Essays of Landscape Gardening: And on Uniting Picturesque Effect With Rural Scenery: Containing Directions For Laying Out and Improving the Grounds Connected With a Country Residence. Illustrated by Six Plates.

London: Printed for J. Taylor, 1825. First edition. Quarto (12 5/8 x 10 inches; 320 x 253 mm). viii, [1, contents], [1, blank], 91, [1, colophon] pp. Complete with six aquatint plates total. Three are are color plates, including the frontispiece and three are in sepia, two of which have overslips. With half-title.

Original drab boards, rebacked to style. Edges uncut. Inner hinges strengthened. Some minor foxing, mainly to preliminaries and margins, not affecting plates. Boards a bit rubbed and with some minor staining. Previous owner's bookplate on front pastedown. Housed in a custom marbled slipcase, with printed paper label on spine and morocco lined edges. Overall a very good copy with all overslips present.

In his Preface, Morris acknowledges the works of Humphry Repton, Uvedale Price, William Gilpinhis as inspiration. Repton's influence can be seen in the presence of the overslips.

"The fashion of what is known as 'bedding out,' came in, and old fashioned plants, which had been the pride of our gardens for centuries, were banished to make room for these newcomers. In an Essay on Landscape Gardening by Morris in 1825, he advocates this plan, which was then quite a new one. 'The beauty of the flower-garden, in the summer season,' he writes, 'may be heightened by planting in beds some of the most freely-flowering young and healthy greenhouse plants. Where there is an extent of greenhouse, a sufficient quantity of plants should be grown annually for this purpose, and should be sunk in the beds about the middle or end of May." (A History of Gardening in England. Cecil, Evelyn.)

Abbey Life, 40.

HBS 67962.

$3,750.