John Windle for R. Essick). Locker has written in pencil, just left of the entry for the Linnell set of the Job water colors in W. M. Rossetti’s catalogue printed in Gilchrist’s vol. 2, “? This is mine FL” (2:214). Two vertical pencil lines suggest that Locker is referring only to Satan Pouring Disease on Job (Butlin #551.6, entitled Satan Smiting Job with Boils). A pencil inscription on the verso of the front free flyleaf of vol. 2, also in Locker’s hand, reads as follows: “See P. 214 I exchanged it for 3 Books with Sir C[harles Wentworth] Dilke.” This could not be correct since the Linnell set was not sold by the Linnell family until 1918. Locker must be referring to the tempera of this subject, recorded by Butlin #807 as having been in both the Locker and Dilke collections.

The Illustrated Book of Songs for Children, London, Edinburgh, and New York, T. Nelson and Sons, preface dated Aug. 1863. Justin Schiller, Feb. gift to R. Essick, publisher’s cloth. See illus. 7.

Blake, Poetical Sketches, Pickering ed., 1868. Adam Mills, March cat. 32, #33, original cloth, with Pickering’s rare pamphlet of Sept. 1874, “William Blake and His Editors,” inserted (£250). Stuart Bennett, Sept. cat. 3, #10, half-title inscribed “To Miss Sinclair, with many sympathies & good wishes. T[homas]. Carlyle. Chelsea, 1 decr 1868,” original cloth ($600).

Blake, The Marriage of Heaven and Hell, J. C. Hotten facsimile, 1868. John Windle, Dec. cat. 26, #45, some foxing as usual, original quarter roan, from the Joseph Holland collection ($600).

W. B. Scott, Blake: Etchings from his Works, 1878. CL, 6 Nov., #107, 10 pls., apparently unbound, with Scott’s etched portrait of Blake (st. not recorded), all from Scott’s estate, Penkill Castle, Ayrshire, 1 pl. illus. (£460).

W. B. Scott, etched portrait of Blake, 1881. John Windle, Dec. cat. 26, #10, image 21.2 × 16.1 cm., 1 of 75 impressions on laid India, with an impression from the same pl. cut down to an image of 18.9 × 13.3 cm., 1 of 2 impressions of 1895 according to a pencil inscription on the mount, with a letter of 5 Oct. 1978 from Geoffrey Keynes to the dealer Jake Zeitlin giving the same information on states and impressions, larger pl. illus. ($1250; acquired by R. Essick). The trimmed pl., slightly worn, was printed as the frontispiece to vol. 1 of W. Robertson Nicoll and Thomas J. Wise, eds., Literary Anecdotes of the Nineteenth Century, 2 vols. (London: Hodder & Stoughton, 1895).

W. Muir facsimiles of Blake’s illuminated books. Bromer Booksellers, Feb. cat. 87, #36, America, 1887, colored issue, Muir’s copy number not recorded, original wrappers ($1250); #37, Europe, 1887, colored issue, Muir’s copy number not recorded, original wrappers ($1250). Black Sun Books, March private offer, Songs of Innocence, 1927, Muir’s copy number not given ($2500). Adam Mills, June “Blake” cat., #2, The Book of Thel executed completely by hand on thick card, 20.5 × 13.7 cm., with 2 versions of the title page, “Thel’s Motto” inscribed “N^o 1,” with the only recorded copies of John Pearson’s early prospectuses for Muir’s facsimiles bound-in, later full morocco (£1500, acquired by R. Essick); #3, Visions of the Daughters of Albion, 1884, no copy number by Muir, on Hodgkinsons wove paper, original wrappers extensively repaired, later portfolio (£600); #4, The Book of Thel, 1884, copy no. 1, no watermarks, original wrappers inscribed “With J. Pearson’s Compliments” (£600); same copy and price, Oct. cat. 34, #25; #5, Songs of Experience, 1885, Muir’s copy no. 45, on Whatman 1883 and 1884 paper, original wrappers, later portfolio (£750); same copy and price, Oct. cat. 34, #26; #6, Europe, 1887, Muir’s copy no. 5, parchment over paper boards (£650, acquired by D. W. Dörrbecker); #7, For the Sexes: The Gates of Paradise, 1888, 6 pls. only, no copy number by Muir, no watermarks, modern marbled boards (£250); #8, Songs of Innocence and Songs of Experience, 1927, 2 vols., no copy number by Muir, in part on Whatman 1923 paper, inscribed on the front wrapper “For Review. Wm Muir,” original wrappers in later slip-case (£1200). John Windle, Dec. cat. 26, #12, America, 1887, no copy number by Muir, full calf rubbed, original wrapper bound in, from

12 Samuel Palmer, Illustration to Milton’s “Lycidas.”   Water color and body color, 39.4 × 58.4 cm., indistinctly signed, datable to 1873 when exhibited at the Old Water-Colour Society. A label attached to the backing mat quotes the lines illustrated: “No: 1/ Lycidas/ ‘Together both, ere the high lawns appeared/ Under the opening eyelids of the morn,/ We drove afield, and both together heard,/What time the grey fly winds her sultry horn.’/ Samuel Palmer./ Furze Hill, Red Hill.” Photo courtesy of Christie’s London.

C. Ricketts, drawing for the frontispiece to the Vale Press ed. of The Book of Thel, 1897. Pen and ink heightened with white, 8.6 × 8.6 cm. Ian Hodgkins, June cat. 80, #114, illus. (£1600; acquired July by Jerome J. McGann).

Letter from The Rosenbach Company (signed by Percy E. Lawler) to Joseph Holland, 29 July 1942. Given Nov. by J. Windle to R. Essick. The 2nd and final paragraph reads as follows: “The Blake item in which you were interested is an impression from the original plate 15 [18 in Bentley], the last page of Europe. Its price is $58.50.” This is very probably the posthumous impression of pl. 18 in reddish brown ink acquired from Rosenbach in 1947 by the Museum of Art, Rhode Island School of Design, Providence, Rhode Island.

Letter from CHarles Sessler Books (signed by Leonard Sessler) to Joseph Holland, 21 Aug. 1942. Given Nov. by J. Windle to R. Essick. The 2nd of 4 paragraphs reads as follows: “I appreciate your feeling in regards to the CANTERBURY PILGRIMS and in answer to your inquiry the two artists who printed the proofs from the original plate were James McBey and Ernest Roth.” This statement confirms the identity of the printers first reported in Geoffrey Keynes, Engravings by William Blake: The Separate Plates (Dublin: Emery Walker, 1956) 48.

Jerusalem, Trianon Press facsimile (almost certainly of copy E, published in 1951). BBA, 23 Feb., #217, “facsimile review copy, coloured plates, letter from the Secretary of the William Blake Trust explaining to the Review Department of The Observer newspaper that it would be too costly to give away full copies for review, original wrappers, cloth box, n.d.” (Breckenridge, £74). The letter may explain why one sometimes encounters copies of the Trianon Press facsimile of Jerusalem copy E consisting only of a selection of plates bound in wrappers.

Blake’s Circle and Followers

Works are listed under artists’ names in the following order: paintings and drawings sold in groups, single paintings and drawings, letters and manuscripts, separate plates, books by (or with plates by or after) the artist.

PALMER, SAMUEL

The Bay of Naples. Water color, 42 × 58.2 cm., datable to 1838. Agnew’s, cat. of 122nd annual exhibition of English water colors and drawings, Feb.-March, #38, illus. color (price on application).

A Cornfield, Shoreham, at Twilight. Pen and brush and brown begin page 125 | ↑ back to top ink, 14.5 × 16 cm. SL, 12 April, #97, illus. color (£161,000 on an estimate of £50,000-80,000 to Agnew’s, apparently for a private client). See illus. 11.

Eventide. Water color and body color, 19.5 × 42.5 cm., signed and dated 1841. Christopher Wood Gallery, 6-24 June exhibition of water colors (price on application). Previously sold SL, 14 July 1994, #150, illus. color (£29,900).

Illustration to Milton’s “Lycidas.” Water color and body color, 39.4 × 58.4 cm., signed indistinctly, datable to 1873. CL, 11 July, #50, illus. color (£89,500). See illus. 12.

Landscape with Setting Sun, Devon. Water color, 18.5 × 27 cm., datable to the late 1830s, from the collection of a descendant of John Linnell. SL, 12 April, #119, illus. color (£6900).

A Tree Line. Brown washes, 9 × 19 cm., datable to 1861. SL, 9 Nov., #151, illus. (£862).

Autograph letter to Thomas Oldham Barlow, Sept. 1873. BBA, 6 April, #232A (Browning, £253).

“The Bellman,” etching. CL, 29 June, #421, 5th st., signed in pencil, from the collection of Sir Geoffrey Keynes, illus. (£4600). Garton & Co., Sept. cat. 62, #14, 6th st., illus. (£4250).

“Christmas or Folding the Last Sheep,” etching. CL, 29 June, #414, 3rd st., signed in pencil, repaired tear (£690). Garton & Co., Sept. cat. 62, #11, 4th st., illus. (£850).

“The Early Ploughman,” etching. CL, 29 June, #419, 4th st. (not sold; estimate £700-1000); same impression, CL, 28 Nov., #632 (not sold; estimate £500-800).

“The Herdsman’s Cottage,” etching. The Antique & Book Collector, July cat., #46, 2nd st. (£475). Garton & Co., Sept. cat. 62, #10, 2nd st. (£525).

“The Lonely Tower,” etching. CL, 29 June, #423, 4th st., signed in pencil, from the collection of Sir Geoffrey Keynes, illus. (£4370). The Antique & Book Collector, July cat., #50, final st., 1950s printing (£475).

“Moeris and Galatea,” etching. The Antique & Book Collector, July cat., #52, 2nd st. (£195). Garton & Co., Sept. cat. 62, #15, 4th st. printed by F. L. Griggs in 1924, illus. (£1250).

“The Morning of Life,” etching. CL, 29 June, #420, 7th st., minor defects in margins (not sold; estimate £500-800); same impression, CL, 28 Nov., #635 (£437).

“Opening the Fold,” etching. CL, 29 June, #422, with “The Homeward Star,” “The Cypress Grove,” “The Sepulchre,” and “Moeris and Galatea,” various states (not sold; estimate £400-600). The Antique & Book Collector, July cat., #51, 8th st. (£500). Garton & Co., Sept. cat. 62, #13, 6th st., illus. (£2500).

“The Rising Moon,” etching. CL, June 29, #417, 5th st., signed in pencil and inscribed “Trial proof before plate was cut,” from

13 George Romney, Portrait of William Hayley.   Oil on canvas, 74 × 63.5 cm., datable to 1777. The mezzotint by John Jacobé (1779) of this portrait is reproduced in Morchard Bishop, Blake’s Hayley (London: Gollancz, 1951) facing 160. The original painting has been reproduced only a few times before the color illustration in Sotheby’s sale catalogue of 8 Nov. 1995. The black and white illustration in Arthur B. Chamberlain, George Romney (London: Methuen, 1910) facing 15, was evidently made before the painting was cleaned and remounted on a new stretcher. Photo courtesy of Sotheby’s London.

the collection of Sir Geoffrey Keynes, illus. (not sold; estimate £2000-3000); same impression, CL, 28 Nov., #633, illus. (not sold; estimate £1500-2000). The Antique & Book Collector, July cat., #48, 7th st. (£950).

“The Skylark,” etching. CL, 29 June, #413, 5th st., signed in pencil, illus. (£2070). The Antique & Book Collector, July cat., #45, 7th st. (£850). Garton & Co., Sept. cat. 62, #9, 7th st., illus. (£850).

“The Sleeping Shepherd,” etching. CL, 29 June, #416, 4th st., from the collection of Sir Geoffrey Keynes (£920). The Antique & Book Collector, July cat., #47, 4th st. (£950). Garton & Co., Sept. cat. 62, #12, 4th st. (£1500).

“The Vine or Plumpy Bacchus,” etching. CL, 29 June, #415, 3rd st., signed in pencil and inscribed “Trial Proof,” from the collection of Sir Geoffrey Keynes (not sold; estimate £800-1200); same impression, CL, 28 Nov., #631 (£632).

“The Weary Ploughman,” etching. CL, 29 June, #418, 7th st., signed in pencil, illus. (not sold; estimate £2000-3000); same impression, CL, 28 Nov., #634, illus. (not sold; estimate £1500-2000). The Antique & Book Collector, July cat., #49, 8th st. (£750).

begin page 126 | ↑ back to top

14 Welby Sherman, Christ in the Wilderness.   Pencil and gray wash, 10.9 × 6.4 cm., datable to c. 1828 when Sherman was working with Samuel Palmer and George Richmond. Signed in cartouche, bottom center, “W S F” (Welby Sherman fecit) or perhaps “W S P” (Welby Sherman pinxit). Essick collection. Formerly pasted into a notebook in which “W Sherman” was inscribed (by Richmond?) on the backing leaf just beneath the drawing. The notebook passed by inheritance from Richmond to his great granddaughter, Miriam Hartley, who removed the drawing in the 1970s and sold it to a private British collector. Another drawing attributed to Sherman was sold in London by Sotheby’s in 1967, but I have not been able to trace its present ownership or find any further drawings or paintings by Sherman. Although in many academic respects awkward, the design and its miniaturistic detail captures much of the spirit of the youthful “Ancients” when most under the spell of Blake and their own “visionary” imaginations. The cartouche and signature (particularly if the last letter is “F”) suggest that the drawing was executed as a preliminary for an engraving. For a color illus. and insightful comments, see Raymond Lister, British Romantic Painting (Cambridge: Cambridge UP, 1989) no. 59.

“The Willow,” etching. CL, 29 June, #412, 2nd st., with “The Herdsman’s Cottage,” 2nd st., from the collection of Sir Geoffrey Keynes (not sold; estimate £300-400); same 2 impressions, CL, 28 Nov., #630 (£184). The Antique & Book Collector, July cat., #44, 3rd st., 1926 printing (£375). Garton & Co., Sept. cat. 62, #8, 2nd st., illus. (£275).

Dickens, Pictures from Italy, 1846. George Bayntun, May cat., #89, original cloth (£165). Robert Allen Books, May private offer, original cloth rehinged, new endpapers ($225). CNY, 15 Dec., #12, original cloth, presentation inscription from Dickens to Lady Blessington dated 19 May 1846 ($34,500!).

Hamerton, Etching & Etchers. BBA, 9 Feb., #303, 1880 ed. with Palmer’s “Herdsman’s Cottage,” lacking the 4 Rembrandt pls., original morocco-backed cloth worn (D. Moore, £172). W. & V. Dailey, Feb. private offer, 1868 ed. with Palmer’s “Early Ploughman,” publisher’s quarter calf over gilt boards ($1500). A. H. Palmer, ed., Life and Letters of S. Palmer, 1892. BBA, 5 Oct., #287, with Alexander, Catalogue of the Etchings of Palmer (1937), Lister, Palmer and His Etchings (1969), and another (unnamed) vol. on Palmer (R. Jones, £264 on an estimate of £60-80). The low estimate may have been caused by the auctioneer’s failure to realize that the Life and Letters contains an impression of Palmer’s etching, “The Willow.”

A. H. Palmer, S. Palmer: A Memoir, 1882. William Reese, April cat. 145, #711, small-paper issue, F. G. Stephens’s copy with a few of his annotations, original quarter leather ($500; purchased by the dealer John Windle). Reese’s cat. entry failed to point out that the volume includes (bound-in at p. 32) an important autograph letter from A. H. Palmer to Stephens, dated 21 March 1883 and describing work on the Palmer pls. for Virgil’s Eclogues, 1883.

Virgil, Eclogues, 1883. Phillip Pirages, April cat. 33, #411, small paper, original cloth, hinges cracked, cover illus. ($1350). BBA, 27 April, #398, large paper, original parchment slightly dust soiled (Franklin, £460 on an estimate of £100-200). Wilsey Rare Books, Oct. Santa Monica Book Fair, large paper, original parchment, 1 of 10 copies for presentation, letter laid in of 30 Aug. 1927 from A. H. Palmer to Martin Hardie ($3000). CL, begin page 127 | ↑ back to top

15 Thomas Stothard, illustration engraved on wood by Luke Clennelland first published in Samuel Rogers, Poems (London: Cadell and Davies, 1816) 177.   The image at the top (3.9 × 5.3 cm.) is the published version; the pre-publication proof (3.9 × 6 cm.) below includes an additional figure, a column, and more vine leaves far right. These motifs were removed from the block before publication. The final leaf top right and half the next leaf to the left in the published version were cleverly formed from the right shoulder and face of the cancelled figure. Essick collection.

28 Nov., #636, the 5 pls. only, apparently removed from the book (£287).

Appendix: New Information on Blake’s Engravings

Listed below are substantive additions or corrections to Essick, The Separate Plates of William Blake: A Catalogue (1983), and Essick, William Blake’s Commercial Book Illustrations (1991). Abbreviations and citation styles follow the respective volumes.

The Separate Plates of William Blake: A Catalogue

“Chaucers Canterbury Pilgrims,” 4th st., pp. 68-70. Another impression of the rare 4th st., with the scratched inscriptions left and right of the title, is in the Memorial Art Gallery of the University of Rochester, Rochester, New York. According to Candace J. Adelson, Curator of European Art, the sheet of laid paper measures 35.6 × 95.9 cm. Formerly folded in half, the print also has several repaired tears. The scratched inscriptions are very light (hardly visible in a photograph). Given to the Gallery in 1983 by a local collector.

“Chaucers Canterbury Pilgrims,” pp. 70-71, impression 5GG. For the sale of this impression by John Windle to a private Chicago collector, see “Chaucers Canterbury Pilgrims” under Separate Plates, above.

“Chaucers Canterbury Pilgrims,” pp. 85-86. The astute print dealer N. W. Lott has found some internal evidence for determining the printing history of the 5th (final) st. In an impression presently (Feb. 1995) in his possession, there are several scratches and other defects that do not appear in impressions of earlier sts. and appear only as slight shadows, if at all, in what are almost certainly Colnaghi (beginning c. 1881) and Sessler (1941) impressions. The most evident of these flaws are a horizontal scratch through the head, eye and nose of the Cook; scratches or corrosion in a horizontal band on the right shoulder and just above the right breast of the Lady Abbess; a similar blemish on the rump of the Knight’s horse just left of his saddle; and a vertical scar on the head of the Knight’s horse extending from the top of his bridle to his mane. Lott’s impression is on heavy wove paper and is very probably earlier than impressions that show only minimal evidence of these defects. Perhaps Colnaghi repaired these accidental defects that occurred between the 4th st. impressions (probably lifetime) and 1881. Since only very slight indications of some of these flaws appear on impressions on thin laid paper with prominent chain lines, I can no longer claim that they may be among the earliest 5th st. impressions.

“George Cumberland’s Card,” p. 113, impression 1M. For the recent history of this impression, see under “Separate Plates,” above.

“Calisto,” pp. 142-43. For a newly-recorded impression, see under “Separate Plates,” above. The fact that the new impression in brown ink on laid paper is in the 2nd st. makes it probable that impression F (Keynes Collection, Fitzwilliam Museum), lacking the title and imprint but in a similar ink on laid paper, is also in the 2nd st.

“Fall of Rosamond,” p. 134, impression 1B. Acquired by the Connecticut print dealer N. W. Lott in Aug. 1995 and sold in the same month to R. Essick.

“The Right Honourable Earl Spencer,” pp. 181-82. According to Peter Ackroyd, Blake (London: Sinclair-Stevenson, 1995) 307, “The publisher [Robert] Bowyer . . . helped to arrange his [Blake’s] work on an engraving from Thomas Phillips’s portrait of Earl Spencer.” Ackroyd offers no source for this information or any further explanation. His comments may be based on nothing more than Bowyer’s letter of 20 June 1810 to Earl Spencer about Blake’s Chaucer engraving—see G. E. Bentley, Jr., Blake Records Supplement (Oxford: Clarendon P, 1988) 132-33.

“Wilson Lowry,” pp. 201-03. 3rd st. on laid India, with an impression between the 3rd and 4th st. also on laid India, acquired by N. W. Lott in Aug. 1995 and sold in the same month to R. Essick. For a description of the these impressions and the intermediate st., not listed in Separate Plates, see Essick, “A Supplement to The Separate Plates of William Blake: A Catalogue,” Blake 17 (1984): 143.

William Blake’s Commercial Book Illustrations

P. 23. For yet another issue of The Whole Genuine and Complete Works of Flavius Josephus, published by J. Cooke, see Josephus under “Letterpress Books with Engravings by and After Blake,” above. D. W. Dörrbecker suggests to me that the designer of pls. 1 and 3, signed by “C. M. Metz” as at least the delineator (“delin.”), may be Caroline M. Metz, not Conrad Martin Metz. The former was a painter, the latter principally an engraver.

P. 24, 2nd st. of Kimpton and Josephus, pl. 1. D. W. Dörrbecker has pointed out to me that the pl. is signed “Metz delin.,” not “Metz Delin.”

P. 48, Darwin, Botanic Garden, pl. 6 (“Tornado”). The proof listed in Raymond Lister’s collection, lacking finishing work in the image but with all letters, was acquired in Aug. by N. W. Lott.

P. 90, Hayley, Life of Cowper, pl. 6. Early in March 1802, Hayley sent John Flaxman a revised drawing for this plate. In his newly-recorded reply of 19 March 1802, Flaxman thanks Hayley and Blake for their suggestions and names a price of 45 guineas for the execution of the monument in marble. For a partial transcription of this letter, apparently including all references to Blake, see under Flaxman, above.