John Ruskin | Two autograph letters signed, to Gardner, laid down in volumes of his works, in prize bindings

John Ruskin

Two autograph letters signed, to H. Willoughby Gardner, a pupil at Charterhouse

responding for a request for books ("...if you send this note with your order to Mr Allen, it will be his authority for sending you the first volume of the Laws of Fesole, bound, without charge..."), 3 pages, 8vo, Brantwood, Coniston, 12 February 1879 and n.d.

laid down in volumes I and VII of an incomplete set of Ruskin's Works, uniformly bound in Charterhouse Prize bindings of blue calf gilt, volumes numbered in gilt on the spine, comprising:

[Vol. I] Laws of Fesole: Volume I. Orpington, 1879; [Vol. III] Aratra Pentelici. London, 1872; [Vol. VII] Ariadne Florentina. Orpington, 1876; [Vol. VIII] Val d'Arno. Orpington, 1874; [Vol X] The Two Paths. Orpington, 1878; all 8vo; [unnumbered] Frondes Agrestes: Readings in Modern Painters. Orpington, 1878, 12mo; [with:] G.S. Davies. Charterhouse in London. London, 1922, 8vo, in a matching binding; spines sunned

H. Willoughby Gardner was awarded a prize of £5 from his school, Charterhouse, in December 1878 (a letter of congratulation from his headmaster is inserted in vol. III), and wrote to Ruskin expressing his wish to use his prize money to buy copies of his works. Gardner went on to be a physician and the later book was a prize awarded to another family member, probably Gardner's son, who attended Charterhouse in the 1920s.

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