Category Archives: Medium

mediums

ONEEVERYONE

“ONEEVERYONE, a public art project by Ann Hamilton, is framed by the recognition that human touch is the most essential means of contact and a fundamental expression of physical care. Commissioned by Landmarks for the Dell Medical School, ONEEVERYONE begins with a series of more than 500 portraits of Austin community members, photographed through a semi-transparent membrane that focuses each point where the body make contact. These images are presented in multiple forms, including porcelain enamel architectural panels; a newsprint publication with commissioned essays responding to the project; public forums; and an exhibition at the Visual Arts Center.”—Andrée Bober, Landmarks Director

“This book presents yet another form for the portraits. Its pages hold at least one image of each participant who volunteered their time and opened themselves to an exchange with the artist. Through the images touch–something we feel more than see–becomes visible.”

The Graphic Arts Collection is fortunate to have acquired this volume, along with the newspaper of commissioned essays, thanks to Landmarks, the public art program of The University of Texas at Austin. For more information on this extraordinary project, see https://www.hamilton-landmarks.org/

Ann Hamilton, ONEEVERYONE (Austin, Texas: Landmarks, University of Texas at Austin, 2017). 1 volume (unpaged): no text. Graphic Arts Collection GAX 2017- in process

Drawn from the Antique

In 1885, The British Museum acquired a small album of 110 drawings by Thomas Rowlandson (1756-1827), depicting Roman busts, labeled “Sketches of the Antique.” It was a donation by Edward Gilbertson (1813-1904) who

“apprenticed at the age of eighteen to an artist and engraver, Mr. Wright (probably Thomas Wright the engraver, q.v.). He travelled to Russia with the Wrights before returning to live briefly with the Paget family in Anglesey. This early career as an artist was abandoned for a career in banking. In 1860 he was appointed secretary to the Ottoman Bank and was later appointed director of the bank in Constantinople. During this period he was awarded honours by the Sultan for his services to the Turkish economy.” –British Museum database.

Gilbertson donated several Rowlandson albums during his lifetime and his collection of 980 coins was later bequeathed to the museum. A second album of “Sketches of the Antique,” made it’s way separately into the Victoria & Albert Museum.

In 2008, a third album of Rowlandson drawings depicting 50 classical busts came onto the market and was acquired by the Graphic Arts Collection. Diogene, Antinous, Ariadne, Hypocrite, Miltiades, Epicure, Alcibiade, Hermes, Themistocles, and Xenophon are among those depicted. Captions and explanatory notes are written in English on corresponding pages, with some additional notes in French. The watermarks in the sheets on which the drawings were executed (as well as the album leaves themselves) are dated 1820-21.

The drawings are not based on actual busts but were copied from Thomas Piroli’s engravings in Johann Gottfried Schweighaeuser (1776-1844), Monumens antiques du Musée Napoléon (Pairs, 1804). Rare Books Ex NB69 .P5. Presumably, Rowlandson owned a copy.

Thomas Rowlandson (1756-1827), Rowlandson’s sketches of the antique, [not before 1820]. Sketchbook with 50 drawings; 24 cm. Graphic Arts collection GAX 2008-0205

Moving the Battle of Princeton

James Peale (1749-1831), The Battle of Princeton, ca. 1782, Oil on canvas, 61.5 x 89.5 cm (24 3/16 x 35 1/4 in.), Princeton University, gift of Dean Mathey, Class of 1912, in 1951.

For many years, this painting by James Peale, younger brother of Charles Willson Peale, hung in Firestone Library before being loaned to the Historical Society of Princeton directly across Nassau Street. In 2009, the painting traveled to Virginia to be hung at Mt. Vernon for almost a year before returning to the Princeton University Art Museum, where it was conserved, glazed, and re-framed. This week, The Battle of Princeton returned to Firestone Library and the newly built Rare Books and Special Collections conference room.

Rand A. Mirante, Class of 1970, wrote a detailed description of the painting for the Princeton University Art Museum’s website. http://artmuseum.princeton.edu/story/james-peale-and-battle-princeton Here is a portion of that text:

This unsigned work, The Battle of Princeton, was a gift of the legendary Princeton trustee Dean Mathey, Class of 1914, and is thought to be a collaborative effort. Both Peale brothers had served in Washington’s army, and both fought during the critical Trenton-Princeton campaign—Charles as a lieutenant in the Philadelphia militia and James as an ensign with a Maryland regiment. Two years later, Charles returned to the Princeton battlefield and made sketches of the site for use in the backgrounds of his series of portraits of Washington. James, who is best known as a miniaturist, is believed to have used those sketches sometime in the mid-1780s to supplement what may have been his own recollections of the clash that took place near campus on January 3, 1777. Assisting James as an apprentice in the brothers’ Philadelphia studio was William Mercer, the deaf-mute son of the general slain during the battle; “Billy” Mercer would later execute his own copy of The Battle of Princeton, a painting currently in the collection of the Historical Society of Pennsylvania.

James Peale’s painting depicts the critical moment when Washington rode onto the battlefield and rallied the militia, which had been retreating before British attacks. On the right are the redcoats, their firing line ranging alongside the Thomas Clarke farmhouse, a structure which can still be seen at the battle site today. In the middle distance lies the prostrate form of General Hugh Mercer, Billy’s father, next to his wounded horse. General Mercer had as a young man served as a surgeon’s apprentice with Bonnie Prince Charlie’s Highlanders at the Battle of Culloden in 1746. After that disastrous defeat he sought refuge from the Crown in America, only to find death by British bayonets on a New Jersey farmer’s field, where it was said that the British mistook him for Washington.

In the foreground is Washington, accurately portrayed as mounted on his chestnut, “Nelson,” who was inured to gunfire, rather than on his white charger, which was strictly a parade-ground horse. An added detail is the General’s unique headquarters flag, all stars and no stripes. Washington is giving orders to his artillery, commanded by Captain Joseph Moulder. It was the sudden appearance of Washington on the battlefield—he had initially been riding ahead with another portion of his force towards the College itself— and a volley of grapeshot from Moulder’s guns that turned the tide that January morning. It is a victory reflected by James Peale in the auspicious openings in the dark clouds in the dramatic sky, a victory that the colonists desperately needed to keep alive their struggle for liberty and freedom.

Note the blue flag with pointed stars that became George Washington’s personal flag in 1775. The actual flag was donated to the Valley Forge Historical Society from a descendant of Washington.

“There is ongoing research being made about Washington’s Commander in Chief Standard/Flag. It most likely dates back to 1775. Because it was Washington’s personal flag, it was with him wherever he went — saw the same action as he did. A painting by James Peale (Battle of Princeton) shows a large blue standard with a linear arrangement of stars. Peale was assisted by an apprentice, William Mercer, the deaf-mute son of General Hugh Mercer who was slain during the battle; William Mercer later produced his own version of The Battle of Princeton, which is currently in the collection of the Historical Society of Pennsylvania, but James Peale produced the original. A painting by his older brother, Charles Wilson Peale titled, George Washington at Princeton shows a blue canton with stars, only in a circular formation. The circular formation of stars on blue is also a device used in the Washington Life Guard Standard.”–text copyright © 1999-2017 by the Independence Hall Association, a nonprofit organization in Philadelphia, Pennsylvania

To learn more about the Battle of Princeton, read Virginia Kays Creesy’s article published online December 1, 2016 in the Princeton Alumni Weekly: https://paw.princeton.edu/article/battle-princeton

See also more about the battleground: http://www.trentonian.com/article/TT/20161212/NEWS/161219944

Matching a Thomas Rowlandson sketch to its finished print

In trying to match our collection of Thomas Rowlandson drawings with published prints and books, it took nine copies of Henry Bunbury’s Academy for Grown Horsemen, before the Ackermann edition turned up with a match. Note: Geoffrey Gambado is a pseudonym for Henry William Bunbury.

Henry William Bunbury (1750-1811). An Academy for Grown Horsemen: containing the completest instructions, for walking, trotting, … illustrated with copper plates, and adorned with a portrait of the author by Geoffrey Gambado, Esq. [pseud.] (London: Printed for R. Ackermann, 1825). xxvii, 30-75, lxxx-xcix, 102-201 p., [27] col. plates: ill.; 15 cm. Graphic Arts Collection (GA) Rowlandson 1787.33 and Rare Books: Laurance Roberts Carton Hunting Coll. (ExCarton SF301 .xB93 1825

The match was first discovered by Joseph Rothrock (former curator of graphic arts) and documented in the Princeton University Library Chronicle 36, no. 2 (winter 1975): 87-110: http://libweb5.princeton.edu/visual_materials/pulc/pulc_v_36_n_2.pdf. This was not an easy attribution to make since Bunbury’s book comes in many shapes and sizes, not to mention the variations of plates inside. Here are a few on our shelves:

Henry William Bunbury (1750-1811). An Academy for Grown Horsemen; containing the completest instructions for walking, trotting, cantering, galloping, stumbling and tumbling.: The annals of horsemanship: containing accounts of accidental experiments and experimental accidents, both successful and unsuccessful; communicated by various correspondents to the author, Geoffrey Gambado, Esq. … Illustrated with cuts, by the most eminent artists (London: Printed for Vernor, Hood, and Sharpe; Longman, Hurst, Rees, and Orme; J. Walker; J. Harris; and W. Bayne; at the union printing-office, … by W. Wilson., 1808). [2], xvi, 28, xvi, 69, [3] p., [29] leaves of plates: col. ill.; 18 cm. With 29 leaves of hand-coloured satirical plates.; plates signed: H. Bunbury esq. delin. Some plates with imprint: London. Pub. by T. Tegg, May 4-1808. Graphic Arts Collection (GA) Rowlandson 1787.32

Henry William Bunbury (1750-1811). An Academy for Grown Horsemen: containing the completest instructions for walking, trotting, cantering, galloping, stumbling, and tumbling: illustrated with copper plates, and adorned with a portrait of the author / by Geoffrey Gambado [i.e. H. W. Bunbury]. 2d ed. (London: Printed for Hooper and Wigstead, 1796). xx, 36 p., [12] leaves of plates: col. ill.; 34 cm. Graphic Arts Collection (GA) Oversize Rowlandson 1791.5q and Rare Books (Ex) 2011-0036Q

Henry William Bunbury (1750-1811). An Academy for Grown Horsemen; containing the completest instructions for walking, trotting, cantering, galloping, stumbling, and tumbling … By Geoffrey Gambado [pseud.] ... 3d ed. … (London, W. Baynes, 1808). xxiv, 36 p. front., plates. 33 cm. Graphic Arts Collection (GA) Oversize Rowlandson 1787.31f

Henry William Bunbury (1750-1811), An Academy for Grown Horsemen; containing the completest instructions for walking, trotting, cantering, galloping, stumbling and tumbling. : The annals of horsemanship: containing accounts of accidental experiments and experimental accidents, both successful and unsuccessful; communicated by various correspondents to the author, Geoffrey Gambado, Esq. … Illustrated with cuts, by the most eminent artists (London: Printed for Vernor, Hood, and Sharpe; Longman, Hurst, Rees, and Orme; J. Walker; J. Harris; and W. Bayne; at the union printing-office, … by W. Wilson., 1808). Graphic Arts Collection (GA) Rowlandson 1787.32

Henry William Bunbury (1750-1811), An Academy for Grown Horsemen; containing the completest instructions for walking, trotting … The annals of horsemanship, containing accounts of accidental experiments … communicated … to the author Geoffrey Gambado, esq.Illustrated with cuts, by the most eminent artists (London: Printed for Vernor, Hood, and Shape [etc,], 1809). 140 p. col. illus. 22 cm. Graphic Arts Collection (GA) Rowlandson 1787.34 and Graphic Arts Collection (GA) Rowlandson 1787.34 and Rare Books: Laurence Roberts Carton Hunting Coll. (ExCarton) SF301 .xB93 1809

A William Blake Puzzle

In the January 1921 issue of The Arts, Scofield Thayer (1889–1982) placed a challenge to readers, which also served as an advertisement for his own newly revived journal The Dial. Thayer asked readers if they could identify which woodcut was made by William Blake (1757-1827) and which was a “vulgarization of it executed to please the public.” The correct answer was rewarded with an additional month added to a Dial subscription.

The answer is simple but the background to the puzzle is more complicated. The question was originally raised in a review of William Mulready’s illustration for Oliver Goldsmith (1730-1774), The Vicar of Wakefield (London: J. Van Voorst, 1843. GAX 2003-0620N), placed in Athenaeum, January 21, 1843, p.65. Two woodcut illustrations are shown, Blake’s Virgil, no. 3 (left) and an anonymous cut after its design (right), published in The Vicar of Wakefield.

“Fine Arts,” The Athenaeum: Journal of English and Foreign Literature, Science, and the Fine Arts, January 21, 1843. Firestone Library

Robert John Thornton (1768?-1837) commissioned a series of illustrations of Virgil’s Pastorals but the work Blake completed did not please the commissioner. Geoffrey Keynes (1887-1982) describes the situation: “Dr. Thornton was not an imaginative man. He was enterprising and prolific where botany and medicine were concerned, and employed recognized artist to illustrate his works, sometimes on a lavish scale.”

Thornton had three of Blake’s designs re-engraved for the book by a professional hand, numbers 14-16. A fourth block was also recut, presumably by the same hand and the result is “an interesting example of how the originality of genius may be reduced to the conventional formula of the moment. It was not used in the book but was printed side by side with an impression form Blake’s corresponding woodblock in the Athenaeum.”

Virgil, The Pastorals of Virgil, [edited by] Robert John Thornton. 3rd ed. (London: F.C. & J. Rivingtons, 1821). Includes woodcuts illustrating Ambrose Philips’ Imitation of Eclogue I (v. 1, p. 13-18) by William Blake. Graphic Arts Collection (GAX) NE910.G7 B5 1821

See also William Blake (1757-1827), The Wood Engravings of William Blake: seventeen subjects commissioned by Dr. Robert Thornton for his Virgil of 1821, newly printed from the original blocks now in the British Museum (London: Published for the Trustees of the British Museum by British Museum Publications, 1977). Rare Books (Ex) Oversize 3631.3.3475.1977q

Burr McIntosh, Class of 1884, and the Burr McIntosh Monthly

The actor, photographer, publisher, and professor Burr McIntosh, Class of 1884 (1862-1942) studied first at Lafayette College and then, for one year at Princeton. Although he never graduated, he went on to have a dynamic if eclectic career, leading first to the Broadway stage and celebrity playing the character Talbot “Taffy” Wynne in the original 1895 Broadway production of Trilby.

McIntosh learned photography by chance and excelled, serving as a photojournalist for Leslie’s Weekly and publishing a memoir, The Little I Saw of Cuba, in 1899. (Recap 10871.604). “In the Spanish-American War,” he wrote, “I was too old to enter the army, but was Leslies‘ chief correspondent as well as representing the Hearst papers, and others.” He also had the first recorded case of Yellow Fever and lost 71 pound in three weeks.

By 1901 McIntosh had recovered and opened a photography studio on West 33rd Street, near the original Waldorf-Astoria Hotel. The actor-turned-artist had such success with portraits of the fashionable elite that he added publisher to his resume, designing a lavish magazine to present his work [see Google image above].

Unveiled on April Fool’s Day, the Burr McIntosh Monthly ran from 1903 to 1910, mixing photographs of beautiful women with celebrity profiles and serious information on the contemporary photography scene.

In particular, it is a treasure-trove on American pictorialism, Alfred Stieglitz, Edward Steichen, Carl Moon, and others. Issues were bound by string so the plates could easily be removed and framed. Unfortunately McIntosh’s lifestyle was equally lavish and by 1908, the Burr McIntosh studio was forced into bankruptcy. His magazine limped on for another year or so before closing.

But just as one business was ending, McIntosh announced a new vision for a colossal artists’ colony in Los Angeles and moved west. He purchased land, hired staff, and made plans. With his own funds waning, McIntosh proposed reopening his magazine and using it to fund his enterprise, but this never happened. Instead, he went back to acting, this time in films, where he is best remembered as Squire Bartlett in Way Down East directed by D.W. Griffith in 1920. http://www.aspresolver.com/aspresolver.asp?SILF;1824760

In corresponding with the Princeton alumni association in the 1930s, McIntosh lists his employer as himself, his position in the firm: “The Whole,” and the business of the firm: “Spreading Cheer.” In a second card, his business address is given as “Cross Roads of the World, 6671 Sunset Boulevard.”

The Burr McIntosh Monthly (New York: [Burr McIntosh Publishing Co., etc.] 1903-10). Firestone Library TR1 .B877

See also: Burr William McIntosh (1862-1942), Football and love; a story of the Yale-Princeton game of ’94 … (New York, London: The Transatlantic Publishing Co., 1895). Seeley G. Mudd Library (Mudd) P79.606

https://free-classic-movies.com/movies-02/02-1928-08-15-The-Adorable-Cheat/index.php
Burr McIntosh in The Adorable Cheat, highly recommended.

Thanks to the Mudd Library staff for their help. All documents found in the Princeton University Archives. Alumni Records, Undergraduate, Box 173. https://rbsc.princeton.edu/databases/undergraduate-alumni-index-part-1.

1743 copper plate engraved by George Bickham

The Graphic Arts Collection recently acquired a copper printing plate (35 x 47 cm) for “The Break-Neck Fox Chase,” designed and engraved by George Bickham, the Younger (ca. 1706-1771), dated June 1743. There are no prints in any institutional collection pulled from this plate. If you find one, please let us know.

The verse, presumably written by the artist, begins,
“By various Turns as Men on Taste refines
Some Foxes hunt, some Women, and some Wine;
Wine gives them Fevers; Women oft the
And Neck or Nothing’s risk’d for every Fox.”

Plate detail

At the time of this engraving, the prolific artist sold his work from two London shops, one at Blackmoor’s Head within the Exeter-Exchange in the Strand, and at May’s Buildings, Covent Garden. Later, he moved west to Kew-Lane in Richmond, teaching and selling from his home. As an added incentive to get his patrons to make the long trip, Bickham advertised that anyone who came (and purchased a print), could see his celebrated female Egyptian mummy.

The plan was successful and preparations were made to build a larger studio with exhibition space. Unfortunately, Bickham died before it was finished and on September 18, 1771, the Public Advertiser announced a sale of the artist’s property. “A piece of ground, 36 feet in front; and 93 feet in depth, where on is now built by the late ingenious Mr. George Bickham, a large commodious Room . . . intended for an exhibition room, forming an octagon in the inside with a large sky-light and gallery to ditto, the angular parts formed for lodging rooms; the whole is very nearly completed and was stopped on account of Mr. Bickham’s death.”

The following year in December 1772, it took four nights to auction off Bickham’s belongings, described as “the remainder of the valuable stock in Trade of the late Mr. George Bickham; consisting of the Whole of his valuable scarce Prints, Drawings, Books of Penmanship, and Letter-press; together with the original Drawings by Gravelot [pseudonym for Hubert-François Bourguignon 1699-1773], beautiful Manuscript Pieces, and other Curiosities collected by the late Mr. George Bickham, sen., including a very perfect Egyptian Mummy and Coffin, in the highest preservation, allowed to be the finest in all Europe, and divers other valuable effects.”

Plate detail

Bingham’s Washington Crossing the Delaware

Washington Crossing the Delaware, From an unfinished painting by G. C. Bingham, between 1856 and 1871. Albumen silver print. Graphic Arts Collection GAX2017- in process.

Yet another find has been made, thanks to the renovation and reorganization of our library. This time credit goes to Steve Ferguson for identifying an albumen silver print of G.C. Bingham’s painting “Washington Crossing the Delaware,” taken during the many years that the work sat unfinished in the artist’s studio. It is, so far, the only image of Bingham’s painting in its earliest stages and will be extremely helpful to American painting scholars who want to study his composition and process.

“September 14, 1855, Bingham was spending most of his time on portraiture. He had opened a studio in the Grand Jury room of the courthouse at Columbia and was engaged upon a number of portraits. By the fourteenth of November he was in Jefferson City and had taken a room in the Capitol, where he remained for a month or more painting portraits. Incidentally, he exhibited in his studio there the “Verdict of the People.” Early in December he spoke in a Whig meeting in the Capitol. March 14, 1856, he was in Columbia again, engaged upon a historical painting, “Washington Crossing the Delaware,” no doubt inspired by Leutze’s popular representation of the same subject, which it resembles markedly both in composition and in purpose. For many years the picture remained unfinished, and not until eighteen years after its beginning was it actually completed. It is a large canvas, and, like Leutze’s, it is crowded and confused and wholly impossible as far as truth to nature is concerned.” —-Fern Helen Rusk, George Caleb Bingham, The Missouri Artist (1917. Marquand ND237.B5 R8)

One of the changes Bingham made between 1865 and 1871 was to remove the horse and rider behind Washington and replace it with two less active soldiers. In general, the entire background is simplified, giving a stronger focus to the central figures. Below are a few of Bingham’s other changes.

George Caleb Bingham (1811-1879), Washington Crossing the Delaware, 1856-71. Oil on canvas. Chrysler Museum of Art, Gift of Walter P. Chrysler, Jr., in honor of Walter P. Chrysler, Sr. Posted with the Chrysler’s permission.

“The painting illustrates the historic crossing of the Delaware River by George Washington and his troops. George Caleb Bingham paints Washington seated atop a horse, which forms the apex of a pyramid, with the oars creating the base of the triangular composition. Artists create a sense of stability and balance by using this choice of arrangement. Washington’s huddled men row across the frozen river almost directly toward the viewer. Bingham added minor embellishments to the scene. Washington was unlikely to have been mounted on his horse for the crossing. It would have made the ride too unstable. In addition, the event happened in the early hours of the morning, in the dark. Regardless, the artist is still able to capture the tense and risky crossing occurring on December 25, 1776 in a perilous snowstorm, leading to the Battle of Trenton.”–Chrysler Museum

For more information on George Washington’s campaign, see:
http://philadelphiaencyclopedia.org/archive/trenton-and-princeton-campaign-washingtons-crossing/

Ardsley Studios

After deinstalling our anniversary Shakespeare exhibition, our prints are being unframed and returned to the vault. Exactly 100 year ago, Hamilton Easter Field (1872-1922) was only beginning to frame his collection of “Hamlet” and “Othello” prints to exhibit at the Ardsley Studios at no. 110 Columbia Heights, Brooklyn (also known as Quaker Row).

Field and his mother lived at no. 106, where he ran the Ardsley School of Graphic Arts. In 1916, he purchased the Washington Roebling mansion next door, adding no. 108 and 110 to his estate, so that he could offer studios, housing, and galleries to his students and friends.

It was Field’s intention each month to exhibit old master prints from his personal collection together with modern American work that had not yet gained full recognition. In January 1917, he presented lithographs of Odilon Redon (1840-1916) and paintings by Bryson Burroughs (1869-1934). February brought Shakespearean scenes by Eugène Delacroix (1798-1863) and Théodore Chassériau (1819-1856) hung with watercolors by John Marin (1870-1953). And in March, he exhibited Honoré Daumier (1808-1879) caricatures along with paintings by Marsden Hartley (1877-1943) and Morton Schamberg (1881-1918).

The New York Times preferred Chassériau to Delacroix, reporting, “Shakespeare gave a rich field for exploration to a man of Delacroix’s culture, but these lithographs show him only scratching its surface. The fashionable young Hamlet is a mincing creature and no one could infer from these mild humans the sense of passion that finds expression in the struggle of the beasts in such great lithographs . . . . Chasseriau is another story. His combination of monumental style and Oriental fervor fitted him for the etchings of Othello. He translated the passion of the Moor, as Shakespeare did, into a literary emotion.”

Early American Bookplates

Bookplate of Ethan Allen Hitchcock (1798-1870), U.S. Army, “Non nisi parvulis [Not unless a child], 19th century. Etching and engraving, Graphic Arts Collection Early American Bookplates

A reference question led to our small but significant collection of early American bookplates. Here are a few both for institutions and individuals.

The Gift of the Society for propagating the Gospell in Foreign parts 1704

Presented to the Warren St Chapel

Hasty Pudding Library, 1808

John Skinner, Hartford, and S. Marble, Orange Street, New Haven

Brothers in Unity

Columbia College Library, New-York. “In Lumine Tuo Videbimus Lumen” [In thy light we shall see light, Psalms 36:9]

Samuel Parker

Bushrod Washington (1762–1829), “Exitus acta probat” [The outcome justifies the deed].

New-York Society Library, 1789. “Emollit Mores” [Learning humanizes or Learning softens character]

Phoenix Society

Newburyport Athenaeum

Alexander Hamilton, Through. Not Alexander Hamilton (1757-1804)

For confirmation, see: Journal of the Ex Libris Society, Vol. 8 (1899). “BOOK-PLATE OF ALEXANDER HAMILTON. Dear Sir,—…Alexander Hamilton had a book-plate— plain armorial, spade shield and crest, with motto — of which one is now in my collection. The Library of the Hospital Ship “Bay State” [ocr errors] No only other copy known to me is inserted in Hamilton’s own copy of “The Federalist,” which is in the possession of a gentleman of New York City, who values this plate at much fine gold, as I happen to know, having made a bid of fifty through the friendly bookseller who mentioned it to me in a casual way, and which he did thrice refuse. It would not interest anyone to know how I finally procured my copy, and I am very unwilling to exploit a mare’s-nest; but I will say that, for the present, this is one of my most cherished plates, ranking next to that of Hamilton’s great friend and admirer, George Washington, and so will it be until some fortunate collector manages to pick up a lot of them in some out-of-the-way corner. I am aware that the authenticity of the ownership of this most important plate rests, for the moment, altogether on what credit one is inclined to place in the aforesaid bookseller, but there was no object to be gained by him in composing a fairy tale of this kind, as the plate he spoke of was in hands, so far as he knew, entirely out of a collector’s reach, and his chance of procuring it simply nil, as has been proved since. After such serious collectors and good authorities as my friends F. E. Marshall and C. E. Clark have had a look at it, there will be time enough to describe this plate; in the meantime, silence is golden.— Yours truly, W. E. Baillie.

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