Text: Charles E. L. Wingate, “[comment about Tamerlane and Other Poems],” The Critic (New York, NY), vol. 23, May 4, 1895, pp. 330-331

[page 330, column 2, continued:]

Again “Tamerlane” has been sold at auction in Boston. Three years ago this copy of the first edition of Poe's work, of which there is now but one duplicate in existence, that being in the British Museum, was sold under the hammer for $1850 to Dodd, Mead & Co. of New York. It was printed in 1827 by Calvin F. S. Thomas of Boston, and its authorship was then [page 331:] simply credited to “a Bostonian.” The New York firm sold the book to George T. Maxwell for $2500, and that gentleman had the work taken from its original cheap paper covers and magnificently bound by European workmen. I understand that the book thus redecorated cost him in all $140 a page. Last week it was bought again by Dodd, Mead & Co. for $1450. The little thing was sold by a second-hand dealer fifteen years ago for twenty-five cents. A certain literary gentleman, who was writing about Poe, and was therefore desirous of collecting all the material possible, went to the Old South Book Store to obtain a “Tamerlane,” but Mr. Burnham, the proprietor, though he thought they had a copy, could not find it. A few days later his clerk, while hunting through the shelves of another bookshop on Cornhill, found this particular copy and very gladly gave a quarter for it, with the idea that later on he certainly might obtain as much as $15. 64 Four or five years later he ran across a reprint of the Tamerlane” of the British Museum, and knew then that he certainly could get as much as $100 for the book. He was even more elated when he received an offer of $400 from Mr. Foote, whose collection was recently sold in New York. But the owner held on, and at last put the work up at auction at Libbie's. Then came the sales I have described above. That fine binding did not improve the book's value, is shown by the depreciation in the second sale. This is the new binding as described in the catalogue: — Beautifully bound in brown crushed levant, with sides ornamented with mosaic of blue levant, in a beautiful interlaced, floriated design; the flowers, leaves and petals are all inlaid in colors — red, blue, green, yellow — with monogram in each corner, double of pure white parchment, wide dentelle borders, vellum fly-leaves, with the original covers bound in, entirely uncut, by Lortic fils, inclosed in crushed levant morocco pull-off case, blind- tooled.”