STRAY LETTERS FROM PROFESSOR RUSKIN TO A LONDON BIBLIOPOLE

London: privately printed, 1892. [Edited and privately printed by Thomas J. Wise]. Pp. xvi+86+[2](colophon, verso blank), index; post 8vo; pebble grain red cloth over bevelled boards, spine lettered in gilt, fore-corners of boards a trifle rubbed, the spine a trifle faded; uncut; a couple of spots of foxing; privately printed (Not for Sale), London, 1892. Edition limited to 'a few copies'. Wise (Ruskin) 1140; Cook & Wedderburn XXXVII.638-641; Todd 210d (giving the number of copies as 7 printed on vellum and 33 on Whatman paper). *Inscribed on the upper free endpaper: 'To William Ward, with kindly regards from Thos. J. Wise 17/1/93'. William Ward (1829-1908) was a friend and pupil of John Ruskin. From about 1885, he dealt in material relating to Ruskin and Turner, issuing a series of 64 catalogues by 1916. He assisted the British Museum by searching for prints by Turner that the museum's collection lacked. The spine title of this volume is Letters to Ellis. Ruskin's letters are to Frederick Startridge Ellis (1830-1901), a bookseller, author and publisher who was for a time the official buyer for the British Museum. (In the Preface, Wise describes him as a gentleman who was 'for some years in frequent business relations with Mr. Ruskin [p. xv]). His literary friends included Swinburne, William Morris, Dante Gabriel Rossetti, and Edward Burne-Jones. Ruskin occasionally addressed him as 'Papa Ellis'.