JACSON, Marie Elizabeth. The Florist's Manual; or, hints for the construction of a gay flower garden. The scarce first edition. vii, [1], 74, [2]pp adverts., 2 folding plates. A good copy in original linen backed boards. Joints cracked and paper spine label rubbed. Armorial book-plate of Earl Cornwallis. 12mo. for Henry Colburn. 1816. ~ James [Cornwallis later Mann], 5th Earl Cornwallis, of Linton Place, married Maria Isabella Dickens in 1804. Her name is written at the head of the title-page, and there are her(?) pencilled names of flowers on the rear end-paper, and also of trees on the inner rear board. She died in 1823. Marie Jacson’s earlier work, Botanical Dialogues was much praised by Erasmus Darwin who listed it in his Plan for the Conduct of Female Education, (1797). There is some confusion about the spelling of her name, which should correctly be Jacson. “In her introduction she recounts that she is frequently consulted on the subject of procuring a gay flower garden and had had complaints from her sister florists of their failure to achieve this. Mistakenly they had stored their borders from a catalogue of some celebrated nursery, with numerous roses and American plants in bog soil with names on large pegs. Instead of the brilliant glow of more humble neighbours' parterres they found their gardens distinguished only by 'paucity of colour and fruitless expenditure'. This she sets about remedying in the subsequent pages, giving advice about the siting, shape and planting of flowerbeds, the care of a flower garden as part of the pleasure ground and the place of the rockery. She deals with the problem of a parterre on a slope and, with a thought for the less affluent, suggests how to make a flat area near a small villa look larger. She provides a catalogue of suitable flowers, arranged in colour groups and their seasons, for mingled planting; later adding a list of the flowers grown in her own early spring border. Comments on garden pests and on bulbs, as indicated in her title, complete Maria's manual... Maria was and remains a spokeswoman for the ordinary person who wants enjoyment from colour and variety in the garden and is not interested in the latest fashion, or perhaps is without the space for ambitious displays. She and her book deserve to be given due recognition standing as they do at the beginning of the long line of notable women gardening writers.” Ref: Percy, Joan. Mary Elizabeth Jacson and her Florist’s Manual. Garden History , Spring, 1992, Vol. 20, No. 1. ~ First published in 1824, Copac mis-attributes the author as Emily Elizabeth Jarrett. This is corrected for the much enlarged 2nd and 3rd edition to Laetitia Ford. The first edition was just 68pp, and had one illustration.