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Notebooks filled with Nelson's ideas and notes on art and poetry, as well as various other subjects, such as translations, women, liberty and democracy, and Americanization, which last shows his bitterness at not having achieved recognition as a creative artist in this country. Also included are quotations from numerous writers (including Samuel Loveman's "The triumph of anarchy" copied from the author's manuscript), with his criticisms on several of them (Stagnelius, a Swedish poet, Amy Lowell, Swinburne, Ezra Pound), on Gounod and Berlioz, on the sculptor Flaxman, and on Nietzsche. There are drafts of letters to various people, and to newspaper editors. Of particular interest is the letter to Hart Crane (see Notebook 1920 November-1921 June), circa May 1921, on whom he had considerable influence, even though their friendship was of brief duration.

Manuscript account books and documents which illustrate and document the history of accounting and business procedures from the 14th century into the 20th century. The earliest item is Ms. 18, a Papal bull relating to notaries and appointing Julius de Gentilibus as a notary; the latest is an invoice book from 1941. The types of volumes contained in this collection include instruction books, daybooks, waste books, journals, bank books, ledgers, receipt books, storage books, invoice books, registers, ships' logs, letter books, diaries, town books, tax roll books, articles of agreement, bills of sale, deeds, wills, and many other significant items. The material originated in many countries around the globe, and represents a range of business and occupations from household to trading company (e.g., English (East India Company) and French East Indian Company (Compagnie des Indes orientales) volumes), and from itinerant laborer to lawyer and physician. The majority of the manuscripts are English and American of the 17th, 18th, and 19th centuries. The earliest American account is Ms. 75, 1690-1730, Josiah Winslow, Plymouth, Mass.