Description

FIRST EDITION.
One of 100 copies on Hollande paper (with large cathedral watermark drawn by Louis Chevalier) after 10 copies on Chine and 21 copies on Japon. Illustrated with an etching portrait of the author by Eugène Delatre and a coloured frontispiece by Pierre Roche printed on eglomised parchment; only the 131 first copies include these pieces.

The book is packed with a BEAUTIFUL AUTOGRAPH LETTER SIGNEDin which Huysmans, intoxicated by the tasting of "flasks fragrant with wild herbs soaked in fine cedar tea [sic]  sealants"He talks about his annual visit to Chartres Cathedral:

I'm still immersed in furious work on the symbolism of the Middle Ages, mainly on Chartres, which I went to see again with Landry at Christmas. I watched the sunrise in the cathedral - it's overwhelming - with all those stained glass windows emerging little by little from their fog into the night and bleeding with the dazzling crimson and the extraordinary sapphire blue that the good glaziers of the 13th century knew how to melt.
This magical walk through this forest of pillars and glass bays is a welcome break from modern disgust.

The author also mentions his run-ins with Stock. a little dishonest and forgetful of a promise given"and complained about his job at the Ministry of the Interior, which he left in 1898: "What's more annoying is the office threatening us with attendance sheets; the radicals in power dreaming of annoying us. Which is really quite pointless. It would be so easy for them to make friends and supporters out of the employees, by treating them well.."

Fine copy in full morocco by Canape.

GDM" dry stamp with dragon on first white endpaper.