Antiquarian Bookshop

Posted on 2008/11/23 11:25:15 (November 2008).

[Monday 17th November]
During some of the time I spent yesterday researching Sir Frederick Seager Hunt I discovered that he'd had his caricature drawn for Vanity Fair in 1893. This was quite a famous series of caricatures it seems, and so quite a lot of antiquarian bookshops had these prints for sale. Searching around on the web I found one in particular - Robert Frew in South Kensington had it in stock, and was only a short tube journey from my office.

So at lunchtime today I took the unusual step of actually leaving the office, and headed to South Kensington. After a quick search in the backroom the chap in the shop found the print in question, and rather pleasingly it came with a fairly detailed biogrpahical passage about Sir Frederick (see here or here). It wasnt mounted, so they asked me to pop back in 20 minutes, giving me a good opportunity for a stroll to Knightsbridge and back, and to grab a quick bite to eat for lunch. Upon returned I claimed my prize, and what a fine looking thing it is - drawn by a very talented gent by the name of Leslie Ward.

It was great to get out of the office at lunchtime, especially to then be briefly immersed in such an entirely different world. Must do that more often.

One of my colleagues got a promotion at work today, and so it seemed appropriate to accompany him to the pub for a couple of celebratory drinks. I proposed the St. George's Tavern, which I'd rather enjoyed the other night, everyone was happy to give it a go, and pleasingly it seemed to meet with their approval. I've been trying for some time now to supplant our default regular pub (basically the nearest one to the office) as it is often inexplicably overcrowded, but despite that I find it generally a bit soulless. I am pleased to see there appears to be some initial support for the new proposed venue.

Once back at home I updated the wikipedia article on Sir Frederick with a picture and the biographical passage from Vanity Fair. I felt really rather pleased with the end result.

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