LAMARTINE Alphonse de (1790-1869)

THREE autograph MANUSCRIPTS, Harmonies and Meditation; 10 folios in-fol. written recto-verso, mounted on tabs on white vellum leaves; bound in one volume in-fol. blue jansenist morocco, lined, smooth spine, blue moire endpapers, double endpapers, gilt edges, case (G. Cretté successor of Marius Michel). Fine manuscripts of two Harmonies and a Meditation. - Harmonie ieme [the number is left blank] - Quare tristis es anima mea ? Harmonies poétiques et religieuses (III, 9), where the title appears in French : " Pourquoi mon âme est-elle triste ? ". 5 leaves; 246 verses. Some erasures and corrections; variants with the printed text. " Why do you moan unceasingly, oh my soul, answer me? from where comes this weight of sadness which weighs today on you? to the tomb which devours us in mourning you did not yet lead your last friends! "... - Harmonie 16eme - The loss of the Anio - to the Marquis of Barol. Harmonies poétiques et religieuses (II, 3) 3 leaves; 146 verses. Manuscript dated at the end: "Florence December 10, 1826". Variants with the printed version. " I had dreamed formerly, with the noise of its cascades; lying on the gossip that Horace had trodden in the shade of the old arches where the Sybil sleeps under its collapsed temple I had seen it falling in the deep caves "... - Meditation vingtieme - Philosophy - to the Marquis de L.M.F. Méditations poétiques (XX). 2 leaves; 128 verses. The manuscript bears at the head a correction as to the classification of this Meditation: "Méditation [vingt et unieme rayé] vingtieme". Lamartine had sent this meditation (on November 5, 1821) to the marquis of LA MAISONFORT, minister of France in Florence, whose collaborator he hoped to become. The manuscript, written on a watermarked paper with the arms and the figure of the King and with the date of 1818, presents some corrections. "oh who will carry me towards the tepid shores where the Arno crowned with its pale shades to the walls of the Medici in its stopped race reflects the palace by a wise inhabited and seems to the flattering noise of its slower wave to murmur the great names of Petrarque and of Dante?"... PROVENANCE Louis BARTHOU (I, 399), Daniel SICKLES (II, 397)