Gallery of the Celebrated Landscapes of Switzerland.

QUEEN VICTORIA,.

Item Number: 109082

J.A. Preuss, and London: H. Rothe: Zurich, n.d. (ca. 1880).

First edition of this extensive gallery of photographs of Switzerland. Quarto, original publisher’s full decorative vellum with gilt titles to the spine and elaborate gilt central motif to the front panel depicting an alpine postal carriage, all edges gilt, gilt patterned endpapers, illustrated with one hundred collotypes displaying views of Switzerland. Presentation copy, with a full page inscription from Queen Victoria to Horatia Stopford, a Lady of her Bedchamber, “To dear Horatia Stopford from her affec. & grateful friend Victoria R Christmas 1885.” In near fine condition.

Queen Victoria made a little-known visit to Switzerland in 1868 where she longed to spend a month where, still mourning the death of her beloved Prince Albert, she could refuse the company of all visitors. Accompanied by her fourth daughter Princess Louise, the duo sketched and painted during various expeditions to Rigi, Pilatus, the Furka Pass, the Rhone Glacier, and Engelberg. During a sojourn in the Alps, she began to sketch and draw people again, something she had rarely done since the death of Albert.