Les Jardins, ou l'Art d'Embellir les Paysages

A rare work and a very attractive copy of the most celebrated and influential poem of Delille, in which the author celebrated the virtues of the natural garden or jardin anglais, rather than the fashion for neoclassical symmetry.

The work includes a famous cameo appearance by "Poutaveri", that is the Tahitian Autourou, who returned to France with Bougainville. In the poem, Poutaveri glimpses a mulberry tree - the plant most commonly used in the manufacture of tapa cloth - and is overwhelmed with homesickness for Tahiti. The name Poutaveri is interesting as it was actually Autourou's rendering of the name "Bougainville", a name he took in honour of his former captain and Parisian host.

Jacques Montanier de Lille (1738-1813) was one of the great eighteenth-century French poets, and his works were much reprinted and translated: his influence on taste in gardening was significant, and he is also known for his translations into French of Virgil's Georgics and Milton's Paradise Lost, two great works with gardening themes.

Les Jardins was first published the same year in in a limited and now very rare large format edition by Didot, and this attractive smaller format edition immediately followed. The poem was a great success throughout Europe with English and German translations appearing quickly.