[DRAWING]. LORRAINE]. FARCY (Hippolyte)]. Souvenir of my best friend. S. l. n. d. Nancy, circa 1872]. In-4 oblong, 67 ff. n. ch. (numbering added in pencil). Bound in red half-chagrin, spine decorated with gilt fleurons, gilt title on the upper board; marbled paper endpapers (period binding). Boards slightly rubbed, corners worn; one flyleaf; a few pages torn off. Size: 265 x 355 mm. Beautiful album of poems, illustrated with 35 drawings, of which 20 in black ink, 7 in watercolour, 7 in wash or graphite and 1 in red chalk. There are 2 loose drawings in black ink, for a total of 37 drawings. These drawings, unsigned, were mostly done on full page; some were mounted on the album's leaves. They represent portraits, figures in traditional costumes, animals, genre scenes, landscapes, and allegorical figures. The album opens with a small poem signed "H. Farcy", copied in a baroque frame drawn in black ink. On the back is a dedication, signed by the same person, to the Empress Eugenie, on the occasion of her visit to Nancy in [July] 1866 to celebrate the centenary of Lorraine's attachment to France. Following this, an excerpt from Alfred de Musset on politics has been transcribed, illustrated with caricatured characters. Unfortunately, we know little about the author, Hippolyte Farcy. The Journal de la Société d'archéologie et du Comité du musée lorrain (Journal of the Archaeological Society and the Lorraine Museum Committee) mentions him twice: for the one-franc subscriptions collected at the Lycée impérial for the restoration of the Galerie des Cerfs of the Musée lorrain (8th year, 3rd issue, March 1859, p. 73). He was then a student at the Lycée impérial de Nancy; and on the occasion of his admission to this learned society, as a full member, on 10 May 1872, where he was presented by "MM. de Dumast, Henri Lepage and Laprevote" (21st year, 6th issue, Nancy, June 1872, p. 114). Extract: [The War of 1870]: "What are you waiting for, Lorrains, to join your brothers? / Have you kept nothing of the virtues of your fathers? / A savage enemy dares to tread on your fields! / He sets up his tent, he forms camps there / To bombard your forts; but no, they are your towns; / For shameful means seem easier to him...". (f. 40).