CARROLL, Lewis [Charles Lutwidge Dodgson]

Sylvie and Bruno [with] Sylvie and Bruno Concluded - PRESENTATION Copies Inscribed to the Mother of Enid, Dodgson's Last Child-Friend

London and New York: Macmillan and Co., 1889, 1893. Harry Furniss. First Editions. Original cloth with both vols. housed in a morocco slipcase with chemises. Titles for both volumes continue: "With Forty-Six Illustrations by Harry Furniss." Two 8vo volumes. Pp. xxi, [4], 2-400, followed by three page of publisher ads, [1]; [4], x-xxxi, [1], 2-423, [2], followed by four pages of publisher ads, and then a facsimile of one page of Alice's Adventures Under Ground. Frontis. illustration to each, with tissue guards. Original red cloth, gilt. All edges gilt. General index in Vol. Ii. Light scattered foxing on first and last few leaves of both volumes. Both volumes a bit cocked, with spines faded; first volume with a few small spots on the front board. Armorial bookplate (Prince Henry, Duke of Gloucester) on front pastedowns. Both volumes inscribed to "Mrs. Stevens" (Edith Stevens), the mother of Dodgson's last "child-friend," Enid Stevens.

Both volumes presented in cloth chemises within three-quarter red morocco clamshell boxes, felt-lined, within a red linen slipcase. Very Good / Case: Fine. Item #7174

Inscriptions read, respectively, "Mrs. Stevens, from the Author. Feb. 28, 1891" and "Mrs. Stevens, with sincere regards, from the Author. Dec. 27, 1893."

Edith Stevens (1841-1919) was the mother of Enid Stevens, considered by Dodgson to be the last of his "child-friends." On the very day of the first inscription Dodgson wrote to Edith, stating, "I have lost a considerable fraction (say .25) of my heart to your little daughter: and I hope you will allow me further opportunities of trying whether or no we can become real friends. She would be about my only child-friend in Oxford" (The Letters of Lewis Carroll, p. 825). Dodgson's warm feelings of his friendship with Enid was reciprocated by Enid who, later in life, wrote "we were the very greatest friends," and "I don't think anybody else ever had so much of him as I had ... I was the last child-friend."

The introductory poem in Sylvie and Bruno contains a double acrostic of the name "Isa Bowman", who was another of Carroll's child-friends; the dedicatory poem in Sylvie and Bruno Concluded contains a single acrostic, "enidstevens" using the third letters of each line.

Provenance: Edith Stevens (née Headland, 1841-1919); Sotheby's, 1929; Christies; Christies, 2006.

Price: $4,500.00