Available Copies from Independent Booksellers
Price: US$180.09 + shipping
Condition: Very Good
Description: First U.s. Edition. Hardback. Large 8vo. pp vii, 278. Original publisher's orange cloth, lettered gilt on spine and on front cover. Signed presentation from the author on the first blank page, 'The Countess of Minto, with the respect of the author, Oliver Wendell Holmes.' Slight mottling and very slight rubbing, otherwise clean, very good+.
Seller: Burwood Books, Wickham Market, United Kingdom
Holmes, Oliver Wendell. John Lothrop Motley. A Memoir. Boston: Houghton, Osgood and Company, 1879.
Price: US$750.00 + shipping
Condition: Near Fine
Description: Octavo, brown cloth lettered in gilt; top edge gilt; corners rubbed, with; slight discoloration to bottom right covers. First edition, "large-paper" issue of 516 copies, with each page enclosed in a frame of printer's rules. Although the title page bears the date 1879, the volume actually appeared in December 1878. BAL 8933; Tilton pp. 172, 173. A presentation copy, inscribed: "Hon. John Jay, with the respects of Oliver Wendell Holmes, Dec. 25th 1878," on the front free endpaper ---- John Jay, grandson of the Supreme Court Chief Justice, worked tirelessly on behalf of the abolitionist movement, notably acting as counsel for black fugitives after the enactment of the 1850 Fugitive Slave Act, and later served as the United States minister to Austria-Hungary under President Ulysses Grant. Meanwhile, the historian-diplomat Motley, close friends with both Holmes and Jay, served as United States minister to the Austrian Empire as well as ambassador to the United Kingdom, until removed by Grant. In 1877, Motley passed away. The same year Jay published a moving tribute, "Motley's Appeal to History," and two years later Holmes published his eulogistic "John Lothrop Motley. A Memoir," which drew much praise from the press. A compelling triple association copy with a distinguished provenance
Seller: North Star Rare Books & Manuscripts, Sheffield, MA, U.S.A.
Price: US$750.00 + shipping
Description: First Edition, one of an unspecific number of Large Paper Copies from the Large Paper Edition. Special dated presentation is 1878 which might make this a pre-publication copy. John Lothrop Motley (181477), American historian and diplomat, b. Dorchester, Mass. Author of two novels concerning Thomas Morton (1839 and 1849), as well as a number of articles for the North American Review. Motleys study of the history of the Netherlands resulted in The Rise of the Dutch Republic (3 vol., 1856), long a standard work and a popular success, and History of the United Netherlands (4 vol., 186067). His last work, The Life and Death of John of Barneveld, appeared in 1874. Motley had spent a short period in 1841 as secretary of the U.S. legation at St. Petersburg and later was minister to Austria (186167). President Grant appointed him minister to Great Britain in 1869, but difficulties arising from Motleys tendency to ignore the instructions of Secretary of State Hamilton Fish and from Grants animosity toward his sponsor and friend, Charles Sumner, caused him to be relieved of his post in 1870. Signed/Presentation copy: "Henry H. A. Beach With the kind regards of his friend Oliver Wendell Holmes Dec. 25th 1878." Beach was apparently a medical student at Harvard and friend of Oliver Wendell Holmes. Very Good Plus in woven terracotta cloth and bevelled boards stamped brightly in gold on the front boards and the spine. Very clean, tight, and attractive with the top edge gilded. With light rubbing to the extremities and a little creasing to the top of the spine. With a faint whitish smudge between the gilded lettering "John and Lothrop" at the top of the spne. A very handsome, collectible, signed presentation copy. Scarce with an 1878 dated presentation inscription. First Edition, one of an unspecific number of Large Paper Copies from the Large Paper Edition. Special dated presentation is 1878 which might make this a pre-publication copy.
Seller: Brainerd Phillipson Rare Books, Holliston, MA, U.S.A.