[Rarebooks] FOR SALE: AN AMERICAN RARITY

[Norman Kane]

THORNTON, WILLIAM 
CADMUS: OR, A TREATISE ON THE ELEMENTS OF WRITTEN LANGUAGE . THE POWER OF EACH CHARACTER . FIXING THE ORTHOGRAPHY AND ORTHOEPY. WITH AN ESSAY ON THE MODE OF TEACHING THE SURD OR DEAF, AND . DUMB, TO SPEAK 
R. Aiken & Son, Philadelphia 1793 - First edition, (there was a later printing the same year with an added London imprint.) ESTC W41523 locates only 5 copies. Old worn calf, joints cracked but tight, old library bookplate, library remnants on rear blanks, notation on title verso recording purchase at Libbie's auction in Oct., 1878, for 50 cents. [2], 110 pages, folding chart. PRESENTATION COPY, inscribed "George William Erving Esq. with the respectful compliments of the Author," (Erving was an American diplomat.) Inserted opposite the title is a holograph check on the Bank of Columbia to the account of Simon [Simeon ?] Allen for $30.00 SIGNED BY THORNTON. On p.41 he has crossed out two lines and substituted a 4-line manuscript correction in the margin. Between pages 46 & 47 he has inserted an 11-line manuscript addendum. (Thornton, born on Jost Van Dyke in the British Virgin Islands in 1759, was a British-American architect, painter, inventor and physician who designed the U. S. Capital and was the first Superintendent of the U. S. Patent Office. Among other buildings he designed were the Library Company in Phila. (recreated by the American Philosophical Society), & the Octagon House (used as the Executive Mansion after the burning of the White House in 1814). Arguing its scientific importance, Thornton persuaded the British not to burn the Patent Office. "Cadmus", the early prize-winning work listed here, is an evidence of the assessment that Thornton was a true polymath. A UNIQUE COPY OF AN AMERICAN RARITY.
A very affordable and desirable copy at $950.00

Postpaid.  Trade discount available.


THE AMERICANIST
(NORMAN KANE-ABAA EMERITUS)
113 CREEK'S EDGE, CHAPEL HILL, NC
27516 PH: 919 967 9287 FAX - 919 338 8081
nkane at kanebooks.com 
libri sono la nostra gioia e la nostra salute