LAWRENCE, Richard.
The complete Farrier and British Sportsman, containing a systematic Enquiry into the Structure and animal Economy of the Horse, the Causes, Symptoms, and most-approved Methods of Prevention and Cure for every Disease to which he is liable, a Detection and Exposure of the erroneous and bad Methods of Treatment generally adopted, with numerous approved and original Recipes for various Diseases, the whole rendered easy and familiar, with a View to general Utility, and founded on the latest Discoveries and experimental Facts, to which the Progress of Improvement for the last twenty Years in the veterinary Art has led, including a faithful Delineation of the various Dogs used in the Sports of the Field, with canine Pathology, interspersed with Anecdotes, and an Account of the most celebrated Horses, Dogs, &c. &c. &c., equally important and interesting to the British Sportsman, as well as Inn-Keepers, Coach-Masters, Farmers, Owners of Stage-Waggons, &c., embellished with a Series of Engravings, executed in the first Style of the Art, from original Drawings in the Possession of Noblemen and Gentlemen of the Turf, and copied, by Permission, exclusively for this Work.
London, W. Clowes for Thomas Kelly, [c. 1823].
4to, pp. iv, [5]-512, with frontispiece, engraved title, and 12 engraved plates; damp-stains, particularly to frontispiece and engraved title, slight cockling; otherwise a very good copy in contemporary half calf with marbled sides, borders roll-tooled in gilt, skilfully rebacked in recent calf with spine gilt-ruled in compartments and lettered directly in gilt, modern endpapers; boards a little rubbed, chipping at extremities, corners lightly bumped.
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The complete Farrier and British Sportsman, containing a systematic Enquiry into the Structure and animal Economy of the Horse, the Causes, Symptoms, and most-approved Methods of Prevention and Cure for every Disease to which he is liable, a Detection and Exposure of the erroneous and bad Methods of Treatment generally adopted, with numerous approved and original Recipes for various Diseases, the whole rendered easy and familiar, with a View to general Utility, and founded on the latest Discoveries and experimental Facts, to which the Progress of Improvement for the last twenty Years in the veterinary Art has led, including a faithful Delineation of the various Dogs used in the Sports of the Field, with canine Pathology, interspersed with Anecdotes, and an Account of the most celebrated Horses, Dogs, &c. &c. &c., equally important and interesting to the British Sportsman, as well as Inn-Keepers, Coach-Masters, Farmers, Owners of Stage-Waggons, &c., embellished with a Series of Engravings, executed in the first Style of the Art, from original Drawings in the Possession of Noblemen and Gentlemen of the Turf, and copied, by Permission, exclusively for this Work.
A sporting compendium, dedicated ‘to the noblemen and gentlemen of the Quorn Hunt’. Much unlike his earlier scholarly work on veterinary science, Lawrence’s Complete Farrier and British Sportsman is written for gentlemen and noblemen with an interest not in farriery but in fox-hunting, discussing both horses and hounds. The text is illustrated by plates, the majority decorative rather than diagrammatic, and accompanied by amusing anecdotes, including those relating to Philip Astley. Having begun his career a well educated advocate of the academic approach to the veterinary art, it is not known what drove Lawrence to write a work of popular farriery for huntsmen.
Several editions, for the most part undated, were issued around 1816, with no established precedence. Though the imprint remains dateless, this second copy has several plates dated 1823; it retains, however, the issue-signatures of the first edition, as though published serially, suggesting it is likely a re-issue of the same sheets.
Not in Dingley; cf. Mellon 103 (another undated edition, c. 1818).
