CHINA & THE PHILIPPINES : EARLY EXPLORATION , MISSIONARIES

 Spanning   about 350 years  from the  late  l6th century , the latest  impressive list  from Douglas Stewart Fine Books , Melbourne, includes  many recent  acquisitions  and comprises accounts by European voyagers and missionaries, dictionaries , works on history , politics , religion, philosophy  and  literature, two letters by  famous  explorers  and  several l9th and  20th century  printings.

One of those items, $550, is the  above  circa  l920  London  China Inland Mission  wooden collection box, thought to have been in use up untill the l960s, with chromolithographic labels on three  sides   and  labels  for the   Young  People's  Branch of  the  CIM, money from which was  designed to win  boys  and girls  over to  Christ  in  China. 

The China Inland Mission was founded in 1865 by James Hudson Taylor (1832-1905), a British missionary who worked in China for over half a century. It was a non-denominational organisation that welcomed missionaries from all Protestant groups, including single women.

In its first few decades the CIM campaigned vigorously against the opium trade, ensuring Taylor’s reputation as one of the most influential Europeans to visit China in the l9th century.

A rare 1862 Chinese and  English  instructor by Ting-ku Tong (1832-1892) , consisting of  six  volumes  bound in  wooden  panels, said to be  one of the most important  19th century publications on Chinese Pidgin English , is for sale at  $16,000.

The author is described as the  most important comprador associated with the Jardine trading business during the 1860s, Chief Officer of China Merchants during 1873-1884. The book was designed for residents of Canton to be able to converse about commercial matters with westerners who spoke English. It also served as a vehicle for westerners to learn Chinese.

The  list  includes other  rare  offerings  ranging in  price  up to $90,000-Histoire de  la Navigation de Jean  Hugues de Linschot, Hollandois aux des Indes Orientales .

Inschot was born in Delft in 1563. Between 1583 and 1589 he travelled to Goa, where he was employed as a clerk, and in 1594-95 he accompanied Barents on his second voyage to the Kara Sea.

His work– first published in Dutch in Amsterdam, 1595-1596 – draws from Portuguese, Dutch and Spanish sources, although it is also based to some extent on his own experiences. Not subject to the strict censorship that would have been accorded to Spanish or Portuguese publications, it contains accounts full of practical intelligence on both the West and East Indies, and in particular of Goa.

The above  partial set of Historia general de Philipinas by Juan de la Concepcion (1724-1787),  priced at $18,000, said  to  be  the best and most exclusive history of   the Philippines ever written. There is reference to Spanish possessions in that country and to their  Spanish-American  territory. It also chronicles  the work of the Augustinian Monks and their important missions in  China  and Japan .

(China. Philippines.Exploration.)

MANY MURDERS AND BUTTERFLIES

 

The author of this  1958 book wrote 18 mystery novels,was  a leading figure in butterfly conservation , played the part of  Agatha Christie's Miss Marple in  a  stage production  and  a  prominent  British  singer and  television  actress .

Dulcie Gray was  the pseudonym  and stage name for  Dulcie Winifred Catherine Savage Denison,nee Bailey, (l915-2011). Born in Kuala Lumpur, her father a  solicitor, and educated in England  , she returned to Malaya to teach .

Upon the death of her father  , she returned  to England  and studied at the  Academy  des   Beaux  Arts, London , and  the  Webber-Douglas  Dramatic School . She  married  actor  Michael Denison in 1939.

In  Murder in Melbourne  an  Australian airline  pilot finds  his girlfriend  poisoned with strychnine  in  the bedroom of  a squalid hotel .  An explanatory note states  the first part of the book was written in Melbourne  when  Dulcie Gray  was starring in Tea and Sympathy. 

The book  thanks  Detective Inspector Welby of the  Russell Street Criminal Investigation Branch, Melbourne, for help he  gave the author  about Australian   police   procedure.  Detective Inspector Peters of the CIB is assigned  to  the case. 

Gray was vice-president of the British Butterfly Conservation Society and in 1978  published Butterflies on My Mind, a work on the conservation and life of butterflies in Great Britain. She also wrote a short biography of J.B. Priestly, the English novelist and playwright.

(Murder. Melbourne. Butterflies.)

RED BULL LADYBIRD TAKES POLE POSITION IN FORMULA ONE TREETOP RACE

 Vallis close up.

(Ladybird. Race. Bull.) 

SHIPPING REPORTER BRAVES DOWNPOUR , FINDS FAMOUS SHIPWRECK

 Our waterfront roundsman  has been getting  about  with a  notebook which on its  cover  declares it  is one  to  be used in all  weather condtions . On spotting the notebook, we asked him if he  expects  an  outbreak of southerly busters  or if  he is planning a  trip to  Antarctica. 

In his salty reply, he  said  several of the notebooks had been given to him by a contact in the mining indusry  who  has to take notes, sometimes in the rain  or  with  water spraying  about . 

The Shipping Reporter  is  a great scribbler .  Sometimes his  usual  notebook jottings  are hard to decipher  after coming into contact with  rain  or spillage from  a drinking session with sailors in  waterfront  grog shops .

In any case, soon after he began using a  waterproof notebook he  found  the revised  book about the  wreck of the Pandora  by Peter  Gesner, published by the Queensland Museum,  in  a  Townsville op shop .  

HMAS Pandora, sent by Admiralty to the South Pacific to recapture the Bounty mutineers, ran aground  on Australia's  Great Barrier Reef on August 29 ,1791 ,resulting in the loss of  31 crew  and  four mutineers.

The mutineers  were locked up in a shipboard prison named Pandora's Box. 

For more than 200 years the wreck remained  untouched,a number of  maritime archeology   dives  made  on the site, resulting in a Pandora exhibition in  Townsville's Museum of Tropical Queensland.

One of those involved in the project was marine archeologist  Vivienne Moran ,late of  Magnetic  Island , who ran the above  art gallery  there, dived on the  Pandora , and  also wrote  a book about  Southern  Ocean shipwrecks. 

She knew the late  Dr Colin Jack-Hinton who was the inaugural director of the Museums and Art Galleries  of the Northern Territory, Darwin, which set up a maritime  gallery  in  his  name covering traditional  boats  and  canoes  .

(Pandora. Moran. Shipwrecks.)

WORLD BLANKETED IN BLOODY CONFLICT : TIMELY WARTIME QUILTS EXHIBITION

 The  Dr Annette Gero collection  of  quilts made by military men  from army or naval uniforms is the subject of  an unusual   specially  curated display for  the  Cairns  Art  Gallery.

It is said to include – among the other irreplaceable treasures – several Australian wartime quilts. Made by Australian soldiers who were captured or held in camps or were stitched when they returned to Australia, they cut up their uniforms to create a vivid memory for themselves or to give to their loved ones and families at home.

The  unique  collection contains quilts  made by soldiers. sailors and regimental tailors  over 300 years , in the  Prussian, Napoleonic and Crimean wars, and in  British  India.

 Supplied information states  Dr Gero classes  her  collection  in two groups: those commissioned and made for important people and those made by soldiers during World Wars I and II.

Her recent research on the first group has revealed a fascinating link to paintings and etchings: many of the quilts were bespoke commissions for prominent notables of their day and were deliberate copies of famous works of art. They are elaborate pictorial panels using the compositions of popular etchings and paintings as templates.

The second group made by soldiers was an accidental discovery through a phone call informing Dr Gero of a quilt pictured in the Gympie Times,Queensland ,  featuring a double-headed eagle. “This made me aware”, she said, “that immigrants had bought extraordinary old quilts from their homeland when they came to Australia, the double-headed eagle representing so much of Europe during the eighteenth and nineteenth centuries. And of course, other quilts reside here from British wars as well…” 

A second one turned up at Christie’s in London at auction. Dr Gero expected to bid against every museum in the world. However, she was the only bidder. At that time no one really understood what these war quilts made from military fabrics were. 

Accompanying the exhibition is Dr Gero’s catalogue, Wartime Quilts: Appliqués and Geometric Masterpieces from Military Fabrics. This richly illustrated book was reviewed by the New York Times as one of the best art and design publications of 2023 and is  available at the Gallery Shop.

(War. Quilts. Cairns. )

TOP END TOPPED UP

 

Darwin rural area lake by Robert Wesley-Smith. 

(Territory. Lake. Wes.)

CITY , ISLAND CLOUD COVER

Townsville from Magnetic Island. 

Distant Magnetic Island. Vallis pix.