BALZAC, Honoré de. Une Rue de Paris et son habitant, publish - Lot 13

BALZAC, Honoré de. Une Rue de Paris et son habitant, published in Paris by the A. Rouquette bookshop in 1899. Rouquette, 1899, one large In-8 volume, lavaliere morocco. Spine decorated with cold-stamped fleurons. Cold-stamped framing decorations on covers with fillets and fleurons. Inner edge in the same morocco, framed with gilded fillets, blue moiré silk lining and endpapers. Corners and headpieces guilloché. Binding signed Gruel (Léon Gruel). Covers and spine preserved. (2 f.)+VI+32 pages, 33 vignettes, lettrines or culs-de-lampe on wood in color in the text. Silk lining with white endpapers partly detached. Joints very slightly worn. A rare illustrated copy of this study of Parisian manners by Balzac, in a unique edition of 125 numbered copies on vellum, this one no. 79, with a suite in black of all the illustrations, on Chine. This edition is accompanied by numerous colored woodcuts, including 19 vignettes, 8 lettrines and 6 culs-de-lampe engraved by François Courboin (1865-1926). The foreword on the history of this publication is written by Viscount de Spoelberch de Lovenjoul. In this delightful short story, Balzac introduces us to the capital through the eyes of a 19th-century Parisian scholar. Although these lines were due to appear in the second edition of the Comédie Humaine, along with two other similar studies, the writer's death left this humorous study unfinished. Nevertheless, it was published in Vautrin's Last Incarnation in 1847, as it had not been included in a work that would remain unpublished. Ex-libris of Professor Méry, ironically depicting an official building with the motto "Information - Publicité - Propagande". "Charming publication" (Carteret V, page 21), with signed contemporary binding in very good condition.