GRAEFER (John). A Descriptive Catalogue of Upwards of Eleven Hundred Species and Varieties of Herbaceous or Perennial Plants; divided into six columns; Exhibiting at one View, The names, Magnitude, Soil and situation, time of flowering, colour of the Flowers, And Native Country of each Species. To which is added, a list of handy ferns for the decoration of northern borders, and the most ornamental annuals. By John Græfer, Botanic Gardener to the King of Naples.1794

London: Printed and Sold by J. Smeeton, Third edition, 8vo ( 220 x 135 mm), iv, 139, [9]pp., with index and final errata leaf, title page spotted with occasional spotting to the text, cont. half calf, joints cracked. John Graefer (1746-1802) a German botanist nurseryman born in Helmstedt. Trained by Philip Miller at the Chelsea Physic Garden, London, one of the most prominent botanical gardens of Europe during the 18th century, Graeffer was subsequently gardener to the Earl of Coventry at Croome Court, Worcestershire, which was being landscaped by Capability Brown, and then to James Vere, of Kensington Gore, a founder of the Royal Horticultural Society. Graeffer struck out on his own as a partner with Archibald Thompson and the prominent nurseryman James Gordon in Gordon's long-established Mile End nursery near the New Globe, Stepney, just beyond the East End of London. In the 1790s Graeffer obtained a recommendation from Sir Joseph Banks, to be employed as head gardener to the king of Naples.—Wikipedia. Provenance: Contemporary ownership signature to head of title page "Eliz. Carill Worsley, 1799." Henrey, 764; originally published in 1789 with two further eighteenth-century editions, a second edition also of 1789 and our third - all are rare. ESTC locates 5 UK copies and one in North America of this third edition.