Source: The Long English Eighteenth Century in the Michigan State University Libraries : A Guide to Materials in Social Sciences and Humanities Reference, Art, Microforms, and Special Collections / Agnes Widder. (East Lansing : Michigan State University Libraries, 1994). p. 123-126.
No area in Special Collections has been collected for as many years as agriculture, the result of MSU’s status as the first land grant school, and the mission of its first curriculum: "to improve and teach the science and practice of agriculture...." Collecting rare works in agriculture is a vast undertaking given its historical importance and the all inclusive nature of the field. Not only does agriculture, or farming, comprehend the cultivation of crops and the breeding of domestic livestock, but it includes the use of land and the conditions which govern that use. For our purposes here it will include such diverse subjects as gardening, veterinary medicine, and apiculture among others.
The collection of rare agricultural works is particularly strong in eighteenth-century English imprints. The century in England is noted for steady improvement with the introduction of a more scientific approach to agriculture. Farming books and manuals, once scarce, now began to multiply after the founding of the Royal Society in 1662. Earlier works include a first edition of John Worlidge’s, Systema Agriculturae (1669), the first systematic treatise on husbandry on a large and comprehensive scale; Nehemiah Green’s The Anatomy of Plants (1682); William Lawson’s A New Orchard and Garden (1683), which is the earliest published work on gardening in the north of England; John Evelyn’s Sylva, or a Discourse of Forest-trees, and the Propagation of Timber (1679), written in response to a request from the Royal Navy which was concerned with forest depletion; and Leonard Meager’s The English Gardener (1670).
The earliest known record of artificial cross-fertilization is evident in Richard Bradley’s, New Improvements of Planting and Gardening (1739). Bradley, a celebrated author and naturalist, was appointed the first professor of Botany at Cambridge in 1724. The most prolific writer of farming literature at this time, it was said he, "produced more private losses and more public benefits than those of any other author." Our collection possesses a first edition of his first work, Farmers Letters to the People of England, (1767), in addition to another 14 titles by him published in the eighteenth century. Also here is Arthur Young’s A Six Month Tour Through the North of England (1771), which is perhaps the first farming survey ever undertaken. Jethro Tull (the farmer not the group) is most lastingly known as the inventor of a seed drill (ca. 1701) which sowed the seeds in neat rows, thus helping to limit the wastage of seeding and making the crop easier to weed. In the collection is his The Horsehoeing Husbandry, or an Essay on the Principles of Tillage and Vegetation (1733), which aroused much controversy, but had lasting and beneficial influences nevertheless. Another prominent agricultural writer was William Marshall, who is perhaps best known for his astute observations of the farming practices of several counties most noted for agriculture. The collection here features a number of these including Rural Economy of Glocestershire (1789), Rural Economy of the Midland Counties (1789), and Rural Economy of Yorkshire (1796).
Among other important agricultural titles here are Edward Lisle’s Observations on Husbandry (1757); John Mortimer’s The Whole Art of Husbandry (1761); Jan Ingenhousz’s, Experiments upon Vegetables (1779), which demonstrates his discovery of photosynthesis; Philip Miller’s Gardener’s and Florists Dictionary (1724); and the 1746 edition of Rider’s British Merlin, an agricultural almanac, "adorn’d with many delightful and useful verities...with notes of husbandry, fairs, marts...;" Henry Kame’s, The Gentleman Farmer (1776); Peter Matthew’s, The Rational Farmer (1771); and Walter Harte’s, Essays on Husbandry (1764).
Besides this noted progress in agriculture, the eighteenth century may also be called the century of the English landscape garden movement. Of the trio of great landscape gardeners which included William Kent and "Capability" Brown, our collection is strongest in the works of Humphry Repton, who was the first to employ use of the term landscape garden, because "the act can only be advanced and perfected by the united powers of the landscape painter and the practical gardener," he said. Works by Repton here are Sketches and Hints on Landscape Gardening (1794), Observations on the Theory and Practice of Landscape Gardening (1803), Enquiry into the Changes of Taste in Landscape Gardening (1806), and Designs for the Pavillon at Brighton (1808). Special Collections also has several facsimiles of Repton’s famous Red Books. When commissioned to improve an estate, Repton would visit it and then paint his design into a book that was intended to show the owner the advantages of the proposed improvements. These books were hand-written, often witty, and lavishly illustrated with watercolor drawings. Many of the watercolor drawings show the site as it appeared when Repton first visited it and - by means of colored overlays - how it would look if improved with a lake, a tree plantation, by removing fences, hedges or even entire hills. During his life, Repton created approximately 150 hand-written, hand-illustrated Red Books.
Other important landscape titles in the collection are Thomas Whatley’s Observations on Modern Gardening (1770), the most comprehensive work on landscape theory before Repton; Bentley Seeley’s, Stow: A Description of the Magnificent House and Gardens... (1777); and Edward Kennion’s, An Essay on Trees in Landscape (1815).
The economic and technical development of the agricultural revolution in the English eighteenth-century resulted in improvements in the treatment of animals. In 1794, for example, the Royal Veterinary College was founded. Up to that point farriery was, for the most part, medieval in concept and its practitioners uneducated. There were exceptions, however. Individuals such as William Gibson, Andrew Snape, and Henry Bracken among others were the forerunners of veterinary medicine’s development into a respected science. Special Collections has one of the nation’s finest collections of early (pre-1800) veterinary books and manuals. It is especially strong in eighteenth century English imprints. One can find here books dealing with a wide variety of veterinary topics that can prove useful for the study of eighteenth-century book illustration, literacy, domestic culture, and technical evolution. Examples include M. Hervieux’s, A New Treatise of Canary Birds (1718); Robert James’ (whom Dr. Johnson described as "a physician who for twenty years was not sober"), A Treatise on Canine Madness (1760); Robert Smith’s, The Universal Directory for Taking Alive and Destroying Rats (1768); William Burdon’s, The Gentleman’s Pocket-Farrier (1730, 1732, 1737); Andrew Snape’s, Anatomy of an Horse (1683); George Stubbs’, The Anatomy of the Horse (1766); Delabere Blaine’s, A Concise Description of the Distemper in Dogs (1806): and a first edition copy of the earliest American publication devoted to the care of horses, Markham and Jefferies’, The Citizen and Countryman’s Experienced Farrier (Wilmington, Delaware, 1764). There are also a number of manuscripts detailing the practice of farriery in eighteenth-century England.
The library’s collection of early bee books originated from the donation in 1946 by the author Ray Stannard Baker, who is perhaps best known for his books on country life he wrote under the pseudonym David Grayson. The Baker Bee Collection is primarily a historical collection with the majority of books printed before 1850. The earliest book is Thomas Hyll’s A Pleasant Instruction of the Parfit Ordering of Bees, (London, 1568), the first treatise in English on bees and beekeeping. The collection also includes The Feminine Monarchie, (Oxford, 1623), by the Rev. Charles Butler, which marks the beginning of bee science, the fruits of which are most apparent in bee books published in England in the eighteenth century. All the important British bee books from that century are present here. Among these are Joseph Warder, The True Amazons: or, the Monarchy of Bees (London, 1716); John Thorley, [Melisselogia]. or, the Female Monarchy, (London, 1744); Thomas Wildman, A Treatise on the Management of Bees, (London, 1768); William White, A Complete Guide to the Mystery and Management of Bees, (London, 1771); and, James Bonner, The Bee Master’s Companion and Assistant..., (Berwick, 1789).
Source: The Long English Eighteenth Century in the Michigan State University Libraries : A Guide to Materials in Social Sciences and Humanities Reference, Art, Microforms, and Special Collections / Agnes Widder. (East Lansing : Michigan State University Libraries, 1994). p. 123-126.
Books on household affairs and cookery are increasingly recognized as valuable resources for the study of eighteenth-century England. The eighteenth century saw the publication of a very large number of such books in Britain, many of which can be found in Special Collection’s cookery collection. The works of Eliza Smith, Hannah Glasse, and Elizabeth Raffald, considered to be the best known eighteenth-century English cooks are well represented. Hannah Glasse’s The Art of Cookery (1747) remains one of the most famous cookbooks of all time and the library holds editions published in 1748, 1788, and 1796. The collection also features the first edition of Glasse’s The Compleat Confectioner (ca. 1770). Elizabeth Raffald gave lessons to young ladies in cookery and domestic economy, and opened what was probably the first registry for servants, in Manchester. The Experienced English Housekeeper (1769) was Raffald’s most popular book. The library holds the 1775, 1778, and 1784 editions of this much reprinted work. First published in 1727 Eliza Smith’s Compleat Housewife was a much sought eighteenth-century English cookbook after the works of Glasse and Raffald. The Williamsburg edition in 1742 of Smith’s work made it the first cookery book published in America. The library has the 1734, or sixth English edition.
Besides the works of these three popular authors, the collection has many other eighteenth-century cookery titles. These include a 1709 edition of Apicius grand work, Apicii Coelii De Opssoniis Et Condimentis... edited by Martin Lister; William Kings, The Art of Cookery (1712); Penelope Bradshaw’s The Family Jewel and Compleat Housewife’s Companion (1751); Ann Cook’s Professed Cookery (1755); and The Housekeeper’s Instructor; or, Universal Family Cook (ca. 1790), by William Henderson, which is notable for a fine engraved frontispiece showing the interior of an eighteenth-century kitchen. Another interesting title is Mrs. Frazier’s The Practice of Cookery, Pastry, Confectionary... (1791) which has a very early recipe for curried chicken, suggesting the beginning influences of Indic cooking on the British palate.
Despite the abundance of printed titles, the collection has manuscript cookery books from the eighteenth century. The earliest is a remarkably clean copy by one "Anne Western" dated 1716. A most recent acquisition is a 344 page volume filled almost entirely with recipes, including one "To make mushroom ketchup." The title page reads, "Ann Bannister, Heckfield, December 12, 1758, wrote by Alexander Everard."
Source: The Long English Eighteenth Century in the Michigan State University Libraries : A Guide to Materials in Social Sciences and Humanities Reference, Art, Microforms, and Special Collections / Agnes Widder. (East Lansing : Michigan State University Libraries, 1994). p. 123-126.
Over the last several decades an effort has been underway to build up a strong representative collection of eighteenth-century British literature. While in no sense near its goal, the holdings in Special Collections can provide researchers with a number of titles in various editions by the century’s important writers. As MSU’s English Department continues to emphasize this area in its graduate work we are adding items and now have a substantial collection for research.
Among the literary holdings are titles which one might expect to find by authors whose work practically defines this century of unparalled literature. These include the first edition of Henry Fielding’s landmark The History of Tom Jones (1749), and his Amelia (1752), as well as Laurence Sterne’s nine volume, The Life and Opinions of Tristram Shandy (1760-67). Matthew Lewis’ gothic novel The Monk (1796) is here, as is his humorous play, The East Indian (1800). Among other important works in the first edition are Samuel Richardson’s Clarissa (1748); Tobias Smollet’s The Adventures of Roderick Random (1748), and The Adventures of Peregrine Pickle (1751); Oliver Goldsmith’s The Vicar of Wakefield (1766); Daniel Defoe’s, A Journal of the Plague Year (1722); William Godwin’s, Things as They Are (1794); Jonathan Swift’s, Travels into Several Remote Nations of the World (1726); William Beckford’s An Arabian Tale (1786); and Alexander Pope’s Dunciad(1729).
Not overlooked in our collection efforts are those women writers who for too long have been largely forgotten. For many years we have recognized the many first rate works by such women writers as Lennox, Haywood and Burney, as well as the overall importance in the creation of eighteenth-century literary culture. To that end we have been for some time building our collection of eighteenth-century British women writers. A few of them and their works include, Frances Burney’s Cecilia, or Memoirs of an Heiress (1782); Mary Delariviere Manley’s The Power of Love (1720); Sarah Fielding’s Familiar Letters Between the Principal Characters of David Simple (1747); Aphra Behn’s Poems Upon Several Occasions: with A Voyage to the Island of Love (1684); Charlotte Lennox’s The Female Quixote; or, The Adventures of Arabella (1752); Sarah Robinson Scott’s A Description of Millenium Hall (1762); Eliza Haywood’s The Female Spectator (1755), The Fruitless Inquiry (1762) and The Invisible Spy (1755) and Anna Seward’s Monody on Major Andre (1781).
No author in our collection has been collected more vigorously than Samuel Johnson. Among the holdings are first editions of The Vanity of Human Wishes (1749), the first work to bear his name; The Prince of Abissinia (1759); the 68 volume The Works of the English Poets (1779-81); and his monumental A Dictionary of the English Language (1755). Here too are his many contributions to the journals, The Adventurer, The Rambler, and The Idler. James Boswell’s The Life of Samuel Johnson (1791) is also here.
Special Collections has virtually all the important eighteenth century editions and separate critical works on Shakespeare, beginning with Nicholas Rowe’s (1709) to the so-called Boswell-Malone edition (1821). Rowe was the pioneer in attempting to retrieve a true text, and his six octavo volumes offered the first "library edition" of Shakespeare. Subsequent editions were edited by Alexander Pope, Lewis Theobald, Sir Thomas Hanmer, William Warburton, Samuel Johnson, Issac Reed, and George Steevens, the only other eighteenth-century editor of Shakespeare who deserves to be mentioned in the same breath with Edmund Malone, with whom he debated matters Shakespearean for a number of years.
Thereafter, with a few notable exceptions, the history of Shakespeare editing is the history of Malone’s editing. Some indication of the progress made in Shakespeare studies between Rowe’s edition of 1709 and the 21 volume Boswell-Malone edition of 1821 can be seen from a glance at the prefatory matter in both editions. Rowe wrote a life of Shakespeare, much reprinted thereafter, and nothing more. The prefatory matter in the 1821 Shakespeare runs to three full volumes, totaling some 1831 pages. Rowe’s edition was in six volumes and there was no attempt on his part to provide a commentary; in the 1,821 Shakespeare the text gives precedence to the commentary.
Special Collections also holds Samuel Johnson’s The Plays of William Shakespeare...with the Corrections and Illustrations of Several Commentators; to Which are Added Notes to Samuel Johnson (1765) as well as several other important eighteenth-century editions of Shakespeare. Some of them include Nicholas Rowe’s The Works of Mr. William Shakespeare (1714); Edmond Malone’s Inquiry into the Authenticity of Certain Miscellaneous Papers...Attributed to Shakespeare (1796) and Elizabeth Griffith’s The Morality of Shakespeare’s Drama (1775).
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