Pope and the Blounts: Books Formerly at Mapledurham House

Abstract

This essay reconstructs a collection of books given by Alexander Pope to the Blount family of Mapledurham in Oxfordshire. The collection includes both books that were presented by the author to the Blounts and also books from his personal library that were bequeathed to Martha Blount in his will. In 1951 more than thirty of the most important books in the collection were sold to the firm of William H. Robinson Ltd. and subsequently dispersed. This essay traces those books and provides their present locations in a finding list. Paying close attention to these books reveals the degree to which Pope was interested not only in the printed form of his writings, but also in their broader bibliographical presentation.

Alexander Pope prided himself on his capacity for friendship. Sometimes he would demonstrate that friendship through the gift of books. Two of his dearest friends, particularly during his early years, were the sisters Teresa and Martha Blount. Along with their brother Michael I (so-called to avoid confusion with his son, Michael II) the sisters were the youngest generation of an old Catholic family based at Mapledurham House in Oxfordshire, some fourteen miles from Pope’s childhood home.

As his fame grew, Pope would display his affection for the Blount sisters by presenting them with copies of his own writings, sometimes accompanied by dedicatory verses. After a later rift with Teresa, he would also, on occasion, give Martha special copies or duplicates from his own library: for instance, the copy of Archbishop Fenélon’s Telemachus which formerly belonged to John Gay, presented to Martha in 1734.¹ When Pope died in 1744, the bulk of his library went to Ralph Allen and William Warburton, but only after ‘Mrs. Martha Blount has chosen Threescore out of the Number’, in addition to which she received a thousand pounds, Pope’s household goods and chattels, and the residue of his estate.² On her behalf, Pope was already in the process of buying the lease on a townhouse—on Berkeley Street, some two hundred yards from Burlington House—where the books would find their new home.³ Upon Martha’s death nineteen years later, the books passed along with the rest of her goods, including her correspondence with Pope, to her nephew, Michael II, at Mapledurham.⁴ As the volumes were absorbed into the family library, Michael II pasted armorial bookplates inside the front boards: atop the family crest is the sun in splendour charged in the centre with an eye, and, below the crest, the motto ‘LUX TUA VITA MEA’.

Unlike the correspondence, which was lent to the Rev. William Lisle Bowles and Alexander Chalmers for their ten-volume edition of Pope, published in 1806, the books would remain mostly undisturbed in their original bindings and wrappers for the next hundred years. Occasionally they would be read by members of the household (as the unusually polemical marginalia in §23 attests) but the fine condition of most of the volumes suggests that they were seldom opened. In the mid-nineteenth century, the Scottish literary critic Robert Carruthers consulted the Mapledurham archives for his new edition of Pope, published in 1853, and again while he was preparing a full-length biography of the poet, published four years later. ‘In the library at Mapledurham are several works which had formed part of Pope’s bequest of sixty volumes to Martha Blount’, Carruthers observed. ‘None of them have marginal remarks by the poet, or possess value as rare or original editions.’⁵ This, as we shall see, is not quite true.

In the early part of the twentieth century, two renowned Pope scholars visited Mapledurham. The first, in 1938, was Maynard Mack. He was shown eight books bequeathed by Pope to Martha Blount, and told of another four that could not presently be located.⁶ Several years later, the independent scholar Norman Ault went in search of untapped manuscript sources for the ‘minor poems’ volume of The Twickenham Edition of the Poems of Alexander Pope (published posthumously in 1954). He would write about the experience in his collection of essays, New Light on Pope (1949), in which he recalled ‘the pleasure of examining the Pope-Blount treasures preserved’ at Mapledurham.⁷ Not least among those treasures were presentation copies of the 1712 Miscellaneous Poems and Translations (§24), which contained the first printing of The Rape of the Locke, and of Pope’s 1717 Works (§32), exquisitely bound in red morocco and inscribed by Teresa Blount.

In 1972 Mapledurham’s owner, John ‘Jack’ Eyston, engaged Richard Williams as a part-time archivist to work on the collection. In addition to family papers and correspondence, the house was home to approximately three thousand volumes, most of which were held in the downstairs library. Partial inventories of the library had been taken in 1778, 1834, 1860, 1913, and 1971. By William’s own account, at the time of his appointment the collection was in a ‘terrible muddle’, with books distributed across the house and nothing where it ought to be.⁸ At some point the collection had been down-sized. During the eighteenth century, the books had been split across two rooms: the formal library and a smaller ‘study room’, which Williams suspected to have been the vestibule adjoining what was then the estate office. Now the entire collection fitted comfortably in the library alone.

Mack would return to Mapledurham in 1973, searching for additional books from Pope’s bequest. In a preparatory letter, Williams warned Mack that ‘a substantial number of books formerly at Mapledurham has now disappeared’.⁹ After days of fruitless searching, Mack was forced to agree.¹⁰ Indeed, in 1978 a collection of seventeenth- and eighteenth-century musical manuscripts with a Mapledurham provenance appeared on the market, including one compiled by or possibly for Teresa Blount while a schoolgirl in Paris.¹¹ According to the bookseller (the reputable Oxford dealer Robin Waterfield) the collection had been out of Mapledurham for at least a gene- ration before it came to him.

When Williams finally completed his catalogue of the Mapledurham library in 1984—a mammoth work of scholarship—it described a number of important association copies: Pope’s copy of the Geneva edition of Boileau’s Oeuvres (1716), given to him by James Craggs in 1717 and presumably acquired by Martha Blount as one of her sixty books; Martha’s copies of separate folio poems by Addison, still in their original wrappers; seven volumes of The Spectator belonging to Teresa and her brother Michael I, given to them by their mother; a fine paper copy of John Sheffield, duke of Buckingham’s Works (1723), bound in ruby morocco, which had been edited by Pope and was, upon publication, censored by the govern- ment.¹²

However, many of the most alluring books had disappeared. Williams identified these books by comparing the present-day holdings against inventories taken during the eighteenth and nineteenth centuries. At the rear of his catalogue, he included a list of 243 titles ‘now disappeared or else- where’.¹³ Many of these missing books dated from the nineteenth century, when the ‘study room’ had fallen out of use; others, Williams suspected, were phantoms resulting from poor earlier cataloguing. However, also on this list were the presentation copies of Miscellaneous Poems and Translations and the Works mentioned by Ault: Pope’s inscribed copies of Milton, Prior, Cervantes, and Montaigne; Martha’s copies of Gulliver’s Travels (1726) and the Dunciad Variorum (1729); two sammelbands of quarto plays and pamphlets, and numerous volumes from Pope’s library. Williams never saw any of these books, which would surely have numbered among the most significant in the collection. Forty-three titles have now been traced. Moreover, it has been possible to piece together the story of their dispersal.

Tucked into Mack’s copy of the Mapledurham catalogue, between the entries for ‘F’ and ‘G’, is a loose sheet listing thirty-nine books, totalling sixty-four volumes.¹⁴ This enigmatic document is a photocopy of a type- written original. The list runs as follows (I have added numbers for convenience):

• [1]

  Pope. Temple of Fame. 1715. 1 vol.

• [2]

  Stanley. History of Philosophy. 1701. 1 vol.

• [3]

  Purchase. Pilgrims. 1625. 1 vol.

• [4]

  Homer, Iliad and Odyssey. 1715–20. 6 vols.

• [5]

  Pope. Works. 1717. 1 vol.

• [6]

  Milton, Paradise Lost and [7] Regained. 1705. 2 vols.

• [8]

  Poems on Several Occasions. 1721. 2 vols.

• [9]

  Burnet. Letters. 1686. 1 vol.

• [10]

  Don Quixote. 1700. 4 vols.

• [11]

  Telemacque. 1717. 2 vols.

• [12]

  Miscellaneous Poems. 1712. 1 vol.

• [13]

  Glover. Leonides. 1737. 1 vol.

• [14]

  Hill. Alzira. 1736. 1 vol.

• [15]

  Miscellanies in Prose and Verse. 1728. 4 vols.

• [16]

  Montaigne. Essays. 3 vols. 1685.

• [17]

  Miller. Gardener’s Dictionary. 1731. 1 vol.

• [18]

  Johnson’s Dictionary. 1799. 2 vols.

• [19]

  Collier, Great Historical Dictionary. 1701. 3 vols.

• [20]

  Dictionaire Historique. Folio. 2 vols.

• [21]

  Calmet. Dictionaire Historique. 1730. 2 vols.

• [22]

  Engraved Account Book (Farm Work). 1 vol.

• [23]

  Old England’s Worthies. c.1870.

• [24]

  Joseph Andrews. 1742. 2 vols.

• [25]

  Gulliver’s Travels. 1 vol.

• [26]

  The Dunciad. 1729. 1 vol.

• [27]

  Gay. Trivia. 1715. 1 vol.

• [28]

  Museum of Animated Nature. 1850. 1 vol.

• [29]

  Carruthers. Life of Pope. 1857. 1 vol.

• [30]

  Essay on Love. 1702.

• [31]

  Harte. Poems. 1727.

• [32]

  Marinda. 1716.

• [33]

  Ancient India. 1733.

• [34]

  Parnell. Poems. 1722.

• [35]

  Bacon. Essays (imp.). 1668.

• [36]

  Voyages. 4 vols. 1707.

• [37]

  Truth in a Mask. 1744.

• [38]

  Hayliss. Damascus. 1720.

• [39]

  Leisure Hours. 1744.

The list bears neither a name nor a title to suggest its purpose. However, with two exceptions, all the books given in this document are also on Williams’s list of books no longer at Mapledurham. The first exception is ‘Engraved Account Book (Farm Work). 1 vol.’, missing from Williams’s catalogue presumably because it was kept in a study or office and not in the library. The second exception is ‘Hayliss. Damascus. 1720.’, which corres- ponds with no known volume in ESTC. However, if ‘Hayliss’ was an error for ‘Hughes’, then the details would tally precisely with the quarto of John Hughes’s play The Siege of Damascus (1720), seemingly given to Martha Blount by Pope, which is included on Williams’s list of missing books (Williams XX57).

Next to the entry for each of these books in Williams’s list is a small note: ‘Sold to Robinsons c. 1951’. William H. Robinson Ltd. was an antiquarian bookseller established by the brothers Lionel and Philip Robinson in 1930 (trading under the name of their grandfather, a Newcastle book dealer since 1881). The Robinson brothers were well-respected in the trade. Between 1938 and 1942, Lionel served as President of the Antiquarian Booksellers Association. In 1946, they famously secured the remaining collection of the nineteenth-century antiquary Sir Thomas Phillipps for £100,000—a deal that effectively secured their position at the pinnacle of the trade. Unlike most of the antiquarian trade, which was clustered around Bond Street, the Robinson brothers set up shop on Pall Mall, where they carefully imbued their shop with the same clubbable atmosphere that drew members of the nobility and gentry to the neighbourhood. The great Cambridge librarian and bibliographer Tim Munby fondly recalled their keeping ‘a decanter of sherry close to hand’, which, in combination with ‘Lionel’s more forceful personality and financial flair’, helped loosen the purse-strings of many a tight-fisted aristocrat.¹⁵ And while bibliophiles could enjoy the delights of the decanter elsewhere—at Elkin Matthews, on the corner of Conduit Street and Bond Street, A. W. Evans and Percy Muir were known to throw gossipy ‘sherry parties’ for their customers—the Robinsons cultivated an air of refinement and discretion.¹⁶

One area in which the Robinsons were ahead of their time was in the acquisition and marketing of association copies. Lionel would tour the country and hobnob with representatives of the oldest families, coaxing them to part with tomes from their manorial libraries.¹⁷ In 1948 he visited Dromoland Castle in County Clare and, in his words, ‘persuaded’ Lord Inchiquin to sell him the family’s first edition of Pope’s Iliad (1715–20), which had originally belonged to Jonathan Swift; two years later he offered it to Donald and Mary Hyde at the ‘very low price’ of $185.¹⁸ In 1935 they sold a professed ‘self-portrait’ of Pope to the American collector A. Edward Newton.¹⁹ Another item with a Popeian association which passed through their shop was the holograph of George Stepney’s translation of Juvenal’s eighth Satire, as published by Dryden in 1693. At some point this manuscript must have been in Pope’s hands, for he annotated the final leaf: ‘Who compares this Original of M^r Stepney’s with that printed in Drydens Juvenal, will see y^e vast advantages it receiv’d by passing under his hands. I question not, the same w^d appear of y^e other translations there, if y^e originals were extant to make the same comparison. this was what that great Man did for almost all his acquaintance’.²⁰ It is an especially revealing note for it shows that Pope esteemed Dryden’s skill not only as a poet but also as an editor. The brothers sold this manuscript to William Andrews Clark in 1936.

Two things about the Robinsons’ acquisition of the Mapledurham books seem clear. Firstly, the anonymous list of books in Mack’s copy of the library catalogue was almost certainly written on their typewriter (albeit not on letterhead); the lettering matches their typewritten correspondence precisely. Secondly, Lionel Robinson handled the transaction, as he had with Lord Inchiquin; next to the entry for Bacon’s Essays (1668–69; three volumes bound as one), Williams broke his usual pattern and wrote ‘Sold to Lionel Robinson c. 1951’.²¹ The Robinson business records have not survived, but 1951 seems a plausible date. Ault saw several of the books shortly before the publication of New Light on Pope in 1949; two of the books (§6 and §31) were first included in a Robinson catalogue in 1953.²² The first record of any sale comes in July 1956, when Donald and Mary Hyde, then staying at Claridge’s during a book-buying jaunt to London, bought six Mapledurham books from the Robinsons for £402. The relevant part of their bill runs thus:

According to accession records, later that same year Harvard bought ten books from the Robinsons, including a Mapledurham book (§17) for $127.²⁴ Three Mapledurham books (§21, §40, and the sammelband containing §20, §18, §43, §10, §7, and §39) were sold to the American collector Robert H. Taylor, though we do not know when. Another two books (§26 and, bound as one, §5 and §1) went to Yale, both originally from Pope’s library. Although in this instance there is no accession record, it may be that the Yale scholar-collector James Osborn in some way facilitated the sale. In September 1953, Osborn received a tantalizing note from Lionel Robinson: ‘On the question of Pope, you may have heard that we possess the remarkable collection of books which Pope bequeathed to his sweetheart, Martha Blount, and many of which bear his autograph.’²⁵ Five months later, during a trip to London, he would visit their shop on Pall Mall.

Despite interest from various collectors, it seems that the Robinsons kept the best books for themselves. On Philip Robinson’s death in 1988, much of his personal collection was auctioned by Sotheby’s in a blockbuster two-day sale.²⁶ But a selection of books was held back by his widow and, on her death in 1998, donated to Newcastle University Library, renamed the Philip Robinson Library in his honour. Among the bequeathed books were twenty- one volumes from Mapledurham—fourteen individual titles. Why Philip Robinson kept hold of these books is a mystery. The firm ceased trading in 1956, though the brothers would continue dealing privately for several years; perhaps he was salting them down for some future customer who never materialized. Perhaps he simply wanted them for himself. Since arriving in Newcastle, though, none of these books has received any scholarly notice. In large part, this neglect may be explained by the over- reliance of modern bibliographical scholarship on the holdings information compiled by ESTC, from which the Robinson books are absent. The only record of their existence is in the local catalogue.

Although the Robinson list contains most of the books now traced from Mapledurham, it is not a wholly accurate reflection of the books they walked away with. The list mentions a first edition of Gay’s Trivia (Robinson 27), but Martha Blount’s copy of the poem, presented to her by the author on 22 January 1716, apparently remains in situ (Williams G17). Conversely, the list does not include the two volumes of Gay’s Fables (1727– 38), bound as one, which Lionel Robinson sold to the Hydes in 1956. Nor does it include two other volumes in public libraries, both with a Mapledurham provenance. The first is a 1688 reprint of Henry VIII’s Assertio septem sacramentorum, a brilliant piece of Catholic polemic, chiefly ghostwritten by Thomas More, with an inscription to the front flyleaf in the hand of Michael I (§16). This book was sold to the Huntington in 1976 by Harry A. Levinson, a California bookseller and founding member of the Antiquarian Booksellers’ Association of America (ABAA). The second volume is a sammelband of seven political pamphlets published between 1714 and 1730 (§4, §8, §15, §36, §37, §28, §42); this book is now at Princeton but there is no accession record in the Firestone Library. It may be that both these volumes left Mapledurham as part of the same transac- tion with the Robinsons. It may be that they were sold off separately.

All the books now traced from Mapledurham fall into one of three categories: (1) books originally from Pope’s library; (2) presentation copies of Pope’s works; and (3) other books belonging to the Blount siblings.

The first category has received most attention from previous scholars, most notably from Mack, whose finding list of Pope’s books, though incomplete, remains the standard work of its kind. For the most part, Pope’s annotations in the books traced here adhere to the established patterns: his use of marginal inverted commas to mark passages of note, for instance, and evidence of textual emendation and the collation of different editions. These patterns are particularly clear in the two volumes of Pope’s Milton (§22 and §23), which, judging by the small ‘print’ hand characteristic of his later teenage years, Pope appears to have bought and annotated soon after publication in 1705. He compared the text of Paradise Lost against one of the ten-book 1669 quartos, to which he presumably had access through a friend or neighbour. In Book XI (lines 485–7), he noted three lines absent from the earlier quarto. Perhaps more intriguing is the manuscript addition of the short advertisement from ‘The Printer to the Reader’, first printed in the third issue of the first edition but absent from Pope’s 1705 copy. Pope explained his rationale for supplementing the text: ‘The Arguments & foregoing Preface were not intended by Milton, but occasioned by the importunity of the Printer; as appears by this short Advertisement pre-fix’d to the first Edition. I insert the words, because I suppose them written by Milton himself’. There are signs of close reading throughout Comus; Pope’s characteristic marginal commas adorn the margins of six pages, none of which is mentioned by Mack, whose practise is not to note them. A more unusual, though still undeniably Popeian intervention is the careful scraping away of the word ‘yet’ from the line ‘I must not suffer this, [yet]’tis but the lees’, resulting in a metrically perfect pentameter line. During his youth, Pope often scraped words and whole lines from manuscripts where he wished to make neat corrections without interlineation: most notably the ‘imitation print’ manuscripts of the Pastorals (c. 1704), An Essay on Criticism (1709), and Windsor-Forest (1712), where scrapings may be detected by the tell-tale feathering of the replaced text due to the rougher paper surface absorbing the ink differently. However, such scraped emenda- tions have not previously been noted in a printed work.

The second characteristic of Pope’s books is his inscriptions. These vary considerably. His early inscriptions are often elaborate. The earliest known examples are from his copies of Don Quixote (Mack 35; §5), George Herbert’s The Temple (Mack 78), and a collected volume of John Oldham’s works (Mack 125), which he bought at the age of twelve: each of the three inscriptions is dated 1700, records the price paid, and is written in a fancy italic hand, with exaggerated looping entry and exit strokes. The next dated example, from 1701 in Pope’s copy of Chaucer, is more typographic: ‘Ex Libris | ALEXANDRI POPEI’, written a neat imitation of roman and italic capitals, with a looping swash to the capital ‘A’. Very similar is the undated inscription to Thomas Stanley’s folio The History of Philosophy, published in 1701 (§38): a combination of imitation roman and swash italic, with the price in smaller roman script, and the same Latinized version of Pope’s name, which Pope continued to use in inscriptions until around 1706, when he switched to a less ornate hand.²⁷ In folio volumes, he continued to inscribe, date, and record the price in large, flowing italics at the centre of the flyleaf: for instance, his copy of Montaigne (§26), which keeps ‘Popei’ and is dated 1706. Hereafter and for smaller books, though, a simple ‘A. Pope’ or ‘E Libris A. Pope’ in the upper right corner of the flyleaf came to suffice.

It is important to note that although as a young man Pope habitually inscribed his books, with age he became increasingly lax. Of the forty-three books described below, two originally belonging to Pope do not bear his inscription (§9 and §18). Mack gives another nine such examples (nos. 23, 28, 38, 44, 75, 95, 117, 127, 167). In searching for Popeian books at Mapledurham, though, Mack’s operating assumption was that Martha Blount would only have picked books with the added ‘association value’ of Pope’s inscription.²⁸ Hence his conviction that the bulk of Pope’s books must have been sold off by descendants of the Blounts in the early part of the twentieth century, when in fact, as Williams’s comparison of nineteenth- century inventories against his own catalogue makes quite clear, the library remained largely intact until the Robinson deal in 1951.

From these details, we may conclude two things: firstly, many of the sixty books taken by Martha Blount from Pope’s collection likely remain at Mapledurham; secondly, they bear no inscriptions or other obvious signs of ownership. It may yet be possible to identify some of these uninscribed books by looking for evidence of annotation: marginal commas, for instance, or emended punctuation and scrapings. Mack himself conceded that there are books we know Pope to have owned but of which no copies have been found bearing his inscription: two examples are his editions of Parnell’s Poems on Several Occasions (1722; §27) and of Buckingham’s Works (1723). It may be significant that, before the Robinson deal, copies of both of those books could be found on the shelves at Mapledurham, each of them bound in Pope’s favourite red morocco. Whether these copies were presented to Martha Blount during Pope’s lifetime or inherited by her after his death must for now remain a mystery.

Less mysterious are the books Pope prepared for presentation. It has long been acknowledged that Pope invested a great deal of time and care in the printed appearance of his texts. As has already been mentioned, his early manuscripts were designed to look like printed books. His contract for the Iliad stipulated that it should be printed in a new font ‘of such kind and Size as the said Alexander Pope shall chuse or direct’ with ‘head pieces and tail pieces and initiall letters’ engraved ‘in such manner by such Graver as the said Alexander Pope shall direct and appoint’.²⁹ His 1717 Works would be printed with the same font and overall mis-en-page, reinforcing his status as a modern classic. It is less commonly observed that Pope’s interest in the material book extended beyond typography and illustration: he would, for instance, stipulate that his books should be printed on several different paper stocks, ranging from standard to ‘ultrafine’ (i.e. extra thick) for special copies.³⁰ He also paid attention to how those special copies were bound. Trade copies of shorter separately published works such as The Temple of Fame (1715) were sold in blue-grey paper wrappers as standard. But the copy of The Temple of Fame presented to Martha Blount (§31), with verses inscribed on the flyleaf, is stitched in vibrant marbled wrappers. Although two major early poems, the Pastorals and The Rape of the Locke, first appeared in miscellanies, they were printed with separate title pages probably so that offprints (perhaps on fine paper) could be circulated among friends and patrons.³¹ None of these offprints is known to have survived, though it is not beyond the realms of speculation that they would likewise have been stitched in upmarket marbled wrappers.

Very similar marbled endpapers feature in several of the Mapledurham bindings, most notably the copy of Pope’s 1717 Works presented to Teresa Blount (§32). It is one of the ultrafine paper copies, sumptuously bound in red morocco stamped in gilt. Unlike the other presentation copies from Mapledurham, there is no inscription in Pope’s hand. Nor is there a clear accompanying letter in the Blount archives. Admittedly, there are two undated notes which may have accompanied the book. One, addressed to both sisters, ‘is accompanyd with a Book which I think a very pretty one, & I believe you have never read’.³² The other, addressed solely to Teresa, opens simply ‘I send your book’, to which Sherburn gives a tentative date of October 1718.³³ Either letter would be a remarkably coy accompaniment for such a grand volume. Although the red and gilt binding of this copy may indeed be described as ‘very pretty’, it is difficult to square the fact that this first letter is addressed to both sisters whereas the copy of the Works is inscribed by Teresa alone. The second note may refer to a later volume of the Iliad (§30), also inscribed by Teresa.

The absence of either an authorial inscription or an obvious accompanying letter comes as a surprise. The Temple of Fame has impromptu verses on the flyleaf and the accompanying letter has survived. One would expect this copy of the Works likewise to be accompanied by dedicatory verses or, at the very least, an inscription such as the one to Teresa in the first volume of the Iliad. Moreover, a book of this status would surely require a more substantial poem. In 1949, Ault proposed ‘Verses Sent to Mrs. T. B. with his Works’, attributed to an anonymous ‘Author’ in the verse miscellany The Grove (1721), as the poem that must originally have accompanied a copy of the Works sent to Teresa Blount. The reappearance of this copy of the Works prompts fresh consideration. The poem is of special bibliographical interest because its central conceit is that ‘Mrs. T. B.’ will be so enthralled by the book’s sumptuous red and gold binding that she will keep it without ever bothering to read it:

This Book, which, like its Author, You

By the bare Outside only knew,

(Whatever was in either Good,

Not look’d in, or, not understood)

Comes, as the Writer did too long,

To be about you, right or wrong;

Neglected on your Chair to lie,

Nor raise a Thought, nor draw an Eye;

In peevish Fits to have you say,

See there! you’re always in my Way!

Or, if your Slave you think to bless,

I like this Colour, I profess!

That Red is charming all will hold,

I ever lov’d it—next to Gold.

Can Book, or Man, more Praise obtain?

What more could G—ge or S—te gain?

Sillier than G-ld-n cou’dst thou be,

Nay, did all J-c-b breath in thee,

She keeps thee, Book! I’ll lay my Head,

What? throw away a Fool in Red:

No, trust the Sex’s sacred Rule;

The gaudy Dress will save the Fool.³⁴

Strong verbal evidence for Pope’s authorship was first amassed by Ault.³⁵ Mack and Valerie Rumbold have since supplied convincing biographical readings that strengthen the case.³⁶ When Pope addressed a birthday poem to Martha Blount in 1723, she was named in the title as ‘Mrs. M. B.’, echoing the ‘Mrs. T. B.’ of the ‘Verses’.³⁷ Moreover, the character of ‘T. B.’ is perfectly in keeping with Pope’s view of Teresa Blount, whom he had by 1717 come to believe superficial, vain, and cruel. He also made jibes about her lack of interest in the content of books: ‘You (who read nothing)’, he wrote to her in a letter of 1714, in contrast to the voracious reading of her sister.³⁸ A transcription of the final six lines, either garbled or tweaked, appears in a manuscript miscellany from the library of Edward Harley, though not in his hand, under the title ‘Wrote in Mr Gay’s Works, Presented to a Lady the Book Finely Bound’.³⁹ However, this transcription says nothing about the fragment’s authorship, nor does it mention ‘Mrs. T. B.’. Although Gay’s Poems on Several Occasions (1720) was elaborately printed, unlike Pope’s collected poems it was not called a Works. Furthermore, according to Williams’s catalogue, the Mapledurham copy of Gay’s Poems (G15) is a standard subscriber’s copy with no inscription and is not bound in the same ‘gaudy dress’ of red morocco and gilt. There is a presentation copy of Gay’s Trivia (Williams G17), but this copy was given by Gay to Martha, not Teresa. Assuming ‘Mrs. T. B.’ is Teresa Blount, as seems overwhelmingly likely, this copy of Pope’s Works is the only volume that fits the bill.

One objection to this identification of the ‘Verses’ as the poem that originally accompanied Pope’s Works might be that the poem is not inscribed in the volume itself. And yet the published title of the ‘Verses’ is carefully phrased: the poem is ‘Sent to Mrs. T. B. with his Works’, not written in his Works, as it says in the Harley transcript. Compare this with the published title of another of Pope’s familiar poems, also probably writ- ten to Teresa: ‘To a Young Lady with the Works of Voiture’ (1712). In other words, is it not likely these poems would have accompanied their respective volumes on separate sheets? I speculate that Pope’s taunts annoyed Teresa, prompting her to discard the accompanying poem. When the ‘Verses’ were eventually printed in The Grove in 1721, Pope sent one of his four royal paper subscriber copies to Mapledurham (Williams G137), after which he and Teresa ceased all communication.⁴⁰ Evidently Teresa attached no sentimental value to this copy of Pope’s Works. Despite the poem’s gleeful ‘She keeps thee, Book!’, Teresa gave the book to her brother in 1727 and, when it was returned after his death, promptly sent it to his widow.

Though perhaps of less inherent literary value, the remaining books shed some light on the reading habits of a recusant gentry household in the early eighteenth century. Michael I was obviously a keen reader of oppositional political pamphlets. From the Mapledurham catalogue, there is a clear split between Martha’s voracious appetite for contemporary literature and French romance and the comparatively limited number of Teresa’s inscrip- tions. According to the index of Williams’s catalogue, thirty-two of the books remaining at Mapledurham are inscribed by Martha, of which fourteen are in French; ten may be described as religious, including a 1679 edition of Augustine’s Confessions (A52), an untrimmed copy of Francis Atterbury’s Maxims (1723), still in the original wrappers (A48), and a Catholic prayerbook given in 1706 by her uncle Charles Stonor Blount (R77); thirteen are of some historical or antiquarian interest, such as Arbuthnot’s 1727 Tables of Ancient Coins, Weights and Measures (A35) and David Mallet’s 1740 The Life of Francis Bacon (M18). And while only half a dozen of the remaining books may strictly be described as literary, including separates of Addison’s poems (A9), Gay’s Trivia (G17), and some later play quartos (H60, O8, S87), to that number may be added sixteen of the books enumerated here, without including the books she inherited from Pope.

By contrast, Teresa’s inscription survives in only ten books, plus one to which she subscribed and the three described below (§19, §30, §32). Of these, seven are in French; two are also inscribed by Martha (A52 and B137); one is a French prayerbook from her education in a Paris convent, inscribed ‘Teresa Mary Blount her book 1702 April 2’ (R69); and another, a 1705 copy of Madame de Lafayette’s Zayde (L10), printed in Paris, was given by ‘Cap^tn G: Bagnell’, a married man whom Teresa would later take as her lover, causing immense grief to her family.⁴¹ It has been suggested that George Bagnall, a military officer, was the foppish ‘Fool in Red’ at whom Pope scoffs in ‘Verses Sent to Mrs. T. B.’.⁴² Even granting that ownership of a book is no guarantee of interest in its contents, this particular volume was obviously important to Teresa. Whereas she gave away her copy of Pope’s Works at the first opportunity, despite its fabulous binding, this gift from Bagnall remained with her all her life.

Footnotes

APPENDIX

DESCRIPTIONS OF THE BOOKS

The following list is alphabetized according to author and title. Individual titles are given separate entries, even when bound in a single volume; the volume description is given in the first alphabetical entry. Each entry provides: (1) a bibliographical description including reference numbers from the ESTC and, where appropriate, David F. Foxon, English Verse 1701–1750: A Catalogue of Separately Printed Poems with Notes on Contemporary Collected Editions, 2 vols (London: Cambridge University Press, 1975); R. H. Griffith, Alexander Pope: A Bibliography, 2 vols (Austin: University of Texas, 1922–27); Richard G. Williams, ‘Mapledurham House Library: Catalogue of Printed Books and Manuscripts’ ([n.p.], 1981[–84]); the Robinson list transcribed above; and Maynard Mack, ‘A Finding List of Books Surviving from Pope’s Library with a Few That May Not Have Survived’, in Collected in Himself: Essays Critical, Biographical, and Bibliographical on Pope and Some of His Contemporaries (Newark, DE: University of Delaware Press, 1982), pp. 394–460; (2) the present location of the book; (3) a bibliographical note.

§1 Animadversions on the Reflections upon Dr. B’s Travels. [London?]: Printed in the Year 1688. 12o. Pp. [4], 5–57, [1]. ESTC R24120; [Williams XX17]; [Robinson 9].

Location:

Yale, Beinecke Rare Book and Manuscript Library, Ik P810 Zz686(2)

Note:

Contemporary brown sheep, with double blind rule to boards and gilt rules framing the bands. Red morocco spine label reads ‘BURNET’S | TRAVELS’. Armorial bookplate of Michael Blount II on front pastedown, beneath page numbers jotted by Pope, corresponding to marginal marks in §5, with which this pamphlet is bound. Not in Mack.

§2 [John Arbuthnot.] An Appendix to John Bull Still in His Senses. London: Printed for John Morphew, near Stationer’s Hall, 1712. 8^o. Fragment. ESTC T22317.

Location:

Newcastle, Robinson Library, Robinson 441

Note:

Between pp. 222 and 223 of §32 is a scrap torn from the title page of this pamphlet, presumably an impromptu bookmark used by an early reader in Mapledurham. The scrap reads merely ‘AN [AP]PENDIX’ within a double ruled border. From the slightly nicked stem of the capital ‘N’ and the gap in the upper right corner of the ruled border, this has been identified as part of the title page to the second edition. No copy in Williams.

§3 Richard Blome. A Geographical Description of the Four Parts of the World. London: Printed by T. N. for R. Blome, dwelling in the Savoy near the Kings Wardrobe, and for convenience are also sold by Nath. Brooks at the Angel in Cornhil, Edw. Brewster at the Crane in St Pauls Church-yard, and Tho. Basset at the George in Fleetstreet, near Cliffords-Inn, 1670. 2^o. Pp. [12], 113, [5], 82, [4], 138, [6], 56, [2], 48, 41–55, [1]. ESTC R7171; Williams XX9.

Location:

Newcastle, Robinson Library, Robinson 413

Note:

Contemporary brown calf, boards stamped blind with gilt tooling to the spine. Marbled endpapers with small inscription in the hand of Michael II: ‘Michael | Blount | 1740’. Third front flyleaf inscribed ‘Michael Blount’ and stamped with the family crest. Michael II inherited Mapledurham on the death of his father in 1739; in 1740 he conducted a detailed survey of the library and inscribed ‘Michael | Blount| 1740’ into many of the family books. William records 124 books bearing some variation of this inscription. Verso of first back flyleaf has manuscript financial calculations dated February 1701 in an unknown hand. Missing ‘A General Mapp of the Empire of Germany’.

§4 Samuel Brewster. Jus Feciale Anglicanum, or, A Treatise of the Laws of England Relating to War and Rebellion. London: Printed for A. More, and sold by the booksellers of London, and Westminster, 1725. 8^o. Pp. [4], xxiv, 55. ESTC T29299; Williams XX143.

Location:

Princeton, Princeton University Library, DA503 1714.B73(1)

Note:

Part of a volume containing seven octavo pamphlets. Contemporary speckled tan calf, stamped blind. No spine label. Front pastedown inscribed ‘Michael | Blount | 1740’ (on this inscription, see §3). Bookplate of Princeton University Library. The volume contains, in order of binding: §4, §8, §15, §36, §37, §28, and §42.

§5 Gilbert Burnet. Some Letters. Containing, an Account of What Seemed Most Remarkable in Switzerland, Italy, &c. At Amsterdam, Printed in the Year, 1686 [i.e. 1687]. 12^o. Pp. [2], 3–308, [8], 309–316. ESTC R25313; Williams XX17; Robinson 9; Mack 31.

Location:

Yale, Beinecke Rare Book and Manuscript Library, Ik P810 Zz686(1)

Note:

For a description of the volume, see §1. Title page annotated by Pope: ‘Alex: Pope. | Pr. 1.^{s 6}.^d’ In the section of the title page ‘Written by G. BURNET, D. D. to T. H. R. B.’, he expands ‘H^ble R^t Boyle’. At the rear of the book is a note in Pope’s hand: ‘The Discourse of the Catacombs | page 204, to p. 213, one of | the most remarkable passages | of this book.’ Imperfect copy missing the section ‘REFLECTIONS On Mr. VARILLAS’s HISTORY Of the Revolutions that have happened in Europe in matters of Religion’ ([2]A–D¹²) but including ‘AN APPENDIX, OR, SUPPLEMENT TO Dr. BURNET’s Letters’ (O⁸) from the ‘Rotterdam’ edition (ESTC R25315), with quire B⁴ from the same edition bound in.

§6 Miguel de Cervantes. The History of the Renown’d Don Quixote de la Mancha. Written in Spanish by Miguel de Cervantes Saavedra. Translated from the Original by Several Hands: and Publish’d by Peter Motteux Servant to His Majesty. London: Printed for Sam. Buckley at the Dolphin in St. Paul’s Church-yard, M.DCC [1700– 1703]. 4 vols. 12^o. Pp. [24], 327, [1]; [10], 331–660, [2]; [2], iii–xiv, vi, 342; [10], 337–722, 221–232. ESTC R21655 and N33121; Williams XX23; Robinson 10; Mack 35.

Location:

Harvard, Houghton Library, Hyde Collection *2003J–EC322

Note:

Contemporary brown calf, stamped blind, with handwritten spine labels and fore-edge titles in Pope’s best ‘print’ hand. Armorial bookplate of Michael Blount II on front pastedown. Pope bought volumes one and two as soon as they were published: volume two is inscribed ‘E Libris Alex. Pope. Pret. 2.^s | 1700’, making it Pope’s earliest known purchase, bought at the age of twelve. Volumes three and four are both inscribed ‘E’ Libris Alex: Pope. Pr. 2.^{s 6d}. ’, and were likely bought on publication in 1703. The first inscription is in a decorative italic hand; the latter two are in Pope’s neat but less ornate italics. The second flyleaf to volume one has lengthy inscription in his neat ‘print’ hand, quoting René Rapin:

Rapine, Reflections, p^t 2.

WE have two Modern Satires writt in Prose, w.^chsurpass all that have been writt of this Kinde in these latter Ages. The first is Spanish, compo- sed by CERVANTES, Secretary to the Duke of Alva. This great Man having been slighted, and receiv’d some Disgrace by the Duke of Lerma, the Chief Minister of State to Philip III, who had ~ no respect for Men of Learning, writ the Rom- ance of Don Quixote; which is a most fine and ingenious Satire on his own Country; because the Nobility of Spain, whom he renders ridicu- lous by this work, were all bit in the head & ntoxicated with Knight Errantry. This is a se- cret I learn’d from one of my Freinds, who recei- ved it from Don Lope, whom Cervantes had made the Confident of his Resentments.

Listed in Robinson catalogue 83: Rare Books and Manuscripts (1953), pp. 150– 51, for £350. Purchased for £300 in 1956 by Donald and Mary Hyde from William H. Robinson Ltd.

§7 Colley Cibber. The Non-Juror. A Comedy. As It is Acted at the Theatre-Royal, By His Majesty’s Servants. London: Printed for B. Lintot, at the Cross-Keys in Fleetstreet. MDCCXVIII [1718]. 8^o. Pp. [4], vi, [4], 76, [4]. ESTC T26840.

Location:

Princeton, Princeton University Library, 18th-412(5)

Note:

Not in Williams. Half-title inscribed in pencil: ‘Martha Blount’. The hand is not Blount’s; it resembles that of Cibber, though this has not been possible to establish with any certainty. Part of a volume containing six octavo playbooks. Contemporary polished calf, with gilt tooling on the spine and gilt double border with blind tooling on the boards. Spine title reads: ‘COLLECTION OF | MODERN| PLAYS’. Bookplates of Michael Blount II and Robert H. Taylor on front pastedown. Second front flyleaf inscribed ‘Martha Blount, | 1723.’, presumably the date of binding. Part of the Taylor bequest to Princeton in 1986. The volume contains, in order of binding: §20, §18, §43, §10, §7, and §39.

§8 Considerations on the Present State of Affairs in Europe. London: Printed for J. Roberts in Warwick-Lane, 1730. 8^o. Pp. [2], 53, [1]. ESTC T90007.

Location:

Princeton, Princeton University Library, DA503 1714.B73(2)

Note:

For a description of the volume, see §4.

§9 François de Fénelon. Les avantures de Telemaque fils d’Ulysse. A Paris: Chez Florentin Delaulne, rue Saint-Jacques, à l’Empereur. M.DCCXVII [1717]. 2 vols. 12o. Pp. [4], [i]–lviii, [14], [1]–492, [2]; [16], [1]–478, [2]. Williams XX39; Robinson 11; Mack 64.

Location:

Newcastle, Robinson Library, Robinson 63

Note:

Contemporary brown calf, gilt tooling to boards, spine, and edges. Marbled endpapers. Green ribbon bookmark in volume two. At the top of the front flyleaf in volume one is an inscription in Pope’s rough italic hand: ‘This book was once | M.^r Gay’s, next M.^r Pope’s, | now M.^rs M. Blount’s. | 1734.’ The top right corner of the title page in each volume bears the ownership inscription ‘J Gay’.

§10 Elijah Fenton. Mariamne. A Tragedy. Acted at the Theatre Royal in Lincoln’s- Inn-Fields.

London: Printed for J. Tonson at Shakespear’s Head over-against Katharine- Street in the Strand, 1723. 8^o. Pp. [8], 75, [5]. ESTC T38972; Williams XX62.

Location:

Princeton, Princeton University Library, 18th-412(4)

Note:

For a description of the volume, see §7.

§11 John Gay. Fables. London: Printed for J. Tonson and J. Watts, M DCC XXVII [1727]. 4^o. Pp. [14], 173, [1]. ESTC T13818; Williams XX47.

Location:

Harvard, Houghton Library, Hyde Collection *2003J-EC321

Note:

Bound with §12. Contemporary full calf with gilt tooling to spine and boards, and a gilt spine label in red morocco: ‘GAY’S | FABLES’. Bookplates of Michael Blount II and of Donald and Mary Hyde on front pastedown. Purchased by the Hydes in 1956 from William H. Robinson Ltd.

§12 John Gay. Fables. By the late Mr. Gay. Volume the Second. Printed for J. and P. Knapton, in Ludgate-Street; and T. Cox, under the Royal-Exchange. M DCC XXXVIII [1738]. 4^o. Pp. [8], 155, [1]. ESTC T13827; Williams XX47.

Location:

Harvard, Houghton Library, Hyde Collection *2003J-EC321

Note:

For a description of the volume, see §11.

§13 Richard Glover. Leonidas, A Poem. London: Printed for R. Dodsley, at Tully’s Head in Pallmall. M.DCC. XXXVII [1737]. 4^o. Pp. [6], xvi, 335, [1]. ESTC T97589; Foxon G191; Williams XX49; Robinson 13; Mack 70.

Location:

Newcastle, Robinson Library, Robinson 440

Note:

Contemporary speckled light-brown calf, with gilt edges and gilt tooling around the boards; traces of gilt fleur-de-lis tooling on the spine, much rubbed. Marbled endpapers. Armorial bookplate of Michael Blount II on front pastedown. Third front flyleaf inscribed ‘Autoris Donum | A.^l Pope. 1737.’ Printed on extra-thick unwatermarked paper, unlike either the ordinary or fine paper stocks described by Foxon. Offset to the inside of the first flyleaf indicates that the loose sheets were originally stacked without the two additional leaves (a single sheet) now bound between the first flyleaf and the title page. Pope’s inscription is on the second of these additional leaves (the third flyleaf). From this it may be inferred that Pope received the book in sheets and had it bound with the additional sheet, which he then inscribed.

§14 Walter Harte. Poems on Several Occasions. London: Printed for Bernard Lintot, at the Cross-Keys between the Temple-Gates, in Fleetstreet, M.DCC.XXVII [1727]. 8^o. Pp. xxx, 244, [4]. ESTC T90938; Williams XX51; Robinson 31.

Location:

Harvard, Houghton Library, Hyde Collection *2003J-EC318

Note:

Contemporary calf, with gilt tooling to spine. Bookplates of Donald and Mary Hyde and the Houghton Library on front pastedown. Title page inscribed by Martha Blount in pencil: ‘Martha Bloun[t]’. Purchased by the Hydes in 1956 from William H. Robinson Ltd.

§15 E[dward] H[awarden]. Some Remarks on the Decree of King Augustus II. London: Printed for A. Moore, 1726. 8^o. Pp. [6], 34. ESTC N22934.

Location:

Princeton, Princeton University Library, DA503 1714.B73(3)

Note:

For a description of the volume, see §4.

§16 Henry VIII, King of England. Assertio septem sacramentorum: or, An Assertion of the Seven Sacraments, against Martin Luther. London: Printed by Nath. Thompson, at the entrance into the Old Spring-Garden near Charing Cross, 1688. 12^o. Pp. [32], 118, [2]. ESTC R416; Williams XX52.

Location:

San Marino, CA, Huntington Library, 431008

Note:

Contemporary speckled brown calf, boards edged with a blind double border and additional gilt double rule near the fore-edge. Gilt spine label. Armorial bookplate of Michael Blount II on front pastedown. Front flyleaf inscribed by Michael I: ‘Henry VIII. in sending his book on | y^e Sacraments accompanied it with| the following lines: | Anglorum Rex Henricus, Leo decime, mittit | hoc opus, & fidei testem & amicitice. | Henricus.’ Purchased by the Huntington in 1976 from Harry A. Levinson.

§17 Aaron Hill. Alzira. A Tragedy. As It is Acted at the Theatre-Royal, in Lincoln’s- Inn Fields. London: Printed for John Osborn, at the Golden Ball in Pater-Noster- Row, M.DCC.XXXVI [1736]. 8^o. Pp. xiv, [2], 56. ESTC T21310; Williams XX54; Robinson 14; Mack 81.

Location:

Harvard, Houghton Library, *Ec7.P8103.Zz736h

Note:

Presentation copy from Aaron Hill to Pope with the following inscription on the flyleaf: ‘August y^e 7.^th—1736. | To Alexander Pope Esq.^r | from His | most humble | & obedient Servant | A. Hill.’ Stitched in contemporary Dutch gilt paper wrappers. Purchased by Harvard in 1956 from William H. Robinson Ltd.

§18 John Hughes. The Siege of Damascus. A Tragedy. As It is Acted at the Theatre- Royal in Drury-Lane. London: Printed for John Watts at the Printing Office in Wild Court near Lincolns-Inn-Fields. MDCCXX [1720]. 8^o. Pp. [12], 68. ESTC T48256; Williams XX57; Robinson 38; Mack 96.

Location:

Princeton, Princeton University Library, 18th-412(2)

Note:

Head of title page inscribed ‘Alexander Pope’ in Martha Blount’s hand. Pope read this play in manuscript and excused himself from writing a prologue because of ill health (Corr., II, 28). Hughes died on opening night. Pope wrote a kind letter of condolence to his brother, Jabez Hughes (Corr., II, 34), but elsewhere agreed with Swift’s account of him as being ‘among the mediocribus in prose as well as in verse’ (Corr., III, 492, 508). For a description of the volume, see §7.

§19 [Silvester Jenks.] An Essay upon the Art of Love. [Paris?]: Printed MDCCII [1702]. 12^o. Pp. [8], 9–300. ESTC T55647; Williams XX37; Robinson 30.

Location:

Austin, TX, Harry Ransom Center, BV 4639 J45 1702

Note:

Contemporary brown calf with gilt tooling to spine. Armorial bookplate of Michael Blount II on front pastedown. Top of front flyleaf inscribed ‘Ter: Blount. e dono | H: Englefyld. 1702’. Below this are three maxims taken from François de La Rochefoucauld, in the hand of Teresa Blount, separated by dashes: ‘N’aimer gueres en amour | Est un Moyen assure pour | Estre aime’; ‘L’esperance toute trompeure | qu’elle Est, Sert au Moins | Nous Mener a La fin Dæ La | Vie par un chemin agreable’; ‘C’est Une preve De peu | D’amitie De Ne S’appercevoir | pas Du refroidissement De | celle De Nos Amis’. On the verso of the flyleaf are three more maxims in Teresa’s hand: ‘S’il y a un amour pur & | Exempt Du meslange De nos | pations C’est Celuy qui Est | Cache au fonds de cœur & que | Nous ignouons Nous- memes’; ‘quand on Ne trove pas son | repos en soy même ill Est | inuitille De la Chercher ailleures’; ‘On Nest Jamais Si heureux | ny Si Mallheurv\e/ux que Lon | panse’. The ‘H. Englefyld’ who gave this book to Teresa in 1702 may have been her uncle, Henry Englefield, who would inherit Whiteknights in 1712. More probably, though, the book was given to Teresa as a gift by her aunt, Helena Englefield, who was a nun in the Benedictine convent at Paris where the Blount sisters were educated. Although ESTC gives ‘[London?]’ as place of publication, a continental printing is more likely; the title-page woodcut precisely matches the one used for both the first and second editions of Jenks’s The Blind Obedience of an Humble Penitent (1698; 1699), which was printed either in Douai or Paris, where Jenks was a Catholic priest. There was also a copy of Jenks’s A Contrite and Humble Heart (1697) at Mapledurham, now missing (Williams XX183).

§20 Thomas Killigrew. Chit-Chat. A Comedy. As It is Acted at the Theatre-Royal in Drury-Lane, by His Majesty’s Servants. London: Printed for Bernard Lintot, between the Temple Gates [1719]. 8^o. Pp. [4], 70, [2]. ESTC T30601; Williams XX62.

Location:

Princeton, Princeton University Library, 18th-412(1)

Note:

Title page inscribed: ‘Mrs Blounts | giuen by y^e Author’. For a description of the volume, see §7.

§21 Leisure Hours Amusements: Being a Select Collection of One Hundred and Fifty of the Most Humorous and Diverting Stories. London: Printed for M. Cooper, at the Globe in Pater-Noster-Row, 1744. 12^o. Pp. xv, [1], 318. ESTC T128707; Williams XX67; Robinson 39.

Location:

Princeton, Princeton University Library, 18th-413

Note:

Contemporary brown calf. Upper front pastedown inscribed ‘Martha Blount’, below which the bookplate of Robert H. Taylor. Part of the Taylor bequest to Princeton in 1986.

§22 John Milton. Paradise Lost. A Poem, in Twelve Books. London: Printed for Jacob Tonson, within Grays-Inn Gate next Grays-Inn Lane. 1705. 8^o. Pp. [12], 483, [9]. ESTC T134232; Williams XX78; Robinson 6; Mack 116.

Location:

Newcastle, Robinson Library, Robinson 61

Note:

Contemporary brown calf, boards stamped blind, with the gilt spine label ‘MILTONS | PARADISE’. Armorial bookplate of Michael Blount II on front pastedown with ownership inscription ‘A: Pope.’ in the top right corner of the front flyleaf. On the title page, immediately below ‘In Twelve Books’, in Pope’s finest ‘print’ hand, is inscribed ‘First publish’d in Ten Books, in the year, 1669 [sic]. Quarto’. On the recto of the first engraving, Pope has written:

The Arguments & foregoing Preface were not intended by Milton, but occasioned by the importunity of the Printer; as appears by this short Advertisement pre- fix’d to the first Edition. I insert the words, because I suppose them written by Milton himself.

The Printer to the Reader.

Courteous Reader, there was no Argument at first intended to the book, but for the satisfaction of many that desird it, I have procurd it; and withal, a Reason of That which Stumbled many others, Why the Poems rimes not.

S. Simmonds.

The first edition of Paradise Lost was in fact published in 1667 and reissued with variant title pages and preliminaries in 1667, 1668, and 1669. To make sense of the annotation on the title page, the edition from which Pope quoted must have been one of the 1669 quartos (ESTC R13406), to which he presumably had access through a friend or neighbour. In the left-hand margin on p. 435, beside Book XI. 485–87, Pope places inverted commas; in the right-hand margin is a cross and, at the foot of the page, a note reading: ‘x These 3 lines added since the first Edition’.

§23 John Milton. Paradise Regain’d. A Poem. In Four Books. To Which is Added Samson Agonistes. And Poems upon Several Occasions. London: Printed for Jacob Tonson, within Gray’s-Inn Gate next Gray’s-Inn Lane. 1705. 8^o. Pp. [2], 457, [5]. ESTC T134230; Williams XX80; Robinson 7; Mack 118.

Location:

Newcastle, Robinson Library, Robinson 62

Note:

Contemporary brown calf, boards stamped blind, with the gilt spine label ‘MILTONS | POEMS’. Armorial bookplate of Michael Blount II on front pastedown with ownership inscription ‘E libris A. Pope. pr. 4.^s’ in the top right corner of the facing flyleaf. In the text of Paradise Regain’d there are two pencil annotations in an unidentified hand: in the right-hand margin on p. 10, beside Book I. 200, ‘heresy’; vertically in the right-hand margin on p. 36, beside Book II. 270–78, ‘poor & lowe’. There are signs of close reading throughout Comus. Pope’s marginal commas, uncharacteristically in pencil, are on pp. 217, 221, 227, 228, 231. In pen and ink, on p. 243, a comma is added to the end of line 787 and the full-stop at the end of line 788 is replaced with a comma. On p. 244, the word ‘yet’ is scraped from the line ‘I must not suffer this, [yet]’tis but the lees’ (line 808). Pope often scraped words and lines from his manuscripts where he wished to make neat corrections, avoiding interlineation. Here the scraping results in a metrically perfect pentameter line. In 1705 Pope lent a copy of Milton’s ‘Poems’ to Sir William Trumbull, which he returned with a note dated 19 October 1705, comparing Pope’s skill as a poet to that of Milton: ‘I know no body so like to equal him, even at the age he wrote most of them, as your self’ (Corr., I, 10). This may be the book. Alternatively, Pope also owned a copy of Milton’s 1645 Poems, which he annotated in his teenage ‘print’ hand, transcribing lines from ‘At a Vacation Exercise’ on a blank page (Mack 115). Pope may, then, have lent his copy of the 1645 Poems to Trumbull in 1705 and, perhaps while it was gone, replaced it with the new and more complete edition described here.

§24 Miscellaneous Poems and Translations. By Several Hands. London: Printed for Bernard Lintott, 1712. 8^o. Pp. [8], 320, [3], 356-76, [8]. ESTC T5777; Griffith 6; Williams XX81; Robinson 12.

Location:

Newcastle, Robinson Library, Robinson 64

Note:

Contemporary tawny calf with gilt tooling to the spine and a gilt double border on the boards, with the spine title ‘MISCEL | LANEY | POEMS’. Armorial bookplate of Michael Blount II on the front pastedown and, on the facing flyleaf, inscriptions in two different hands. In the top right corner, in the scratchy hand of Martha Blount, is written ‘Martha Blount; A: P:’. Below that, in an unidentified hand, is a couplet: ‘Each pretty Caracter with pleasing smart | deepens ^\the/ dear Idea in my heart’. Ault states that this is Pope’s autograph hand and attributes the verses to him on that basis (Twickenham, VI, 231; New Light, pp. 54–55). However, the italic nib and the crossing-out of ‘Your’ are both uncharacteristic of Pope, as is the minuscule ‘d’ to start a new line; Pope habitually started each new line of verse in majuscule. Pope’s minuscule ‘r’ form always terminates with the horizontal stroke at the top; this ‘r’ drops down to the line after the horizontal stroke. On stylistic territory, the jangling internal rhyme of ‘dear Idea’ doesn’t seem worthy of Pope. This copy of Miscellaneous Poems and Translations is presumably the one that accompanied a letter from Pope to Martha Blount, dated 25 May 1712, explaining that the volume contained ‘some things that may be dangerous to be lookd upon’ (Corr., I, 143). However, the couplet is not written in Pope’s hand, is not in keeping with his style, and on those grounds ought to be removed from the canon of Pope’s minor verse.

§25 Mary Monck. Marinda: Poems and Translations upon Several Occasions. London: Printed by J. Tonson at Shakespear’s Head, over-against Catharine-Street in the Strand, MDCCXVI [1716]. 8^o. Pp. [52], 156, [4]. ESTC T96669; Williams XX85; Robinson 32.

Location:

Harvard, Houghton Library, Hyde Collection *2003J-EC317

Note:

Contemporary full sheep with boards stamped blind. On the title page, next to the imprint, is inscribed: ‘Martha Blount. | 1716’. Bookplates of Donald and Mary Hyde and the Houghton Library on front pastedown. Purchased by the Hydes in 1956 from William H. Robinson Ltd.

§26 Michel de Montaigne. Essays of Michael Seigneur de Montaigne. In Three Books. With Marginal Notes and Quotations of the Cited Authors. And an Account of the Author’s Life. New Rendred into English by Charles Cotton, Esq. London: Printed for T. Basset at the George in Fleet-street, and M. Gilliflower and W. Hensman in Westminster-Hall, 1685–93. 3 vols. 8^o. Pp. [2], 307, 316–638; [6], 384, 369–400, 415–22, 385–687, 686–725; [5], 573, [1]. ESTC R2740; Williams XX86; Robinson 16; Mack 121.

Location:

Yale, Beinecke Rare Book and Manuscript Library, Ik P810 Zz685

Note:

Matching contemporary brown calf. Armorial bookplate of Michael Blount II on the front pastedown. The first two volumes have identical ownership marks on the flyleaf: ‘E Libris A: Popei. | Pr. 3^s. | 1706.’ All three volumes are annotated throughout (extensively described by Mack). This book was previously in Yale’s Sterling Memorial Library, before the Beinecke was established in 1963. There is no accession record.

§27 Thomas Parnell. Poems on Several Occasions. London: Printed for B. Lintot, at the Cross-Keys, between the Temple Gates in Fleet-street, 1722 [i.e. 1721]. 8^o. Pp. [8], 221, [3]. ESTC T42652; Griffith 130; Williams 94; Robinson 34.

Location:

Harvard, Houghton Library, Hyde Collection *2003J-EC319

Note:

Contemporary full red morocco, gilt tooling to boards, spine, and edges. Marbled endpapers. Bookplates of Michael Blount II and Donald and Mary Hyde on front pastedown. Second front flyleaf and title page both inscribed ‘Patty [i.e. Martha] Blount’. This volume was edited for the press by Pope and this is probably one of his presentation copies; another such copy, presented to Harley and later sold at the Herbert T. Butler sale (14 June 1934; lot 353), was likewise bound in red morocco. Purchased by the Hydes in 1956 from William H. Robinson Ltd.

§28 Ambrose Philips. Memoirs of Venutius and Cartismandua. London: Printed for T. Warner, at the Black Boy in Pater-Noster-Row [1723?]. 8^o. Pp. [4], 34. ESTC T39161.

Location:

Princeton, Princeton University Library, DA503 1714.B73(6)

Note:

Not in Williams. For a description of the volume, see §4.

§29 Alexander Pope. The Dunciad. With Notes Variorum, and the Prolegomena of Scriblerus. London: Printed for Lawton Gilliver at Homer’s Head, against St. Dunstan’s Church, Fleetstreet, 1729. 8^o. Pp. [2], 24, [2], 19–221, ccxxii–ccxxxii, [2]. ESTC T5548; Foxon P779; Griffith 218; Williams XX97; Robinson 26.

Location:

Harvard, Houghton Library, Hyde Collection *2003J-EC314

Note:

Contemporary full brown calf; boards and spine stamped in gilt. Bookplates of Michael Blount II and of Donald and Mary Hyde on front pastedown, beneath the inscription ‘Martha Blount’. Purchased by the Hydes in 1956 from William H. Robinson Ltd.

§30 Alexander Pope. The Iliad of Homer. Translated by Mr. Pope. London: Printed by W. Bowyer, for Bernard Lintott between the Temple-Gates, 1715–20. 6 vols. 4^o. Pp. [58], 63, [3], 40, [2], 47–143, [3], 145–218, [2], 223–54; [4], [319]–357, 356, 295–317, [1], 321–657, [1]; [4], [659]–948; [4], [955]–1258, 1249–1295, [1]; [4], [1301]–1598, 1591–1598, [2], 1609–1630; [4], [1631]–1882, [34]. ESTC T14925; Griffith 40, 48, 76, 94, 113, 117; Williams XX55; Robinson 4.

Location:

Newcastle, Robinson Library, Robinson 70

Note:

Presentation copy on superfine Dutch royal paper in contemporary brown calf with gilt tooling to the spines and edges and a plain gold border on the boards.

Joints are deteriorating and the tooling on the edges has mostly rubbed off. Speckled edges. Complete six-volume set. All six volumes have the armorial bookplate of Michael Blount II on the front pastedown. The half-title to volume one is annotated by Pope, in his neat italic hand: ‘To Mrs. Teresa Blount, from | her most faithful humble serv.^t | A. Pope:’. Both volumes two and three are annotated by Teresa Blount, in the top right corner of the front pastedown: ‘Teresa Maria Blount | giuen by Mr; Pope’. On 3 June 1715, Pope wrote a letter to Martha Blount that included the following postscript: ‘I desire Mr Blount not to send for his first Vol. of Homer to London: I shall have one for him on a better paper than Ordinary by Thursday next’ (Corr., I, 294). This was probably not the same copy inscribed to Teresa. Michael I was among the subscribers and Williams records two other copies of Pope’s Iliad at Mapledurham (H44 and H45). On 10 June, Lintot informed Pope that ‘All your Books were deliverd pursuant to your directions’ (Corr., I, 295)

§31 Alexander Pope. The Temple of Fame: A Vision. London: Printed for Bernard Lintott betwixt the two Temple Gates in Fleet-street, 1715. 8^o. Pp. [1]–52, [4]. ESTC T5753; Foxon P974; Griffith 36; Williams XX98; Robinson 1.

Location:

Newcastle, Robinson Library, Robinson 60

Note:

Presentation copy stitched in contemporary marbled wrapper, with creases where the pamphlet has been folded into quarters. Half-title inscribed on the recto: ‘Martha Blount: giuen ^\me/ by A Pope | 1715’. On the verso, in Pope’s italic hand, is written the following epigram:

What’s Fame in Men, by Custom of the Nation Is calld in Women only Reputation;

About them both why make we such a pother? If you’l but give up one, I’ll give up ’tother.

A slight variation was printed in 1732 and again in an undated letter to a nameless lady in the 1737 octavo of Pope’s correspondence (Griffith 461), following an explanatory paragraph: ‘Now I talk of fame, I send you my Temple of Fame, which is just come out: but my sentiments about it you will see better by this Epigram’ (Corr., I, 280). Later editions included a footnote before this explanatory paragraph, remarking: ‘From hence to the End of this Letter, is left out in the Author’s Edit’. Sherburn gives Martha Blount as the recipient. Assuming the letter was addressed to her and that it enclosed this copy of the poem, as seems possible from the fold lines, then it would not have included the epigram (because it was written on the verso of the half-title). For the octavo editions, Pope must have decided to make his verse public by incorporating it into the letter. Pope appears to have ordered several copies of The Temple of Fame to be stitched in wrappers for distribution among friends: he sent a copy to Sir William Trumbull (Corr., I, 281); a copy in ‘original grey wrapper’ was included in the Herbert T. Butler sale on 14 June 1934 (lot 333), and Foxon records another copy in ‘original blue wrappers’ (P974). If the standard wrappers were plain grey or blue, then marbled wrappers may have been reserved for special presentation copies. Listed in Robinson catalogue 83: Rare Books and Manuscripts (1953), pp. 152–53, for £500. Presumably never sold.

§32 Alexander Pope. The Works of Mr. Alexander Pope. London: Printed by W. Bowyer, for Bernard Lintot between the Temple-Gates, 1717. 4^o. Pp. [32], 435, [1]. ESTC T5385; Griffith 79; Williams XX96; Robinson 5.

Location:

Newcastle, Robinson Library, Robinson 441

Note:

Presentation copy on superfine Dutch paper in contemporary binding of full ruby morocco with ornate gilt tooling around the spine, edges, and framing the boards. Marbled endpapers. This is one of the 120 copies on royal paper allowed Pope by his contract (Foxon, Pope, p. 240). Half-title annotated in at least two hands. Across the page is written: ‘Teresa, Maria Blount | giuen by the Author’. The word ‘Blount’ is slightly larger and written in a darker ink, but is consistent with Teresa’s hand. Between ‘by’ and ‘the’ is the date ‘1717’, also in a darker ink, possibly though not definitely in Teresa’s hand; the second ‘1’ of ‘1717’ has been overwritten with a ‘2’ in a different hand, making the date ‘1727’. In showy italics at the top of the page is the inscription: ‘Michael Blount Esqr Mapledurham’. The handwriting appears to be that of Teresa and Martha’s younger brother Michael I, and not that of their nephew, Michael II, whose bookplate is absent from this volume. His inscription is in the same faded brown ink as the overwritten ‘2’ and is written using a similarly flat italic nib, approximately one millimetre wide. Both annotations appear to have come from the same pen. The logical conclusion is that this book, first a gift from Pope to Teresa, was in 1727 passed on to her brother, who amended the date. In February 1726, Michael I had suffered a ‘dangerous Wound in the Belly’ after being stabbed during a tavern brawl (Proceedings of the Old Bailey, 2 March 1726) and spent much of the next year recovering. It may be that Teresa gave him the book for entertainment during his convalescence. On a blank leaf at the end of the volume is written: ‘Sent to the Widow Blount | by her affect^t sister Maria | Teresa Blount’. The inscription is undated but, judging by the deterioration of Teresa’s handwriting, must have been written quite late in life. The ‘Widow Blount’ must be Teresa’s sister-in-law, Mary Agnes Blount, née Tichborne, who was widowed after the death of Michael I in 1739. In the correspondence surrounding Michael’s death, Teresa called Mary Agnes ‘my sister’ (Carruthers, Life, p. 426). For Mary Agnes, her husband’s inscription at the front of the book would have made it a poignant memento; equally, having previously given Michael the book, Teresa may have seen it as the rightful property of his widow. Between pp. 222 and 223 is a scrap torn from Arbuthnot’s An Appendix to John Bull Still in His Senses (§2).

§33 Matthew Prior. Poems on Several Occasions. London: Printed for J. Tonson in the Strand, and J. Barber upon Lambeth-Hill, MDCCXXI [1721]. 2 vols. 12^o. Pp. [2], 267; [5], 238, [2]. ESTC T75190; Williams X99; Robinson 8; Mack 138.

Location:

Newcastle, Robinson Library, Robinson 65

Note:

Contemporary brown calf with gilt tooling to boards and spine. Armorial bookplate of Michael Blount II on front pastedown, above which an inscription in pencil in a modern hand (likely written by one of the Robinsons brothers): ‘Presentation – | Prior – Pope – Martha Blount’. In the top right corner of the flyleaf, in Pope’s best italics: ‘A. Pope. | Dñm Auths’.

§34 Samuel Purchas. Pvrchas His Pilgrimes. In Five Bookes. London: Printed by William Stansby for Henrie Fetherstone, and are to be sold at his shop in Pauls Church-yard at the signe of the Rose, 1625. 4 vols. 2^o. Pp. [38], 186, [10], 468, 479–642, 645–748, [24]; 749–1270, 1269–1860, [40]; [28], 1006, 1009–1140, [68]; [8], 1141–1973, [41]. ESTC S111862; Williams XX101; Robinson 3; Mack 140.

Location:

Newcastle, Robinson Library, Robinson 427

Note:

Original brown calf, with some restoration to the spine and hinges. Armorial bookplate of Michael Blount on front pastedown. Front flyleaf inscribed: ‘E Libris A. Pope.’ in large italics resembling Pope’s mature hand. On the title page, ‘The Third Part’ is obliterated under a thick oblong of ink. On the table of contents (sig. *1^r), ‘second booke’ is emended in Pope’s printing capitals to ‘first book’. In the outer margin of p. 492 is an aborted note in an unidentified early seventeenth- century hand: ‘’. On p. 1140 is an obliterated note, which is indecipherable, plus the inscription ‘John Phippes’ in an early seventeenth-century hand, running vertically down the page.

§35 Eusèbe Renaudot. Ancient Accounts of India and China. London: Printed for Sam. Harding at the Bible and Anchor on the Pavement in St. Martins-Lane, MDCCXXXIII [1733]. 8^o. Pp. xxxvii, [1], 99, [1], 260, [12]. ESTC T100403; Williams XX102; Robinson 33.

Location:

Newcastle, Robinson Library, Robinson 96

Notes:

Contemporary brown speckled calf, stamped blind with gilt spine label. Front pastedown inscribed ‘Martha Blount’; some fading and glue residue where a bookplate was once attached.

§36 W[illiam] S[hippen]. A Speech Against Sir R—— W———’s Proposal for Increasing the Civil List Revenue. London: Printed for J. Watson in Black-Fryers, and sold by the Booksellers of London and Westminster [1727]. 8^o. Pp. 23, [1]. ESTC T70945.

Location:

Princeton, Princeton University Library, DA503 1714.B73(4)

Note:

For a description of the volume, see §4.

§37 Thomas Sprat. A Relation of the Wicked Contrivance of Stephen Blackhead and Robert Young Against the Lives of Several Persons. London: Printed for T. Payne, 1722. 8^o. Pp. [8], 44. ESTC T66486.

Location:

Princeton, Princeton University Library, DA503 1714.B73(5)

Note:

For a description of the volume, see §4.

§38 Thomas Stanley. The History of Philosophy: Containing the Lives, Opinions, Actions and Discourses of the Philosophers of Every Sect. London: Printed for W. Battersby at Thavy’s Inn-Gate, near St. Andrew’s Church in Holbourn, Hugh Newman, Tho. Cockerill, Herbert Walwyn in the Poultry, and W. and J. Churchill in Pater-Noster-Row, MDCCI [1701]. 2^o. Pp. [38], 658, [16], 63, [1]. ESTC T102824; Williams XX111; Robinson 2; Mack 154.

Location:

Newcastle, Robinson Library, Robinson 409

Note:

Contemporary brown calf, stamped blind, with the armorial bookplate of Michael Blount II on front pastedown. The front flyleaf is inscribed in Pope’s neat ‘print’ hand (the first line in bold roman, the second in swash italic capitals): ‘E Libris | ALEXANDRI POPEI. | Pret. 14.^ss’. The style of the inscription is near- identical to that made by Pope in 1701 to his copy of Chaucer, now at Hartlebury (Mack 36). The book was evidently carefully read. In the life of Pythagoras (p. 428, four lines from the bottom of column one), Pope inserts a negative into the sentence: ‘We must ^\not/ wear the image of God in a Seal-ring’. On p. 429, the name Empedocles has been misspelt ‘Empedoctles’: the ‘t’ has been crossed through in ink. A single comma has been crossed through on p. 459. To the sentence ‘The Cave of Mithra is mentioned by many others’ (n.s. p. 33), Pope has added a cross and a marginal note in small italics: ‘x — Persei sub rupi | bus antri, | Indignata sequi | torquentem cornua | mitram. | Statius. lib 1. Theb’ (line 720). Given that Pope was translating the first book of the Thebaid in 1702, and the hand is consistent with his earliest annotations, this would suggest that he was working through the book around this date. Severe foxing throughout. Fourteen shillings would have been a very considerable outlay for Pope, who was only thirteen years old when the book was published.

§39 Richard Steele. The Conscious Lovers. A Comedy. As It is Acted at the Theatre Royal in Drury-Lane, By His Majesty’s Servants. London: Printed for J. Tonson, 1723. 8^o. Pp. [16], 86, [2]. ESTC N59227 Williams XX113.

Location:

Princeton, Princeton University Library, 18th-412(6)

Note:

For a description of the volume, see §7.

§40 Jonathan Swift and Alexander Pope. Miscellanies in Prose and Verse. London: Printed for Benjamin Motte, at the Middle-Temple Gate in Fleet-Street. M.DCC.XXVII [1727–32]. 4 vols. 8^o. Not collated. Robinson 15.

Location:

Princeton, Princeton University Library, 18th-402 RHT

Note:

This set was located by Stephen Karian, who will discuss it and its provenance in a forthcoming essay. Upper front pastedown of each volume inscribed ‘Martha Blount’, below which the bookplate of Robert H. Taylor. Part of the Taylor bequest to Princeton in 1986.

§41 Jonathan Swift. Travels into Several Remote Nations of the World. In Four Parts. By Lemuel Gulliver. London: Printed for Benj. Motte, at the Middle Temple- Gate in Fleet-Street, M.DCC.XXVI [1726]. 8^o. Not collated. ESTC T139452; Teerink 289; Williams XX115; Robinson 25.

Location:

Private collection

Note:

Contemporary calf with mismatched volume spine labels, possibly resulting from a modern repair. Upper front pastedown inscribed ‘Martha Blount | her Book’ in volume one, and ‘Martha Blount’ in volume two. Armorial bookplate of Michael Blount II. Listed in Quaritch catalogue 1008: Eighteenth Century English Literature (1980), item 376. Then sold at Christie’s New York on 9 Dec. 1993, lot 134; resold at Sotheby’s London on 14 July 2011, lot 47. Described in the Sotheby’s catalogue as ‘the finest association copy of Gulliver’s Travels known to exist’.

§42 [Edward Ward?] The Republican Procession. [London], Printed in the year 1714. 8^o. Pp. [2], 3–44. ESTC T138010.

Location:

Princeton, Princeton University Library, DA503 1714.B73(7)

Note:

For a description of the volume, see §4.

§43 Edward Young. The Revenge a Tragedy. As It is Acted at the Theatre-Royal in Drury-Lane. By His Majesty’s Servants. London: Printed for W. Chetwood at Cato’s-Head in Russel-Street Covent-Garden, and S. Chapman at the Angel and Crown in Pall-Mall. 1721. 8o. Pp. [16], 63, [1]. ESTC T44866; Williams XX131.

Location:

Princeton, Princeton University Library, 18th-412(3)

Note:

Half-title inscribed: ‘Martha Blount giuen me | by the Author’. For a description of the volume, see §7.