The Guernsey workman, by Charles Hugo
The decoration of the salle à manger, or dining room, at Hauteville-House, Victor Hugo's residence in Guernsey, was finished in May 1857. Charles Hugo wrote of it:
Victorian
Victor Hugo in Guernsey, by Henri Boland
From Boland's Les Iles de la Manche, 1904, pp. 145-6, including a note attached to the pages by Edith Carey. [By Dinah Bott]
A Farmer's Vacation, 1873
Guernsey, from an article in the influential American publication, Scribner's Monthly Magazine, September 1873; the article is one of a series eventually brought together as a book, A Farmer's Vacation, by George Wearing, published in the same year. Interest in the exportation of Guernsey cattle to North America and their management was bringing significant numbers of US farmers or their agents to Guernsey in this period. Wearing had first visited Jersey, to compare their agricultural procedures. Below is the Couture Water Lane in St Peter Port, admired by the author.
Early children's books
The Priaulx Library has amongst its collection of rare items several books intended for children.
A Library Christmas selection box
Guernsey Christmas—published and unpublished excerpts from the Library's collection. The illustration is Victor Hugo's own frontispiece to his Guernsey novel, Toilers of the Sea, the story of which begins at Christmas; like much of Hugo's artistic output, the picture is somewhat gloomy, but the rocks, so important in the book, are nevertheless covered with holly. The print is from a rare edition of the illustrations in the Library's collection.
Guernsey people
By Frank Feather Dally. Guernsey folk love a good funeral.
Dame Drillot
Mary, shown in the illustration in front of the Drillot's farmhouse, meets her future grandmother-in-law, a Guernsey farmer's widow, Marion Drillot; Marion's costume is described in detail. By Frances Carey Brock, from her moralistic but entertaining novel, Clear shining after rain: a Guernsey story, in the Library collection, published in 1871.
Attempted Murder at Sea
From The Terrific Record and Chronicle of Remarkable and Interesting Events , 1849. I was bound for Liverpool, says an American Captain, in a fine stout ship, of about four hundred tons burden, with a valuable cargo on board, and about ninety thousand dollars in specie. When we were about to sail, the mate informed me that he had shipped two foreigners as seamen, one a native of Guernsey, and the other a Frenchman from Brittany. I was pleased, however, with the appearance of the crew generally, and particularly with the foreigners. They were both stout and able-bodied men, and alert and…
Brehon Tower
From The Star, August 31, 1915.
A Farmer's Vacation, 1873: Sark
From George Wearing's A Farmer's Vacation, 1873, pp. 231 ff. The photographs are from the Library collection; that of the Seigneurie in Sark is by Thomas Singleton and dates from c. 1875; above is Baker's Valley in around 1880. 'The population of the island is less than six hundred souls, and of these over ten per cent are confirmed drunkards.'