Napoleon Bonaparte Connoisseur Edition 1906. This is a beautiful seventeen-volume set about Napoleon published as a limited edition by the Grolier Society of London in 1906. It includes sixteen volumes that were limited to seventy-five copies printed for Great Britain and America, and the set is called the Edition Connoisseur Astrale on the limitation page, and another volume was added to the set called “Napoleon In Time”, in a binding that matches the other sixteen volumes, but was published anonymously and without a date. The set includes include six volumes by William Hazlitt titled “The Life Of Napoleon Bonaparte”, six volumes by the Duchesse D’Abrantes titled “Memoirs of Madame Junot”, four volumes by Louis Antoine Fauvelet De Bourrienne titled “Memoirs Of Napoleon”, and the extra volume titled “Napoleon In Time”, which was published anonymously and printed for subscribers only. The books are 3/4 bound, with four raised bands, five compartments with gilt titles, Napoleon’s “N” in a gilt laurel wreath at the top of the spine and a gilt “N” in a fancy gilt design toward the bottom of the spine, with “London” in gilt at the heel, the covers have crushed morocco bindings with marbled boards, marbled endpapers with the bookplate of Harry Elisha Converse on the front paste-downs, there are double frontispieces at the beginning of each volume, one in black and white and the other in color, and the black and white images match the color images, and the volumes are all numbered 66 of the 75 limited copies that were printed. There are five other illustrations in each volume beside the frontispieces, all protected with tissue guards (Napoleon In Time has no illustrations except the frontispieces), the top edges are gilt, and the sixteen volumes were all printed by the Edinburgh Press. The Hazlitt titles have 317 pages of text in Volume I, 303 pages in the next volume, then 303 pages, 302 pages, 309 pages, and 281 pages of text plus an Index for a total of 294 pages in Volume VI; the Madame Junot titles have 300 pages of text in the first volume, then 298 pages in the next one, then 308 pages, 311 pages, 302 pages, and 271 pages of text and more for the Index at the end for a total of 284 pages in Volume VI; the Bourrienne titles have 444 pages of text in Volume I, then 468 pages, 483 pages, and 448 pages of text plus 40 pages of an Index, for a total of 488 pages in the last Volume, with uncut pages here and there. There are also fold-outs at the rear of some titles: a chart of the Brothers and Sisters of Napoleon and a chart of General Junot’s descendants at the end of Volume II in the titles by Madame Junot, and two fold-outs of the Concordance of the Republican and Gregorian Calendar at the rear of Volume II of the de Bourrienne titles. There is also a printing error on the spines of the Madame Junot and de Bourrienne titles: Volumes V and VI of the Madame Junot titles have Bourrienne on the spines, when they should have Madame Junot V and VI on the spines, and there were actually only four titles by de Bourrienne, not six, so someone goofed when the bindings were being printed, which makes this set even rarer, unless all 75 copies printed for the Connoisseur edition have the same printing mistake on the spines. (The title pages and contents inside the Madame Junot and de Bourrienne books are correct, there was just a printing error on the spines.) William Hazlitt was an English essayist, drama and literary critic, social commentator, and philosopher. He is now considered one of the greatest critics and essayists in the history of the English language, placed in the company of Samuel Johnson and George Orwell. Mademe Junot, the Duchess of Abrantès, was a French writer who knew the Bonaparte family almost from childhood. After her husband died, a young Napoleon Bonaparte made an offer of marriage and she evidently said no, and she did not side with Napoleon during the Hundred Days when he returned from exile on Elba. De Bourrienne was a French diplomat who became Napoleon’s private secretary for five years, but was dismissed because of financial speculations, and that left de Bourrienne in disgrace. Harry Elisha Converse (1863 - 1920) was born in Malden, Massachusetts and died in Marion, Mass, where the consignor of these books came from. His father was mayor of Malden and helped found the Boston Rubber Shoe Company, which became the largest shoe manufacturer in the world and later merged with U.S. Rubber, and if you’ve ever owned Converse sneakers, they were probably produced by Harry’s family. The books are 8vo. and measure 9 x 6 1/4 in. wide and are in beautiful condition. The bindings are tight and the pages and text are exceptionally clean, with no foxing, browning or offset. There are specks of rubbing on a couple of tips and a couple of tips are slightly turned in, a small tear in the margin on page 301 in volume II of the Hazlitt titles, and there’s a bump on the edge of Napoleon in Time, and that’s really it for blemishes or apologies. The books are a really attractive set about Napoleon, written by two people who actually knew him and by another who was a famed writer and essayist, and there were only 75 copies of this Connoisseur edition ever printed. #177 #5001