The Eighteenth Century

28. Printer's devils, from The Grub-street Journal Extraordinary, Numb. 148, Monday, October 30, 1732.

Although Curll is not mentioned by name, at least three of the works being hung up to dry by the devils are Curll imprints—"Atalantis" is the almanac New Atalantis for the Year 1713 while "Cases of Impotency" and "Rochester's Poems" are both examples of Curll's 'soft porn' publications. Most of the other publications shown—Fog's Journal, The Craftsman, Hyp-Doctor, The Examiner, Free Briton, Daily Courant, Post Boy, Daily Post, Applebee's Journal, Read's Journal, London Journal, and the Weekly Register—are present in the Bond or Realey collections.

Among the many colorful figures of the 18th century was "the unspeakable Curll," a most prolific publisher and bookseller with well over a thousand books and pamphlets to his credit or discredit, a man almost constantly at war with Swift, Pope, or another of his involuntary authors (he was singularly unimpressed by the concept of literary property), and a very successful businessman. In 1955 the Library acquired Peter Murray Hill's private collection of 500 volumes of Edmund Curll, now built to over 800.

Of Curll's unwilling authors the best known is certainly Jonathan Swift, whose Meditation upon a Broomstick (first printed by Curll in 1710 from a manuscript obtained by theft) is one of the puzzles of the collection—scholarship has not yet been able to discover which of the two versions in the Curll Collection is earlier, the 16-page two penny edition or the 30-page six penny edition. Trials, scandals, topical poems, poetical miscellanies, politics, British antiquities, travels and the classics make up this collection of the stock that Curll felt would move well or could be made to move by being re-issued with a new and up-to-date title-page.

29. Britannia Excisa, London, 1733.

Cartoons and ballads against a tax proposal of Sir Robert Walpole (called Sir Blue String in reference to the ribbon of his Order of the Garter).

Charles B. Realey, professor of history, bequeathed his library to the University and in 1963 his collection of Walpoliana came to the Department. The original two hundred volumes, now increased to nearly 500, provide a concentrated and remarkably full coverage of Sir Robert Walpole's administration (1721-1742). Complete sets of The Craftsman and of Cato's Letters, many clandestine and controversial pamphlets, and a sizable group of contemporary newspapers are particularly valuable additions to the Library's resources on the political life of the period.

Acquired from Peter Murray Hill in 1985 through the Wallace Pratt fund.

30. An attack on Cato's letters, in a letter of 1 August [1721] from Thomas Gordon, one of their editors, to their other editor, John Trenchard. Part of the Trenchard-Simpson correspondence.

John Trenchard and Thomas Gordon, reforming Whigs, founded the London Journal and published in it the extremely controversial and anonymous letters signed "Cato" from November 1720 to July 1723. Gordon later became a member of Walpole's government.

This volume is mainly correspondence between Trenchard and Sir William Simpson, one of the barons of the Exchequer and an important political figure.

Phillipps MS 11763, acquired in the Sotheby sale of 15 June 1971.

The extensive manuscript collections of the department include much 18th century material—drafts of speeches by Queen Anne, correspondence such as that between John Trenchard and Sir William Simpson, military letters and reports, diplomatic notebooks, confidential diplomatic and secret service letters, and a variety of private papers.

31. The General Magazine. For Saturday, October 29, 1743. No. 1, London: Printed by A. Ilive.

The only known copy of the only known issue of this periodical.

From the library of Richmond P. and Marjorie N. Bond.

From no other source can a researcher gain so vivid and detailed a picture of this period as from the newspapers and periodicals of the day, and few sources are so elusive. Survival does not come easily to an old newspaper. The collection of Richmond P. and Marjorie N. Bond (acquired by the Department in 1970 with the help of Henry L. Snyder, professor of history) is the result of years of patient and knowledgeable searching. Begun as a teaching collection—a group of representative items illustrating the development of the English periodical press—it has grown into a research collection of uncommon value.

Of the more than 900 entries in the Bonds' original catalogue approximately one-fourth are concerned with Joseph Addison and Richard Steele—the Tatler and Spectator constitute the core of the collection, occurring in original form, in later editions, in varied formats. Letters, contemporary pamphlets, and other works connected with Addison and Steele add to the research value of this portion of the collection. Well over two hundred other journals published before 1800 are included, with many of the eminent journals in complete or good files and many other papers represented by a few issues. Ranging from the "newsbooks" of the Civil War period through the Popish Plot era (the Observator and others), the post-Revolutionary Present State of Europe, and the great age of the periodical, the 18th century, the collection includes almanacs, parliamentary debates, provincial papers, essay journals, review journals, and what can only be described as general magazines. Some items are very well known—the Connoisseur (the Bond copy has been annotated by John Boyle, 5th earl of Cork, one of the contributors), Dr. Johnson's Rambler, the Ladies Diary, the Flying Post, the Daily Courant; many are obscure—Jopson's Coventry Mercury, the Lady's Curiosity; some are extremely uncommon—News from the Dead, Free Holder, The General Magazine.

The collection continues to grow, supported in great part by the continuing generosity of Mrs. Bond, increasing in variety, importance and usefulness. A few of the additions to the collection since its acquisition are The Scotish Dove Sent Out, and Returning, no. 44, 9-16 August 1644 (one of two known copies; from the Sotheby sale of the Fairfax Library, 14 December 1993), L'Estrange's Intelligencer (a gift of the KU Friends of the Library), scientific journals such as The Philosophical Transactions of the Royal Society (begun in 1664 and still publishing), business newspapers such as Lloyd's Evening Post, as well as many other journals which strengthen the original topics of the collection.

Perhaps the most common form of publication of the 18th century was the pamphlet. Every conceivable subject and nearly every 18th century figure of any note was discussed in a pamphlet, or more commonly in a series of pamphlets. We have, over the years, assembled large numbers of these invaluable sources—poetical, dramatic, political and economic, and religious pamphlets. We have generally attempted to obtain them unbound, with the secondary aim of using them for bibliographical study. Particularly important collections added to our 18th century holdings are the Robert D. Horn Collection of contemporary poems on the 1st Duke of Marlborough (over 150 satires and panegyrics, purchased from the collector in 1976) which complements the already very strong holdings on Queen Anne and her great general, and the Brodie of Brodie Collection, purchased in 1961, of about 1200 pamphlets (mainly 18th century, including many Scottish imprints) collected by the Brodie family of Elgin over some 150 years.

32. La Triomphante, contre-danse nouvelle, dédiée a nos très-illustres et très-puissans seigneurs du Parlement de Bourgogne. A l'occasion de leur rentrée à Dijon, en Octobre 1788. Par Toppin l'ainé, musicien & maitre de danse de Paris, [Dijon, 1788].

A contemporary hand has supplied the music for this dance in manuscript. Other known copies of this pamphlet also have the music in manuscript, suggesting that it was the publisher who was responsible for the addition.

From the Frank E. Melvin collection; acquired from Martinus Nijhoff in 1952.