Manuscripts
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# 45908
MACPHERSON GRANT, James (1811-1847)
Letter from an aristocratic Scottish squatter to his father, written on “Bendinine”, near Yass, New South Wales, December 1843.
Manuscript in ink, 2 pp, quarto (lacking the first sheet), signed at the foot ‘Your affectionate son, J. Macpherson Grant’; outer wrapper addressed to Sir George Macpherson Grant, Baronet, Edinburgh (but redirected to Ballindalloch), with framed ‘YASS / POST PAID’ in red, and oval ‘PAID SHIP LETTER / SYDNEY’ dated ‘DE 23 1843’ in red; …
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![Letitia Elizabeth Landon, poet and novelist: autograph note, signed, to Miss Dutton, who is known to have painted a portrait miniature of the writer. London, [1837?].](https://douglasstewart.com.au/app/uploads/2025/01/2025_DSFB_0366-300x300.jpg)
# 46172
LANDON, Letitia Elizabeth (1802-1838)
Letitia Elizabeth Landon, poet and novelist: autograph note, signed, to Miss Dutton, who is known to have painted a portrait miniature of the writer. London, [1837?].
Manuscript in ink on white notepaper, 105 x 115 mm; written entirely in the hand of Letitia Elizabeth Landon and signed by her at the foot ‘Yours in great haste but most truly, L. E. Landon’, the note is addressed to ‘My dear Miss Dutton’, and is simply headed ‘Friday’, without any further date; laid down on …
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# 46223
MANION, Margaret; VINES, Vera F.
Medieval and Renaissance Illuminated Manuscripts in Australian Collections (signed copy)
Melbourne : Thames and Hudson, 1984. Quarto, boards in dustjacket, pp. 240; addendum, a fine copy, signed by Margaret Manion on the endpaper.
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# 45912
MUELLER, Ferdinand von, Baron (1825-1896)
Baron Ferdinand von Mueller, botanist : autograph letter, signed, to a lady plant collector, re. an intriguing specimen she has sent him. Melbourne, October 1889.
Manuscript in ink, [3] pp., octavo (200 x 125 mm); dated 7 October 1889; although von Mueller addresses his correspondent only as ‘dear Madam’, she is Melbourne philanthropist Jane Emma Murphy (see note on provenance below); von Mueller discusses a plant specimen Murphy has sent him (almost certainly from the Mornington area, where she resided), …
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# 44067
[COLONY OF VICTORIA]
Death warrants for Samuel Gibbs, an African-American from Philadelphia, and George Thompson, of African heritage from the West Indies, both found guilty of murder in Ballarat on the Victorian goldfields. Melbourne, November 1858.
I. Death warrant for Samuel Gibbs. Pro-forma document printed on laid paper, 420 x 320 mm, with manuscript entry in a secretarial hand, dated 2 November 1858; authorised by His Excellency Sir Henry Barkly, Captain-General and Governor-in-Chief of the Colony of Victoria, addressed to the Sheriff of the Colony of Victoria: ‘Whereas at the Circuit …
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# 43243
BALCOMBE, Emma Juana (1823-1907)
Commonplace album of Emma Juana Balcombe (Reid), of “The Briars”, Mornington, Victoria. 1860s-80s.
Quarto (290 x 240 mm), lacking the upper board, but retaining the original elaborately tooled leather lower board and backstrip; approximately [70] leaves of paper in a variety of colours, containing more than 30 original pencil sketches and watercolour drawings by amateur artist Emma Juana Balcombe (Mrs Alexander Beatson Balcombe), including studies of native flowers, …
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# 29401
BOUGAINVILLE, Hyacinthe Yves Philippe Potentien, Baron de (1781-1846)
Hyacinthe de Bougainville : autograph letter, signed, written from the harbour of Macao in 1825 during his circumnavigation in the “Thétis”.
Manuscript in brown ink, folio, 1 page; headed ‘Rade de Macao, ce 1er Janvier 1825’, the letter is to an unnamed recipient and concerns the Lazarist missionary, Lamiot; old vertical and horizontal folds (minor tears at the ends), roughened at top and bottom edges, else clean and complete, with red wax seals preserved. Rare, unpublished …
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![[MELBOURNE] Thomas N. Fitzgerald, surgeon : autograph private note, signed, on his "Rostella" letterhead. Melbourne, October 1903.](https://douglasstewart.com.au/app/uploads/2024/12/2024_DSFB_6668-300x300.jpg)
# 45860
FITZGERALD, Thomas Naghten, Sir (1838-1908)
[MELBOURNE] Thomas N. Fitzgerald, surgeon : autograph private note, signed, on his “Rostella” letterhead. Melbourne, October 1903.
Manuscript in ink, 1 page, octavo (200 x 125 mm), on FitzGerald’s personal stationery with embossed letterhead of a racehorse and jockey and the name of his residence, Rostella; dated ‘Saturday Oct 12 03’, the note is addressed ‘My dear Mrs McWilliams’ and is signed in full at the foot ‘T. N. FitzGerald’, who writes: …
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# 45859
BLACKIE, John Stuart (1809-1895)
John Stuart Blackie, classical scholar : autograph envelope with inscription in New Testament Greek. Edinburgh, June 1882.
Mailing envelope, 95 x 120 mm, front addressed in ink in the hand of John Stuart Blackie to ‘J. Christie Esq., 14 Florence Place, Stanley Street, Glasgow’, with accompanying inscription in Greek at lower left ἀληθεύω εν ἀγάπη (=”I speak the truth in love”) – an allusion to Ephesians 4:15 – and endorsed twice in pencil in …
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# 44771
LANMAN, Charles Rockwell (1850-1941); MÜLLER, Friedrich Max (1823-1900)
Charles Rockwell Lanman, American Sanskritist, to Professor Max Müller, German Orientalist: a handwritten postcard, sent from Harvard to Oxford in 1896.
United States of America two cents postcard, 90 x 140 mm, recto addressed Professor Fr. Max Müller, K.M., etc. etc., University of Oxford, England, with an Oxford arrival postmark of July 4 1896, and re-directed address of Spitalhaugh, West Linton, S. B. [i.e. Scottish Borders]; verso imprinted ‘C. R. Lanman, 9 Farrar Street, Cambridge, Mass. / Harvard …
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# 45671
EMPRESS SHOTOKU-TENNO (718 - 770 CE)
Hyakumantō Dhāraṇī (百万塔陀羅尼) : an example of the earliest reliably datable printed text
Japan : Nara period [764 – 770 CE]. Three-tier turned wooden pagoda made of hinoki (Japanese Cypress), with original white gesso wash, separate turned katsura wood finial (small edge chips to the rings), overall height 220 mm; the cavity of the pagoda containing the original printed dhāraṇī (55 x 458 mm) with 31 lines of …
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# 45151
FORSYTH, John Walter [INGLETON, Geoffrey C., copyist & editor]
The discovery of the mainland of New Guinea : Álvaro de Saavedra Cerón or Íñigo Ortiz de Retes?
/ by J. W. Forsyth. (Copy by G. C. I.). Manuscript in fountain pen, 67 pp., foolscap folio, written recto only on faint-ruled paper; with a page of prefatory notes by Geoffrey C. Ingleton, headed ‘Forsyth’s Paper’; complete and very well preserved; housed a custom clamshell box. ‘John Forsyth, a solicitor by profession, was an …
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# 44894
TASMAN, Abel Janszoon (1603 - 1659)
Abel Janszoon Tasman’s Journal of his discovery of Van Diemen’s Land and New Zealand in 1642.
With documents relating to his exploration of Australia in 1644 being photo-lithographic facsimiles of the original manuscript in the colonial archives at The Hague with an English translation and facsimiles of original maps to to which are added life and labours of Abel Janszoon Tasman by J. E. Heeres, Ll. D. Professor at the Dutch …
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![[MANUSCRIPT] A Journal or Narrative of the Proceedings betweene the Commissioners appointed by His Majestie, and the Commissioners Deputed by the States Generall, pursuant to the Treaty of Peace made at Westminster 9/19 Ffebruary 1673/4 Concerning a Treaty Marine to be observed throughout all the World. And also an Article particularly relateing to the English and Dutch East India Companyes Concluded in the yeare 1674.](https://dsfb-wp.s3.ap-southeast-1.amazonaws.com/app/uploads/2017/05/09135912/2017_DSFB_1491-300x300.jpg)
# 38366
[MANUSCRIPT] A Journal or Narrative of the Proceedings betweene the Commissioners appointed by His Majestie, and the Commissioners Deputed by the States Generall, pursuant to the Treaty of Peace made at Westminster 9/19 Ffebruary 1673/4 Concerning a Treaty Marine to be observed throughout all the World. And also an Article particularly relateing to the English and Dutch East India Companyes Concluded in the yeare 1674.
[London, 1674-75]. Folio (300 x 200 mm), old mottled calf gilt, spine with raised bands, gilt ornament, and contrasting title labels lettered in gilt; all edges gilt; manuscript written in English, Latin, Dutch and French in several contemporary secretarial hands; ff 269; clean and fresh throughout. An important contemporary manuscript record of the Mixed Commission established to draw up …
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# 43114
[ORSMOND, John Muggridge, 1788-1856]
Autograph letter in the Tahitian language, written by a chief of Bora Bora to the LMS missionary, Rev. John Muggridge Orsmond. Bora Bora, 1822.
Manuscript in brown ink on laid paper, 3 pp. on quarto bifolium, 175 x 150 mm; letter in the Tahitian language addressed to missionary Rev. John Orsmond at Tahiti, written entirely in the hand of an unidentified chief of Bora Bora, signed ‘Porapora’ at the foot; undated, but probably 1822 (see below); traces of original …
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![[CARTOGRAPHY] John Coles, Royal Geographical Society map curator : signed letter to A. C. Macdonald of the Geographical Society of Australasia, re. the gift of a large map of New South Wales. April, 1885.](https://douglasstewart.com.au/app/uploads/2024/08/2024_DSFB_4730-300x300.jpg)
# 44840
COLES, John (1832-1910)
[CARTOGRAPHY] John Coles, Royal Geographical Society map curator : signed letter to A. C. Macdonald of the Geographical Society of Australasia, re. the gift of a large map of New South Wales. April, 1885.
Manuscript in ink, 1 page, small quarto (230 x 180 mm), on the letterhead of the RGS, London; dated 11 April 1885, the letter is addressed to ‘A. C. Macdonald Esq., Melbourne’; written in a secretarial hand, but with the autograph signature at the foot of ‘John Coles, Map Curator, RGS’; some off-setting and light …