THE

De la Mare's definitive answer to the oft-asked question regarding the meaning of his best-known poem - and also one of the most celebrated English poems of the twentieth century - 'The Listeners'. 1p, 4to, in good condition, lightly aged, folded twice. After thanking her for her 'kind letter', he adds: 'I am afraid you may not find my answer to your question a very satisfactory one.

A highly interesting letter from a leading Victorian dramatic critic (Thomas describes himself in the letter as 'For five & twenty years [...] theatrical critic of the Daily news & the Graphic', who has 'served under at least thirteen editors') to a leading actor-manager (Hare was knighted in 1907), on the subject of alleged editorial pressure on Fleet Street's theatre critics. 4pp, 8vo. On four leaves. Aged and worn, but with text complete and clear.

Eleven volumes, 1890-1900, each of around 50pp, 16mo. Uniform (but for a few decorative features) in grey printed wraps. The sixth annual report (November 1891) has an attractive frontispiece illustration of 'Proposed New Buildings, when completed'; the seventh (December 1892) has two plates showing the interior of the mission building 'when used as church' and 'when used as hall'. The other volumes each have frontispiece maps of the environs of the 'Mission Hall' and 'Missioners' House'.

On one side of 9 x 14 cm leaf of cream paper. In good condition, lightly aged and worn. Reads: "'Sincerely Yours' | Very Lynn". A good, firm underlined signature, in a large sloping hand, with the words 'Sincerely Yours' in single quotation marks.

2pp, 12mo. Bifolium. In good condition, lightly aged. He sends her belated thanks for her 'kind compliance with Mrs. Caird's request'. His wife has been very ill since he received her letter, but he believes that 'the critical stage of the disease is fairly over; & besides her illness, the death of an old servant, has left me little time to attend to other engagements'. Mrs Caird is 'much gratified' that Marshall is 'to share in management of her stall'.

On one side of 8 x 13.5 cm leaf of cream paper. In good condition, lightly aged and worn, with slight creasing to one corner. A good, firm underlined signature. Reads: 'Good luck to Enid! | Max Wall | 1951'. On the reverse is the autograph of an unknown signatory: 'To Enid | [Sister? Lister?] [J?] Ferguson'.

The four items in good condition, lightly aged, with stubs from mounts still adhering. The first three are bifoliums, carrying seals in red wax (that to the third letter broken). The second letter is addressed to her at Grosvenor Square; the third and fourth to her at Upper Brook Street. ONE: No place or date. [London, on paper with watermark of 'J GREEN & SON | 1824'.] 1p, 12mo.

On one side of what is clearly a fly-leaf removed from a book. In fair condition, aged and worn, skilfully placed in a windowpane mount of cream paper, to which a white stub still adheres. Written in a small hand at the head of the recto: 'Guillaume Shenstone | du College de Pembroke | en Oxford. | 1734.'

On one side of 7 x 11 cm slip of paper, possibly cut down. In good condition, lightly aged, with stub from mount adhering. Reads: 'Have you any engagement on Tuesday 9th. (7/30) and will you come to a masculine dinner with | Yours always | W M Thackeray'. Addressed at bottom left to 'One Two Three Park Street Esqr.' The celebrated travel writer Richard Ford, best-known for his 'Handbook for Travellers in Spain' (1845), lived at 123 Park Street, Grosvenor Square, from 1849 to his death in 1858.

1p, 8vo. On bifolium addressed on verso of second leaf to 'Mr. Erskine'. In good condition, lightly aged. Autograph jeu d'esprit, signed at foot 'J. Jekyll. | June 30th. 1800'. A short poem reading: 'Tell Mrs. Crewe | I envy You. | But sit on Lu- | nacy. || Yet Mrs. Crewe | will think I'm stu | pid in my lu | -cid Intervals.' Jekyll's entry in the Oxford DNB concludes, perhaps unkindly: 'If he is remembered by later generations, it is chiefly as a wit. It has to be said, however, that his wit, which consisted in large measure of excruciating puns, has not lasted well.'

1p, 12mo. Folded twice. In good condition. Presumably in response to a request for an autograph, the central third of the page carries Patmore's signature ('Coventry Patmore.') beneath a four-line quotation from Patmore's best-remembered poem, 'The Angel in the House': 'Spirit of Knowledge, grant me this: | A simple heart and subtle wit | To praise the thing whose praise it is | That all which can be praised is it!'

On one side of a piece of laid paper, top half torn off and missing, leaving the conclusion of the letter. Roughly 11 x 17.5 cm. Thirteen full lines of text, with two partial lines along the tear at the top edge. A frail item, in fair condition, aged and worn. See Gifford's entry in the History of Parliament. The letter, apparently addressed to an individual at the Admiralty or the Treasury, concerns a part of the tortuous process of raising finances for the conversion of the Queen's House into the hospital.

1p., 12mo. In fair condition, aged and spotted. Reads: 'Dear Mrs. Epps, | I shall be very glad to see you and your party this afternoon; or, if I am not able to be with you, an assistant shall meet you in the hall at 3.'

Printed on one side of a 75 x 56 cm piece of thick wove paper. In fair condition, lightly aged and worn, with short closed tearing to edges and two light vertical fold lines. The lower part of the page carries the almanack, flanked on the right by a list of the 'University Officers', and on the left by the 'Heads of Colleges'. The upper part of the page carries a fine 31 x 44 cm aerial view, in colours, of 'THE UNIVERSITY PRESS | From a drawing by David Gentleman for its quincentenary year', A nice item, now uncommon.

The Campden Hill Club was founded in 1907, 'in affectionate memory of Byam Shaw, and as a tribute to his teaching', and comprised, according to the Studio magazine in 1922, 'mainly of past and present students of the Byam Shaw and Vicat Cole School of Art, with which it keeps closely and stimulatingly in touch'. The three items are in good condition, on lightly-aged paper, in worn bindings. ONE (Visitors Book, 1958-1976): 190pp., 4to. Ruled notebook bound in red cloth, with 'Visitors' stamped in gilt on the front cover.

The previous year Green had succeeded Prestwich in the Chair of Geology at Oxford. In the same year the second volume of Prestwich's 'Geology' was published for the University by the Clarendon Press, the first volume having appeared in 1886. 3pp., 12mo. Bifolium. In fair condition, lightly aged. The subject of the letter is 'the plates of “Geology”', with Prestwich writing that his 'only object is to make the book useful in as many ways as possible.

Long's obituary in the New York Times, 6 September 1998, describes her as 'war correspondent for The New York Herald Tribune and The New York Times who covered the London blitz and the Nuremburg trials' and 'one of only a few women who were correspondents in World War II'. She had joined the New York Herald Tribune's London bureau in 1941, and subsequently married Raymond Daniell, chief of the New York Times's London bureau, joining that newspaper as a reporter in February 1942.

2.5 x 11.5 cm slip of paper, laid down on part of leaf from album, with d'Albret's autograph dating ('i67i') on 1.5 x 6 cm slip laid down below it. In good condition, lightly aged. The valediction of a letter, written in an undisciplined hand.

Sequeira was born in Aldgate. In the years following his service in the London Regiment during the First World War, he acted in Shakespeare at the Old Vic, and he would continue as an actor into the age of film and television. In addition to acting Sequeira taught (including a youthful Peter Cushing) at Guildhall School of Music and Drama, painted, and in 1953 published a book on stage make-up. The present four items, all undated, are in good condition, lightly aged. ONE: Autograph duologue titled 'Seeing the Coronation'. 5pp., foolscap 8vo. With revised conclusion, 1p., 12mo.

1p., 12mo. In fair condition. He has 'from week to week been purposing a visit to you to express my gratitude & sincere thanks for your kindness to me & the cure you accomplished'. He can only write his thanks, having been overwhelmed by 'the arrears of work that followed my illness', and leaving for Paris the following day.

2pp., 12mo. Bifolium. In good condition, lightly aged. Addressed to 'My dear Warden', and sending his 'kind regards to Mrs Hyslop & yourself', and so addressed to Rev. Archibald Richard Frith Hyslop (1866-1926), Warden of Trinity College, Glenalmond. He has received Hyslop's letter on his 'return from a Highland visit'. He gives his reasons for having to leave early on the following Monday and Tuesday (a journey to Perth and another to Oban).

1p., 4to. Aged and creased, with closed tears and damage to extremities. He will be 'very glad if you will instruct Allen's to send me a copy of your book. I will review it, though I cannot promise to do it in any particular month for the "U.D.C".' The organisation will be glad to 'enclose a number of your circulars, if you will have them sent. Not more than a thousand.'

1p., 4to. In good condition, lightly aged. Addressed in type to 'My dear Shepard,' but with the last word corrected in autograph to 'Ernest'. He has now 'made sufficient progress with Monmouthshire' to be able to give Shephard 'a line': 'The first two verses bear upon the Wye valley and the Usk valley, of which Tintern is the best symbol.

For information on Graves see his generous obituary in The Times, 18 April 1944. Both items in fair condition, lightly aged and worn, with minor staining from paperclip to first leaf of letter. The work was not published, and although Graves states in Item One that the greater part of the text is 'in the hands of my typist', there is no record of its survival, or of the thousand related documents he states were sent to him by M. H. Spielmann. ONE: ALS from 'C L. G.' to 'Dear Evoe'. 4pp., landscape 8vo.

1p., 8vo. In fair condition, lightly aged, with small pin hole to corner. The letter relates to celebrations of the anniversary of the Glorious First of June at Portsmouth (involving HMS Victory). He begins by expressing the hope that Wyllie has 'asked Lord Howe for the Function on June 1st? […] If not I have asked the Com[mande]r. in Chief to peform the Function, which he is agreeable to do.' It is 'desirable to know', as 'time is short', and 'The C in C wishes to ask him to lunch.

1p., 12mo. In envelope addressed to Giles at Moulsecoombe, Brighton. In good condition, lightly aged. He has looked for Giles's letter 'but cannot – yet – find it. Sorry. I vaguely remember it.' He will find Giles '2 tickets for a Dress Rehearsal if you will let me know which one.' Options of six operas, on six different days are listed, including Figaro and Giovanni.

On 5 x 10 cm slip of paper. In good condition, lightly aged. Reads: 'Yours faithfully | George du Maurier'. The first line lightly inked, the signature itself bold and strong. Nothing else on the card, except for the number '92' in a contemporary hand at top left above the signature.

2pp., foolscap 8vo. In fair condition, lightly aged. Addressed to 'Dear Mr. Wyllie'. Writing following a visit to the School by Wyllie (who from the context appears to have been doing war work to assist Otter-Barry), Otter-Barry begins by stating that he will be sending him a sketch, adding: 'I was sorry to see so little of you on the day you came over, but I was pretty well occupied & taxed with all these infernal staff people about.

An attractive Chiswick Press item (on the firm's own paper), possibly printed for Beatty himself. No other copy traced, either on OCLC WorldCat or on COPAC. 3pp., 12mo. Printer's slug at foot of otherwise-blank reverse of second leaf. On laid paper with 'Chiswick Press' watermark. Aged and worn, with pin-hole through top inner corner of both leaves, and light staining at foot of first page. Reprinting a speech thanking the US Atlantic Fleet 'again, again, and again for the great part the Sixth Battle Squadron has played in bringing about the greatest naval victory in history'.

1p., 4to. In good condition, lightly aged, with punch holes at margin. MacEntee begins his letter to Hickey: 'In the tribute which “The Statist” pays to the late Hilaire Belloc a reference is made to his essay on usury. I read this some time ago but cannot recall the title of the volume in which it appeared. I should be grateful, indeed, if you would be kind enough to make good the lacuna by supplying the missing title.' He congratulates Hickey 'on the article itself'.