Manuscript transcription by Lord Phillimore, of a 'Poem written by the Right Hon. W. E. Gladstone MP Christmas 1869 for contribution to "The Coppice Courant" which had however expired in January 1867.' With typescript.

Author: 
[William Ewart Gladstone (1809-1898), Liberal prime minister; Walter George Frank Phillimore (1845-1929), Baron Phillimore, Judge, ecclesiastical lawyer and international jurist]
William Ewart Gladstone
Publication details: 
Transcription undated, on Phillimore's letterhead of The Coppice, Henley on Thames. Typescript undated.
£325.00
SKU: 10730

Phillimore's transcript: 12mo, 3 pp. On bifolium. Text clear and complete. Fair, on lightly-aged paper, with mark from rusted paperclip at head. Thirty-six line poem, in heroic couplets, with 'W E G. Christmas 1869' at end. Typescript (folio, 2 pp), with a couple of manuscript corrections. Fair, on aged paper. The poem begins 'Happy the gamester, on whose earliest throw, | Grim Fortune frowns, and cuts his treasure low; | But hapless he, whom luck shall onward lure, | She only means to make his ruin sure.' Phillimore's father, Sir Robert Joseph Phillimore, also a judge, was a Liberal MP and lifelong friend of Gladstone's. It does not appear that the verses have been printed elsewhere.