A Treatise on Forest-Trees: containing Not only the best Methods of their Culture hitherto practised, but a variety of new and useful Discoveries, the result of many repeated experiments. . .
A Treatise on Forest-Trees: containing Not only the best Methods of their Culture hitherto practised, but a variety of new and useful Discoveries, the result of many repeated experiments: as also Plain Directions for removing most of the valuable kinds of Forest-Trees, to the height of thirty feet and upwards, with certain success; and On the same principles, (with as certain success) for transplanting Hedges of sundry kinds, which will at once resist Cattle: to which are added, Directions for the Disposition, Planting, and Culture of Hedges, by observing which, they will be handsomer and stronger Fences in five years, than they now usually are in ten. By William Boutcher, Nurseryman, At Comely-Garden, Edinburgh. Edinburgh: R. Fleming for the Author and J. Murray, 1775. First edition.
Quarto (10 3/16” x 8”, 260mm x 202mm): binder’s blank, π2 a-f4 A-Kk4 [$2 signed]. 158 leaves, pp. 1-3 4 (title, copyright, 2pp. dedication), i ii-xlviii (26pp. preface, 17pp. subscribers, blank, fly-title, blank, 2pp. contents), 21 22-259, [5] (blank, 3pp. post-script, blank).
Bound in contemporary sprinkled calf. On the spine, five raised bands, Author and title gilt to red sheep in the second panel. Gilt roll to the edges of the boards. All edges of the text-block glazed yellow.
Rubbed, with wear along the lower edges and at the fore-corners. Both boards starting at the head. Darkened at the spine, with a streak of sunning to the front board. Passages of tanning and offsetting, with scattered mild foxing. Armorial bookplate of John Harrison to the front paste-down, and his ownership signature in ink, dated 1776, to the title-page.
William Boutcher (fl. 1734–1781) was an active nurseryman and gardener, working with some of the great Scottish landowners and horticulturalists. The Treatise on Forest-Trees is a work born of real experience in the cultivation and maintenance of forests and hedges; Henrey calls it the best arboricultural book of its century. Arboreta and pineta were a great rage in the stately homes of Britain in the Georgian and Regency periods; available only to those with considerable estates, carefully managed forests of prized specimens were ornaments of erudition surpassing a landscaped pleasure-park. Boutcher’s work is particularly Scottish; it is dedicated to the third Duke of Buccleuch, and the (vast) list of subscribers contains nearly all the grandees of Scotland, and many nursery-men besides.
Boutcher transmits the sort of philosophical wisdom born of working with mighty trees: “I must lay it down as a principle, that some small degree of learning at least is necessary to make a good gardener…” and “every body knows the best cook cannot furnish out of a handsome table without the assistance of a good gardener; and perhaps there is as much judgment required in raising materials of the best quality, as in dressing them well” both find themselves on p. vii. The copyright (π1v, p. 2) reads “Entered in Stationers-Hall,/ And each genuine Copy is signed by” — but the present item is not signed. Perhaps only subscribers’ copies were signed?
John Harrison, who owned the book the year after its publication, is difficult to pin down. His spade-shield armorial[1] bookplate conforms well to the date, that style being in favor 1770–1810. Perhaps the owner was John Harrison of Norton Place (1738–1811), MP for Great Grimsby and for Thetford. While serving director of the Bank of England (1785–1794), he was a spokesman for agricultural interests; his biography in The History of Parliament notes that “he was respected as an agricultural improver.” Particularly tantalizing is the chance, rather, that our Harrison was a member of an early American colonial family from Virginia, whose arms are distinguished by the three demi-lions rampant (although a direct comparison with the roundel or is difficult to find).
Cleveland Collections, 521; Henrey 476; Raphael, An Oak Spring Sylva 117-120.
[1] Dexter: quarterly 1st and 4th azure, a roundel or between 3 demi-lions rampant; 2nd and 3rd azure, per fess or, in chief three mullets argent; sinister: sable, a bend argent between 6 goats salient (Garforth?).
Item #JLR0613
Price: $685