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The Americas from Helen R. Kahn Rare Books The Americas from Helen Kahn. By Michael Stillman Helen R. Kahn and Associates of Montreal has issued their 65th catalogue of rare books, "The Americas." This includes 150 items pertaining to the western hemisphere. Here are just a few examples. One of the best histories of New England in its time (1720) was The History of New-England Containing an Impartial Account of the Civil and Ecclesiastical Affairs of the Country to the Year...1700, by Daniel Neal. Quoting from "European-Americana," Kahn says it was "a classic for its time, written by a man who had never set foot in the country about which he wrote." Neal borrowed heavily from Cotton Mather and Oldmixon, and it has its share or mistakes, but is generally considered a good work for someone writing from such a distance. Item 125. Priced at $2,500. Memoirs of an American Lady: with sketches of manners and scenery in America, as they existed before the Revolution was also written from a great distance in both space and time. The author, Mrs. Anne Grant, was an ocean and 40 years removed, but at least she had been there. Her father had served for the British in the Seven Years' War (French and Indian War). Mrs. Grant lived for awhile with the widow Margarita Schuyler, aunt to the future Revolutionary War General Philip Schuyler. Madame Schuyler is the "American Lady" of this book. Grant's Memoirs tells about life and the people in the Albany, New York, area. For those interested in reading her story, check out the following website: http://www.nysm.nysed.gov/albany/art/grant.html. Item 66. $300. The Memoirs of Mrs. Coghlan...written by herself, and Dedicated to the British Nation... are the memoirs of a somewhat different type of lady. Mrs. Coghlan is best known for having an affair with Aaron Burr when she was very young. This would be followed by a brief, unhappy marriage and an "abandoned" life in which she still managed to become acquainted with notable personalities in Europe and America. This was a scandalous book in its time, and this copy included the suppressed preface most copies lack. Item 51. $775.
The Americas from Helen R. Kahn Rare Books none Filippo Mazzei is not that well remembered today, but he was an inspirational figure for many of America's founding fathers. An Italian who had set up shop in London in the 1770s, he was invited by Thomas Jefferson to settle on land near Monticello. He assisted Jefferson in establishing vineyards in Virginia. Mazzei wrote articles supporting America's independence and the liberties that would later be established in the Constitution. His thoughts likely influenced Jefferson and other American leaders he knew. Item 122 is Mazzei's Recherches Historique at Politiques sur les Etats-Unis de l'amerique Septentrionale... It was published in Paris in 1788 and traces America's history with England and the causes of its eventual separation. In an interesting comment about America's Indians, Mazzei says, "these people are called savages, because their customs differ from ours, which we think the perfection of good breeding; they have the same opinion of theirs." $1,850. As long as we are polishing up our French, how about Le Sens-Commun? That's French for "Common Sense," Thomas Paine's influential book which helped lead to the American Revolution. It also played a similar role in France, and this second French language edition (first Paris) was published in 1791, near the outbreak of the French Revolution. Paine would support that Revolution, serve as an elected official, and be imprisoned during its most radical stage. Eventually Paine would return to America, where his controversial thoughts about organized religion would leave him something of an outcast when he died. Item 128. $1,925. George Lyon fits in with the long and illustrious group of explorers who failed to find a Northwest Passage. Item 97 is A Brief Narrative of an Unsuccessful Attempt to reach Repulse Bay, published in 1825. It was just as well. There is no outlet to the Pacific from Repulse Bay, just lots of snow and ice. However, Lyon does tell us about Hudson's Bay and the Esquimaux who inhabited the region. $365. Daniel Harmon wrote Journal of Voyages and Travel in the Interiour of North America, between the 47th and 58th Degrees of North Latitude, extending from Montreal nearly to the Pacific Ocean, which was published in 1820. Harmon spent almost two decades in the backwoods of the Northwest, as an explorer and fur trader for the Northwest Company. He became very familiar with the Indians and this book includes an extensive vocabulary of the Cree language. However, Editor Daniel Haskell attempted to clean up the book and make it more consistent with his religious mores, so some of this narrative has been twisted to be not believable for what was really going on at the frontier. Item 70. $2,500.
The Americas from Helen R. Kahn Rare Books none Mary Eastman was the wife of Captain Seth Eastman, who served at Fort Snelling in the Minnesota Territory in the 1850s. Captain Eastman was also an artist, and his drawings accompany Mrs. Eastman's text in The American Aboriginal Port Folio, published in 1853. This is an excellent report on Plains Indians' customs, rituals and beliefs in the middle of the 19th century. Item 59. $1,450. Item 95 is a copy of The Quebec Gazette from June 22, 1837. The timing is what's interesting. This, naturally, was the year of the Revolt of 1837, and the Gazette includes a proclamation from the Governor-General of Upper and Lower Canada calling on all military and peace officers "to oppose and frustrate the insidious designs adverted to in this Proclamation..." The "insidious designs" referred to were meetings that had been held with "their object resistance to the lawful authority of the King and Parliament, and the subversion of the laws." A revolt would break out in November of that year, but unlike the one in the nation to Canada's south, the British would put this one down quickly. For now, England's toehold in the Americas would be spared. $435. Item 129 is the third English edition of A Voyage Round the World, performed in the Years 1785, 1786, 1787, and 1788...by Jean Perousse. The third English is generally considered the best English edition, as the first two were abridged versions of the original French. This one, from 1798, is complete. Captain Perousse was a French navigator who led this expedition on behalf of his homeland to find a Northwest Passage through America from the Pacific side. Like so many others, he was not successful, but his explorations brought him to the west coast of America, Alaska, Siberia, China, Hawaii, the South Seas, and finally, Australia. From there his expedition disappeared, and nothing was known of his fate until wreckage was discovered 40 years later. $10,500. Helen R. Kahn & Associates Rare Books, Maps & Manuscripts has a website at www.hrkahnbooks.com or may be reached by phone at 514-844-5344.

The Americas from Helen R. Kahn Rare Books

The Americas from Helen Kahn.

By Michael Stillman

Helen R. Kahn and Associates of Montreal has issued their 65th catalogue of rare books, "The Americas." This includes 150 items pertaining to the western hemisphere. Here are just a few examples.

One of the best histories of New England in its time (1720) was The History of New-England Containing an Impartial Account of the Civil and Ecclesiastical Affairs of the Country to the Year...1700, by Daniel Neal. Quoting from "European-Americana," Kahn says it was "a classic for its time, written by a man who had never set foot in the country about which he wrote." Neal borrowed heavily from Cotton Mather and Oldmixon, and it has its share or mistakes, but is generally considered a good work for someone writing from such a distance. Item 125. Priced at $2,500.

Memoirs of an American Lady: with sketches of manners and scenery in America, as they existed before the Revolution was also written from a great distance in both space and time. The author, Mrs. Anne Grant, was an ocean and 40 years removed, but at least she had been there. Her father had served for the British in the Seven Years' War (French and Indian War). Mrs. Grant lived for awhile with the widow Margarita Schuyler, aunt to the future Revolutionary War General Philip Schuyler. Madame Schuyler is the "American Lady" of this book. Grant's Memoirs tells about life and the people in the Albany, New York, area. For those interested in reading her story, check out the following website: http://www.nysm.nysed.gov/albany/art/grant.html. Item 66. $300.

The Memoirs of Mrs. Coghlan...written by herself, and Dedicated to the British Nation... are the memoirs of a somewhat different type of lady. Mrs. Coghlan is best known for having an affair with Aaron Burr when she was very young. This would be followed by a brief, unhappy marriage and an "abandoned" life in which she still managed to become acquainted with notable personalities in Europe and America. This was a scandalous book in its time, and this copy included the suppressed preface most copies lack. Item 51. $775.

The Americas from Helen R. Kahn Rare Books

none

Filippo Mazzei is not that well remembered today, but he was an inspirational figure for many of America's founding fathers. An Italian who had set up shop in London in the 1770s, he was invited by Thomas Jefferson to settle on land near Monticello. He assisted Jefferson in establishing vineyards in Virginia. Mazzei wrote articles supporting America's independence and the liberties that would later be established in the Constitution. His thoughts likely influenced Jefferson and other American leaders he knew. Item 122 is Mazzei's Recherches Historique at Politiques sur les Etats-Unis de l'amerique Septentrionale... It was published in Paris in 1788 and traces America's history with England and the causes of its eventual separation. In an interesting comment about America's Indians, Mazzei says, "these people are called savages, because their customs differ from ours, which we think the perfection of good breeding; they have the same opinion of theirs." $1,850.

As long as we are polishing up our French, how about Le Sens-Commun? That's French for "Common Sense," Thomas Paine's influential book which helped lead to the American Revolution. It also played a similar role in France, and this second French language edition (first Paris) was published in 1791, near the outbreak of the French Revolution. Paine would support that Revolution, serve as an elected official, and be imprisoned during its most radical stage. Eventually Paine would return to America, where his controversial thoughts about organized religion would leave him something of an outcast when he died. Item 128. $1,925.

George Lyon fits in with the long and illustrious group of explorers who failed to find a Northwest Passage. Item 97 is A Brief Narrative of an Unsuccessful Attempt to reach Repulse Bay, published in 1825. It was just as well. There is no outlet to the Pacific from Repulse Bay, just lots of snow and ice. However, Lyon does tell us about Hudson's Bay and the Esquimaux who inhabited the region. $365.

Daniel Harmon wrote Journal of Voyages and Travel in the Interiour of North America, between the 47th and 58th Degrees of North Latitude, extending from Montreal nearly to the Pacific Ocean, which was published in 1820. Harmon spent almost two decades in the backwoods of the Northwest, as an explorer and fur trader for the Northwest Company. He became very familiar with the Indians and this book includes an extensive vocabulary of the Cree language. However, Editor Daniel Haskell attempted to clean up the book and make it more consistent with his religious mores, so some of this narrative has been twisted to be not believable for what was really going on at the frontier. Item 70. $2,500.

The Americas from Helen R. Kahn Rare Books

none

Mary Eastman was the wife of Captain Seth Eastman, who served at Fort Snelling in the Minnesota Territory in the 1850s. Captain Eastman was also an artist, and his drawings accompany Mrs. Eastman's text in The American Aboriginal Port Folio, published in 1853. This is an excellent report on Plains Indians' customs, rituals and beliefs in the middle of the 19th century. Item 59. $1,450.

Item 95 is a copy of The Quebec Gazette from June 22, 1837. The timing is what's interesting. This, naturally, was the year of the Revolt of 1837, and the Gazette includes a proclamation from the Governor-General of Upper and Lower Canada calling on all military and peace officers "to oppose and frustrate the insidious designs adverted to in this Proclamation..." The "insidious designs" referred to were meetings that had been held with "their object resistance to the lawful authority of the King and Parliament, and the subversion of the laws." A revolt would break out in November of that year, but unlike the one in the nation to Canada's south, the British would put this one down quickly. For now, England's toehold in the Americas would be spared. $435.

Item 129 is the third English edition of A Voyage Round the World, performed in the Years 1785, 1786, 1787, and 1788...by Jean Perousse. The third English is generally considered the best English edition, as the first two were abridged versions of the original French. This one, from 1798, is complete. Captain Perousse was a French navigator who led this expedition on behalf of his homeland to find a Northwest Passage through America from the Pacific side. Like so many others, he was not successful, but his explorations brought him to the west coast of America, Alaska, Siberia, China, Hawaii, the South Seas, and finally, Australia. From there his expedition disappeared, and nothing was known of his fate until wreckage was discovered 40 years later. $10,500.

Helen R. Kahn & Associates Rare Books, Maps & Manuscripts has a website at www.hrkahnbooks.com or may be reached by phone at 514-844-5344.