SAN FRANCISCO, CA.- A Walt Whitman manuscript of "Rain Enigma" [Voice of the Rain] was the leading lot of Bonhams’ $940,163 auction of fine books and manuscripts on September 22 in San Francisco. The manuscript, which achieved $52,500, is of a poem which appeared in the first annex “Sands at Seventy” of the 1891-1892 edition of “Leaves of Grass." In addition to the hand-written manuscript, the piece featured an autograph inscription of Horace Traubel, Whitman’s close friend and self-described "spirit child.”

The manuscript, which was one of 268 lots offered, sold as a result of competitive bidding that continued throughout the auction. Bidders from 19 countries took part in the sale, with particularly strong phone and internet participation.

Nearly reaching the top lot spot was an early 15th century "Book of Hours," that sold for $50,000. It bears an ownership inscription by Pre-Raphaelite British artist Edward Burne-Jones (1833-1898), as well as his book plate. Also tied to Burne-Jones - featuring 87 of his woodcut illustration designs - was one of 425 paper copies of “The Works of Geoffrey Chaucer” printed by William Morris’ Kelmscott Press in 1896, which brought $46,250.

Another fine press highlight was one of the finest productions of the Shakespeare Head Press, and perhaps the most difficult to acquire of its editions on vellum: "The Works" by Edmund Spenser, Oxford: Shakespeare Head Press, 1930-32, which achieved $20,000.

From the sale's section of travel, natural history and color plate books, a key work that stood out was "Illustrations of China and its People. A Series of Two Hundred Photographs, With Letterpress Description of the Places and People Represented," 1873-1874, by John Thomson (1837-1921). The first edition in special binding achieved $46,250, far exceeding its $20,000 high estimate. Another notable lot from the category was an extremely rare Jesuit manuscript on the colonization of Brazil, entitled "Historia da Companhia de Jesu da Provincia Domaranham e Para...," 1759, by Jose De Morales. Intriguingly, this copy was once nearly lost in a shipwreck. It brought $31,250.

Most successful from the art and illustration portion of the sale was a signed, limited edition of "A Book of Cats," by Tsuguharu Foujita, New York: Covici Friede, 1930, which brought $36,250, past a $30,000 high estimate.

From the Americana portion of the auction, an extremely rare broadside from 1769, regulating the number of bars, pool halls and cabarets in the young city of New Orleans, achieved $35,000, soaring past a $15,000 high estimate. It was signed by then Louisiana governor Alejandro O'Reilly (1722-1794) and was only the third broadside edict to be printed in New Orleans immediately after he arrived in the city and took formal possession of Louisiana in August of 1769.

Additional stand-out lots from that section included "The American Woods, Exhibited by Actual Specimens and with Copious Explanatory Text," 1957, by Romeyn Beck Hough, which sold for $22,500, and a Revolutionary War map of the Battle of Long Island, 1776, which achieved $18,750, past an $8,000 high estimate.