BLITH, Walter. The English improver improved or the survey of husbandry surveyed - London: 1652. 4to. pp. [lii], 262, [20]. Engraved frontispiece on which the author is described as “A lover of...

BLITH, Walter. The English improver improved or the survey of husbandry surveyed - London: 1652. 4to. pp. [lii], 262, [20]. Engraved frontispiece on which the author is described as “A lover of ingenuity” and four plates. A very good copy in old panelled calf, spine elaborately tooled in gilt. Wing B 3195. Rare. A Yorkshireman who published his original work in 1649, Blith served as a captain in Cromwell’s army in Ireland. He was paid for his services in land and it was while farming in this country that he produced this important revision. According to Canon Hart - Essays on Husbandry (published in 1767) - “Ireland, it must be confessed had a wretched method of husbandry, and strong prejudices in behalf of that method till about 1650 when Blith alone .... was sufficient to open’s men's eyes by his incomparable writings.” Donald McDonald who devotes a chapter to Blith in his work, “Agricultural Writers from Sir Walter of Henley to Arthur Young, 1200 - 1800” observed that “his writings touch every branch of the industry, and he seems to have entertained the first systematic conceptions of the benefits that would attend the Alternate Husbandry.” Sweeney 444. Provenance: Library Lilford bookplate. The two extra leaves that are called for are present in this copy. The first offering extra information on “woad and its usage” separates pages 230 and 231 and the second dealing with “The discovery of Rape and Cole-Seeds husbandry” is inserted between pages 248 and 249.

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