Tiger Books

original decorated cloth, spine bumped and a trifle sunned and dulled, publisher’s catalogue dated April 1888, good. loosely inserted is a six-page autograph letter signed, on notepaper addressed ‘Lansdowne,/ Edgbaston.’ and dated ‘Jan 1889’: ‘My dear Dr Jordan/ The beautiful little book/ that Mrs Jordan and you/ have sent us, as a New/ Years greeting, has given/ a great deal of very/ real pleasure. The/ sketches are so truly/ artistic and charming./ It is too, a very great/ pleasure to us to/ be remembered with/ kindness and cheer/ by you at the/ beginning of a new/ year which comes/ upon us with all/ the veiled uncertainties/ and the more dreaded but perhaps less,/ hurtful apprehensions/ that follow in its train./ It is always a true/ satisfaction to me when/ you can approve of my/ writing, especially artistically./ I sent the Countess Eve/ to scarcely anyone, for/ I wished everyone to read/ it quite independantly of/ its author. I am particularly/ thankful that it has/ been well received by good/ women which shows that/ I have succeeded in/ treating the rather difficult/ subject as a manner void/ of offence. I look upon/ it as the ‘story of Fall’ read/ across the ‘Shadow of the/ Crucifix’. I had once/ an idea of dedicating it/ to Louis Stevenson. The advantage it has over his/ most wonderful and appealing/ allegory is on introduction/ of ‘Hope’. Why do you call/ the ‘abbe’ a ‘monk’. He/ is of course not an/ ‘abbe regulier’ but an ‘abbe seculier’ in which sense the/ word is usually received, in literature. The ‘abbe’ of/ French life was merely the/ holder of some ecclesiastical/ property. He had in most/ cases only taken ‘first’ orders/ which implied little or nothing/ and was very seldom a priest./ If the priest, as we/ are told, can transform himself into an/ Angel of Light, sure/ly he would find/ little difficulty im-/personating/ “un petit abbe” of/ the 17 and 18 century./ I know all G.P.R./ James’ and have/ nearly all of them./ I remember ‘Morley/ Ernstein’. It is/ not one of his best./ Observe the water/ mark and the opposite sheet. I will not/ write upon it. It/ is of course only a/ reproduction./ With best wishes from us/ both & many thanks to Mrs/ Jordan & yourself/ yours ever truly/ J.Henry Shorthouse’; first edition; 240 pages;