Dee Master (1 results)

Manuscript school calligraphy book belonging to Master W. Dee, a pupil of Shuthonger House School, Tewkesbury. Quarto. Contemporary half green morocco over blue marbled boards with printed name plate to the upper board. Marbling to page edges. Decorative printed title page. 85pp. completed in calligraphic manuscript in black and red ink (the remaining 29pp. blank), comprising 33 poetic and literary excerpts, with decorative titles to each piece, some incorporating drawings of quills. Condition is very good, the binding is firm with some chipping to the head of the spine and rubbing to the boards. The contents with a little cracking in places are otherwise in very good order and clean throughout. A beautifully-executed calligraphic commonplace book produced by a talented young English scholar, notable - and uncommon - for its inclusion of an early American patriotic poem - 'The American Eagle' by C. W. [Charles West] Thompson, c.1830s (5pp.) - in praise of the nation's beloved symbol: "Bird of Columbia! well art thou An emblem of our native land; With unblench'd front and noble brow, Among the nations doom'd to stand; Proud, like her mighty mountain woods; Like her own rivers, wandering free; And sending forth, from hills and floods, The joyous shout of liberty!" The other titles in the book offer a diverse mixture of the literary, historical, scientific and philosophical, including 'The Chameleon'; 'The Country Bumpkin and The Razor Seller'; 'The Newcastle Apothecary'; 'Waterloo'; 'Rollin's Address to the Peruvians'; 'Pneumatics'; 'Modern Logic'; and 'On the Death of Sir Thomas Moore'.