Loudon, [Jane Wells] | A handsomely bound set of renewed works

Loudon, [Jane Wells]

The Ladies' Flower-Garden of Ornamental Greenhouse Plants; The Ladies' Flower-Garden of Ornamental Perennials; The Ladies' Flower-Garden of Ornamental Annuals; The Ladies' Flower-Garden of Ornamental Bulbous Plants; [and] British Wild Flowers. London: Stewart & Murra for William S.Orr & Co., [circa 1850; 1855]

5 works in 5 volumes, 4to (289 x 227mm). 300 handcolored lithographic plates; light spotting throughout, a few plates very slightly browned, Plate 38 in Ornamental Perennials bound as frontispiece, Plate 42 in Ornamental Annuals bound as frontispiece, Plates 37-48 in Ornamental Annuals erratically numbered but 50 present in total, Plate 46 in Ornamental Bulbs bound as frontispiece, Plate 38 in Ornamental Bulbs with marginal staining. Uniformly bound in contemporary green pebble-grain morocco, boards elaborately ruled and bordered in gilt, spines with raised bands in six compartments, second compartments gilt-lettered, others with repeat overall decoration in gilt, gilt turn-ins, purple watered silk endpapers, all edges gilt; minor rubbing to joints, one or two minor scuffs, one or two instances of very minor fraying to silk, gutter of Ornamental Perennials cracked between "frontis" and title, with interleaf creased and torn. 

A handsome set of a popular series, second editions.

Jane Webb married John Loudon, the renowned horticulturalist and writer, in 1830. She was 23 and he 47. John had sought her out after reviewing a copy of her first published novel, The Mummy!, in his The Gardener's Magazine. A "Tale of the Twenty-Second Century," The Mummy! was was the first novel to feature a reanimated mummy, and depicts future filled with advanced technology—even predicting a sort of Internet it.

By 1838, John Loudon had fallen into considerable debt, and Jane Loudon was prompted to write botanical works under her own name. The Ladies Flower Garden of Ornamental Annuals appeared in 1840, and and would proved to be the first in a line of popular works to appear through the 'forties. It is worth noting that the plates for the Wild Flowers are after H. Noel Humphreys, and first appeared in this second edition.

REFERENCE:

Fine Flower Books 115; Nissen, BBI 1233, cf. 1234-37

PROVENANCE:

Christie's New York, 11 November 1998, lot 78 (undesignated consignor)