Bernard M’Mahon - Revision history

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-'''Bernard M’Mahon''' (before 1765–September 18, 1816), self-described “[[Nursery]], Seedsman, and Florist,” wrote a popular calendar for American gardeners in 1806, ran a successful [[nursery]] and [[botanic garden]] in Philadelphia, corresponded with [[Thomas Jefferson]] about his gardening and agricultural endeavours, and cultivated previously undescribed botanic specimens collected by the Lewis and Clark expedition.
+'''Bernard M’Mahon''' (before 1765–September 18, 1816), self-described “[[Nursery]], Seedsman, and Florist,” wrote a popular calendar for American gardeners in 1806, ran a successful [[nursery]] and [[botanic garden]] in Philadelphia, corresponded with Thomas Jefferson about his gardening and agricultural endeavours, and cultivated previously undescribed botanic specimens collected by the Lewis and Clark expedition.
 ==History==
 The details of Bernard M’Mahon’s birth and youth in Ireland prior to his immigration to the United States remain largely unknown. While Appleton’s ''Cyclopedia of American Biography'' gives his birth date “about 1775,” historian Robert Cox has pointed out that that the 1810 census records list him as one of two men in his household over 45 years of age, suggesting a birth no later than 1765, and probably several years earlier.<ref>Robert S. Cox, ed., “‘I Never Yet Parted’: Bernard McMahon and the Seeds of the Corps of Discovery,” in ''The Shortest and Most Convenient Route: Lewis and Clark in Context,'' Transactions of the American Philosophical Society 94, no. 5 (American Philosophical Society, 2004), 131, [https://www.zotero.org/groups/54737/keywords_in_early_american_landscape_design/items/itemKey/CHM5IVVN/q/i%20never%20yet%20parted view on Zotero].</ref> By 1806, he claimed already to have had experience “of near thirty years, in practical gardening,” so he must have begun an apprenticeship as a gardener or horticulturist around the year 1776.<ref>Bernard M’Mahon, ''The American Gardener’s Calendar: Adapted to the Climates and Seasons of the United States. Containing a Complete Account of All the Work Necessary to Be Done... for Every Month of the Year....'' (Philadelphia: Printed by B. Graves for the author, 1806), v, [https://www.zotero.org/groups/54737/keywords_in_early_american_landscape_design/items/itemKey/HU4JIS9C/q/the%20american%20gardener's%20calendar view on Zotero].</ref> The precise reasons for and year of his immigration are also unknown, but the botanist, physician, and congressman William Darlington (1782–1863) attributed his motivation to political unrest in Ireland, which came to a head with the failed French invasion of 1796 and the Irish rebellion of 1798.

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 '''Bernard M’Mahon''' (before 1765–September 18, 1816), self-described “[[Nursery]], Seedsman, and Florist,” wrote a popular calendar for American gardeners in 1806, ran a successful [[nursery]] and [[botanic garden]] in Philadelphia, corresponded with [[Thomas Jefferson]] about his gardening and agricultural endeavours, and cultivated previously undescribed botanic specimens collected by the Lewis and Clark expedition.
 ==History==
@@ Line 129: / Line 155: @@
 ==Other Resources==
 [https://www.monticello.org/site/house-and-gardens/bernard-mcmahon-pioneer-american-gardener “Monticello's Twinleaf Journal Online: Bernard McMahon, Pioneer American Gardener”]

@@ Line 123: / Line 123: @@
 <gallery widths="170px" heights="170px" perrow="7">
 Image:2191.jpg|Title page for the first edition of ''The American Gardener's Calendar'' (1806)
-Image:2192.jpg|Receipt for payment received by Bernard M’Mahon from the American Philosophical Society, recto, 1806
+Image:2192.jpg|List of seeds and receipt for payment received by Bernard M’Mahon from the American Philosophical Society, recto, 1806
-Image:2193.jpg|Receipt for payment received by Bernard M’Mahon from the American Philosophical Society, verso, 1806
+Image:2193.jpg|List of seeds and receipt for payment received by Bernard M’Mahon from the American Philosophical Society, verso, 1806
 </gallery>
 <hr>

@@ Line 23: / Line 23: @@
 Within M’Mahon’s lifetime, he became especially known for his championing of [[hedge]]s as live fences, and his calendar may have helped popularize them wherever it was read. <span id="Aurora1816_cite"></span> In 1816, his obituary singled out his innovative approach to planting “Quickset [[hedge]]s” from European white thorn (''Crataegus laevigata''), based on observation of the weathering and germination of Hawthorn seeds in the wild ([[#Aurora1816|view text]]). As Brenda Bullion points out, M’Mahon himself understood these live fences as a response to the deforestation of the American countryside, recommending them “particularly in those parts of the Union in which timber has got scarce, and must inevitably become more so in a very rapid progression.”<ref>Bullion 1990, 304–5, [https://www.zotero.org/groups/54737/keywords_in_early_american_landscape_design/items/itemKey/9XGG8N2W/q/brenda%20bullion view on Zotero].</ref> Here, as elsewhere, his ''Calendar'' had both practical and aesthetic implications for the development of American landscape design.
-Landscape design principles formed a small but significant part of the book’s content, and in 1841, the landscape gardener [[Andrew Jackson Downing]] described the ''American Gardener’s Calendar'' as the “only American work previously published which treats directly of landscape gardening.”<ref> A. J. Downing, ''A Treatise on the Theory and Practice of Landscape Gardening, Adapted to North America; with a View to the Improvement of Country Residences... with Remarks on Rural Architecture'' (New York: Wiley & Putnam, 1841), 20, [https://www.zotero.org/groups/54737/keywords_in_early_american_landscape_design/items/itemKey/PGUEKHNG? view on Zotero].</ref> Squeezed into the month of January, M’Mahon’s introductory overview of “The [[Pleasure ground/Pleasure garden|Pleasure]], or [[Flower Garden]]” quotes extensively from ''The Universal Gardener and Botanist'' by John Abercrombie.<ref>See the entry on Pleasure-Garden in the 1778 and, even more similar, 1797 editions of Thomas Mawe and John Abercrombie, ''The Universal Gardener and Botanist, or A General Dictionary of Gardening and Botany'' (London: Printed for G. Robinson et al, 1778), [https://www.zotero.org/groups/54737/keywords_in_early_american_landscape_design/items/itemKey/ID3XI7NM/q/abercrombie view  on Zotero].</ref> This overview effectively popularized a design vocabulary drawn from earlier English works for American audiences, employing terms for plantings like [[lawn]], [[hedge]], and [[parterre]]; architectural elements such as [[temple]], pyramid, and [[obelisk]]; and earthworks including [[slope]], [[terrace]], and [[eminence]].<ref>M’Mahon 1806, 55–69, [https://www.zotero.org/groups/54737/keywords_in_early_american_landscape_design/items/itemKey/HU4JIS9C/q/m'mahon view on Zotero].</ref> M’Mahon’s taste and those of his sources subtly shaped this vocabulary. <span id="Modern_cite"></span>He expressed a preference for the “[[Modern style/Natural style|modern]] garden” in imitation of nature rather than the “too formal works” that characterized the [[Ancient style]] ([[#Modern|view text]]).<ref>M’Mahon 1806, 66 (perspective), 55–56 (modern garden), [https://www.zotero.org/groups/54737/keywords_in_early_american_landscape_design/items/itemKey/HU4JIS9C/q/m'mahon view on Zotero].
+Landscape design principles formed a small but significant part of the book’s content, and in 1841, the landscape gardener [[A. J. Downing]] described the ''American Gardener’s Calendar'' as the “only American work previously published which treats directly of landscape gardening.”<ref> A. J. Downing, ''A Treatise on the Theory and Practice of Landscape Gardening, Adapted to North America; with a View to the Improvement of Country Residences... with Remarks on Rural Architecture'' (New York: Wiley & Putnam, 1841), 20, [https://www.zotero.org/groups/54737/keywords_in_early_american_landscape_design/items/itemKey/PGUEKHNG? view on Zotero].</ref> Squeezed into the month of January, M’Mahon’s introductory overview of “The [[Pleasure ground/Pleasure garden|Pleasure]], or [[Flower Garden]]” quotes extensively from ''The Universal Gardener and Botanist'' by John Abercrombie.<ref>See the entry on Pleasure-Garden in the 1778 and, even more similar, 1797 editions of Thomas Mawe and John Abercrombie, ''The Universal Gardener and Botanist, or A General Dictionary of Gardening and Botany'' (London: Printed for G. Robinson et al, 1778), [https://www.zotero.org/groups/54737/keywords_in_early_american_landscape_design/items/itemKey/ID3XI7NM/q/abercrombie view  on Zotero].</ref> This overview effectively popularized a design vocabulary drawn from earlier English works for American audiences, employing terms for plantings like [[lawn]], [[hedge]], and [[parterre]]; architectural elements such as [[temple]], pyramid, and [[obelisk]]; and earthworks including [[slope]], [[terrace]], and [[eminence]].<ref>M’Mahon 1806, 55–69, [https://www.zotero.org/groups/54737/keywords_in_early_american_landscape_design/items/itemKey/HU4JIS9C/q/m'mahon view on Zotero].</ref> M’Mahon’s taste and those of his sources subtly shaped this vocabulary. <span id="Modern_cite"></span>He expressed a preference for the “[[Modern style/Natural style|modern]] garden” in imitation of nature rather than the “too formal works” that characterized the [[Ancient style]] ([[#Modern|view text]]).<ref>M’Mahon 1806, 66 (perspective), 55–56 (modern garden), [https://www.zotero.org/groups/54737/keywords_in_early_american_landscape_design/items/itemKey/HU4JIS9C/q/m'mahon view on Zotero].
 </ref> <span id="Variety_cite"></span>Lifting passages from Abercrombie’s ''Universal Gardener and Botanist'' verbatim, he advocated variety in garden design, rather than single-minded adherence to any individual design principle ([[#Variety|view text]]).

@@ Line 23: / Line 23: @@
 Within M’Mahon’s lifetime, he became especially known for his championing of [[hedge]]s as live fences, and his calendar may have helped popularize them wherever it was read. <span id="Aurora1816_cite"></span> In 1816, his obituary singled out his innovative approach to planting “Quickset [[hedge]]s” from European white thorn (''Crataegus laevigata''), based on observation of the weathering and germination of Hawthorn seeds in the wild ([[#Aurora1816|view text]]). As Brenda Bullion points out, M’Mahon himself understood these live fences as a response to the deforestation of the American countryside, recommending them “particularly in those parts of the Union in which timber has got scarce, and must inevitably become more so in a very rapid progression.”<ref>Bullion 1990, 304–5, [https://www.zotero.org/groups/54737/keywords_in_early_american_landscape_design/items/itemKey/9XGG8N2W/q/brenda%20bullion view on Zotero].</ref> Here, as elsewhere, his ''Calendar'' had both practical and aesthetic implications for the development of American landscape design.
-Landscape design principles formed a small but significant part of the book’s content, and in 1841, the landscape gardener [[A.J. Downing]] described the ''American Gardener’s Calendar'' as the “only American work previously published which treats directly of landscape gardening.”<ref> A. J. Downing, ''A Treatise on the Theory and Practice of Landscape Gardening, Adapted to North America; with a View to the Improvement of Country Residences... with Remarks on Rural Architecture'' (New York: Wiley & Putnam, 1841), 20, [https://www.zotero.org/groups/54737/keywords_in_early_american_landscape_design/items/itemKey/PGUEKHNG? view on Zotero].</ref> Squeezed into the month of January, M’Mahon’s introductory overview of “The [[Pleasure ground/Pleasure garden|Pleasure]], or [[Flower Garden]]” quotes extensively from ''The Universal Gardener and Botanist'' by John Abercrombie.<ref>See the entry on Pleasure-Garden in the 1778 and, even more similar, 1797 editions of Thomas Mawe and John Abercrombie, ''The Universal Gardener and Botanist, or A General Dictionary of Gardening and Botany'' (London: Printed for G. Robinson et al, 1778), [https://www.zotero.org/groups/54737/keywords_in_early_american_landscape_design/items/itemKey/ID3XI7NM/q/abercrombie view  on Zotero].</ref> This overview effectively popularized a design vocabulary drawn from earlier English works for American audiences, employing terms for plantings like [[lawn]], [[hedge]], and [[parterre]]; architectural elements such as [[temple]], pyramid, and [[obelisk]]; and earthworks including [[slope]], [[terrace]], and [[eminence]].<ref>M’Mahon 1806, 55–69, [https://www.zotero.org/groups/54737/keywords_in_early_american_landscape_design/items/itemKey/HU4JIS9C/q/m'mahon view on Zotero].</ref> M’Mahon’s taste and those of his sources subtly shaped this vocabulary. <span id="Modern_cite"></span>He expressed a preference for the “[[Modern style/Natural style|modern]] garden” in imitation of nature rather than the “too formal works” that characterized the [[Ancient style]] ([[#Modern|view text]]).<ref>M’Mahon 1806, 66 (perspective), 55–56 (modern garden), [https://www.zotero.org/groups/54737/keywords_in_early_american_landscape_design/items/itemKey/HU4JIS9C/q/m'mahon view on Zotero].
+Landscape design principles formed a small but significant part of the book’s content, and in 1841, the landscape gardener [[Andrew Jackson Downing]] described the ''American Gardener’s Calendar'' as the “only American work previously published which treats directly of landscape gardening.”<ref> A. J. Downing, ''A Treatise on the Theory and Practice of Landscape Gardening, Adapted to North America; with a View to the Improvement of Country Residences... with Remarks on Rural Architecture'' (New York: Wiley & Putnam, 1841), 20, [https://www.zotero.org/groups/54737/keywords_in_early_american_landscape_design/items/itemKey/PGUEKHNG? view on Zotero].</ref> Squeezed into the month of January, M’Mahon’s introductory overview of “The [[Pleasure ground/Pleasure garden|Pleasure]], or [[Flower Garden]]” quotes extensively from ''The Universal Gardener and Botanist'' by John Abercrombie.<ref>See the entry on Pleasure-Garden in the 1778 and, even more similar, 1797 editions of Thomas Mawe and John Abercrombie, ''The Universal Gardener and Botanist, or A General Dictionary of Gardening and Botany'' (London: Printed for G. Robinson et al, 1778), [https://www.zotero.org/groups/54737/keywords_in_early_american_landscape_design/items/itemKey/ID3XI7NM/q/abercrombie view  on Zotero].</ref> This overview effectively popularized a design vocabulary drawn from earlier English works for American audiences, employing terms for plantings like [[lawn]], [[hedge]], and [[parterre]]; architectural elements such as [[temple]], pyramid, and [[obelisk]]; and earthworks including [[slope]], [[terrace]], and [[eminence]].<ref>M’Mahon 1806, 55–69, [https://www.zotero.org/groups/54737/keywords_in_early_american_landscape_design/items/itemKey/HU4JIS9C/q/m'mahon view on Zotero].</ref> M’Mahon’s taste and those of his sources subtly shaped this vocabulary. <span id="Modern_cite"></span>He expressed a preference for the “[[Modern style/Natural style|modern]] garden” in imitation of nature rather than the “too formal works” that characterized the [[Ancient style]] ([[#Modern|view text]]).<ref>M’Mahon 1806, 66 (perspective), 55–56 (modern garden), [https://www.zotero.org/groups/54737/keywords_in_early_american_landscape_design/items/itemKey/HU4JIS9C/q/m'mahon view on Zotero].
 </ref> <span id="Variety_cite"></span>Lifting passages from Abercrombie’s ''Universal Gardener and Botanist'' verbatim, he advocated variety in garden design, rather than single-minded adherence to any individual design principle ([[#Variety|view text]]).

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 :“In Europe plants are not rejected because they are indigenous, on the contrary they are cultivated with due care; and yet here, we cultivate many foreign trifles, and neglect the profusion of beauties so bountifully bestowed upon us by the hand of nature.”
-*Anonymous, 1807, Review of ''The American Gardener’s Calendar'' (''The Medical Repository'' vol. 4: 177-180)<ref>“Review of ''The American Gardener’s Calendar'',” ''The Medical Repository'' 4 (1807): 174–80. [https://www.zotero.org/groups/54737/keywords_in_early_american_landscape_design/items/itemKey/UR9I39RN view on Zotero].</ref>
+*Anonymous, 1807, Review of ''The American Gardener’s Calendar'' (''The Medical Repository'' vol. 4: 177-180)<ref>“Review of ''The American Gardener’s Calendar'',” ''The Medical Repository'' 4 (1807): 174–80, [https://www.zotero.org/groups/54737/keywords_in_early_american_landscape_design/items/itemKey/UR9I39RN view on Zotero].</ref>
 :“Mr. M’Mahon has parcelled his work into twelve great divisions. These correspond to the months of the year. In each he prescribes the work to be done, and the way of doing it. In this manner he has constructed a Calendar, beginning with January, and proceeding regularly to June, and thence forward to December. By attending to this arrangement, the person who consults the volume can readily find the months, by casting his eye to the top of the pages, and below them the labour and preparation during each.
-:“Besides this distribution of his precepts and directions, according to the sun’s place in the zodiacal signs, the author has made a methodical disposition of the business of every month. The operations in the [[kitchen-garden]], fruit-garden, [[orchard]], vineyard, [[nursery]], [[flower-garden]], [[green-house]], and [[hot-house]], are placed under distinct heads; and its is easy to find under one or another of these titles, whatever the Calendar contains for all the months of the year. By adverting thus to a division of his publication, into twelve parts or months, and these again into a subdivision of each into eight sections, Mr. M. has rendered it very easy to find any thing it contains. And, by attending to this, it is scarcely more difficult to examine the directions for the [[pleasure garden]] in September, the orchard in March, or the [[hot-house]] in December, &c. &c. Than to search for a word and its correlatives in the Encyclopaedia, or to examine passages in the Bible by the aid of a Concordance.
+:“Besides this distribution of his precepts and directions, according to the sun’s place in the zodiacal signs, the author has made a methodical disposition of the business of every month. The operations in the [[kitchen-garden]], fruit-garden, [[orchard]], vineyard, [[nursery]], [[flower-garden]], [[Greenhouse|green-house]], and [[hot-house]], are placed under distinct heads; and its is easy to find under one or another of these titles, whatever the Calendar contains for all the months of the year. By adverting thus to a division of his publication, into twelve parts or months, and these again into a subdivision of each into eight sections, Mr. M. has rendered it very easy to find any thing it contains. And, by attending to this, it is scarcely more difficult to examine the directions for the [[pleasure garden]] in September, the [[orchard]] in March, or the [[hot-house]] in December, &c. &c. Than to search for a word and its correlatives in the Encyclopaedia, or to examine passages in the Bible by the aid of a Concordance.
 :“The reader is not to expect that the work should be wholly original. The author does not pretend to this. A candid acknowledgement is made, that in writing the treatise, he consulted the best publications in the American States, and in the transatlantic countries, especially those extant in the English, French, and Latin tongues. To bring into one compendious tract the information scattered in many books, composed in different languages, hard and costly to procure, laborious to examine when procured, and requiring more literature than falls to the lot of the great body of cultivators, is a very laudable and useful undertaking. Our fellow citizens, we confidently believe, will concur with us in opinion, that he has done them worthy and acceptable service. He is perfectly aware that in some cases he may be mistaken, and in others may have made omissions; and these he is ready to amend as soon as they shall be discovered. But he has employed a good share of judgment in the directions he has given for the rearing of thorn-quicks and other plants for live [[fence]]s; for cultivating liquorice, manna-ash, and rhubarb for medicines; planting madder and weld for dyeing; cork tree, fuller’s teazel, tanner’s-sumac, and paper mulberry for the economical arts; sea-kale for the dining table; grapes for the preparation of wine; and mulberry trees and insects for the manufacture of silk. And, in addition to all his knowledge derived from preceding authors, Mr. M. lays claim to the attention of his readers, by the experimental skill derived from a large and extensive course of practical gardening, pursued for almost thirty years. . . .
 :“We were pleased to find that the American plants which beautify the woods, fields, and swamps, had not been overlooked or neglected by our author. Many of them are duly noticed, and the cultivator’s attention called to them among the instructions for the [[flower-garden]] in the month of August. And we were gratified also with a piece of convenient economy, by substituting oak leaves newly fallen in autumn, instead of tanner’s bark, as described in the section which relates to the [[hot-house]] department for October.

@@ Line 44: / Line 44: @@
 :“However, for the sake of diversity, some of the more elegant regular works, ought still to be admitted, which would form a beautiful contrast with the general rural improvements, and diversify the whole scene, so as to have a most enchanting effect.”
-*<div id="Indigenous"></div>M’Mahon, Bernard, 1806, endorsing the ornamental use of “indigenous” flowers (1806: 72)<ref>M’Mahon 1806, 72, [https://www.zotero.org/groups/54737/keywords_in_early_american_landscape_design/items/itemKey/HU4JIS9C/q/m'mahon view on Zotero].</ref>[[#Indigenous_cite|back up to History]]
+*<div id="Indigenous"></div>M’Mahon, Bernard, 1806, endorsing the ornamental use of “indigenous” flowers (1806: 72)<ref>M’Mahon 1806, 72, [https://www.zotero.org/groups/54737/keywords_in_early_american_landscape_design/items/itemKey/HU4JIS9C/q/m'mahon view on Zotero].</ref> [[#Indigenous_cite|back up to History]]
 :“Here I cannot avoid remarking, that many [[flower-garden]]s, &c. Are almost destitute of bloom, during a great part of the season; which could be easily avoided, and a blaze of flowers kept up, both in this department, and in the borders of the [[pleasure ground]], from March to November, by introducing from our woods and fields, the various beautiful ornaments with which nature has so profusely decorated them. Is it because they are indigenous, that we should reject them? ought we not rather to cultivate and improve them? what can be more beautiful than our Lobelias, Orchis’, Asclepias’ and Asters; Dracocephalums, Gerardias, Monardas and Ipomoeas; Liliums, Podalyrias, Rhexias, Solidagos and Hibiscus’; Phlox’s, Gentianas, Spigelias, Chironias and Sisyrinchiums, Cassias, Ophrys’, Coreopsis’ and Cypripediums; Fumarias, Violas, Rudbeckias and Liatris’; with our charming Limadorum, fragrant Arethusa and a thousand other lovely plants, which if introduced would grace our plantations, and delight our senses?
 :“In Europe plants are not rejected because they are indigenous, on the contrary they are cultivated with due care; and yet here, we cultivate many foreign trifles, and neglect the profusion of beauties so bountifully bestowed upon us by the hand of nature.”

@@ Line 47: / Line 47: @@
 :“Here I cannot avoid remarking, that many [[flower-garden]]s, &c. Are almost destitute of bloom, during a great part of the season; which could be easily avoided, and a blaze of flowers kept up, both in this department, and in the borders of the [[pleasure ground]], from March to November, by introducing from our woods and fields, the various beautiful ornaments with which nature has so profusely decorated them. Is it because they are indigenous, that we should reject them? ought we not rather to cultivate and improve them? what can be more beautiful than our Lobelias, Orchis’, Asclepias’ and Asters; Dracocephalums, Gerardias, Monardas and Ipomoeas; Liliums, Podalyrias, Rhexias, Solidagos and Hibiscus’; Phlox’s, Gentianas, Spigelias, Chironias and Sisyrinchiums, Cassias, Ophrys’, Coreopsis’ and Cypripediums; Fumarias, Violas, Rudbeckias and Liatris’; with our charming Limadorum, fragrant Arethusa and a thousand other lovely plants, which if introduced would grace our plantations, and delight our senses?
 :“In Europe plants are not rejected because they are indigenous, on the contrary they are cultivated with due care; and yet here, we cultivate many foreign trifles, and neglect the profusion of beauties so bountifully bestowed upon us by the hand of nature.”
 *Anonymous, 1807, Review of ''The American Gardener’s Calendar'' (The Medical Repository vol. 4: 177-180)<ref>“Review of ''The American Gardener’s Calendar'',” ''The Medical Repository'' 4 (1807): 174–80. [https://www.zotero.org/groups/54737/keywords_in_early_american_landscape_design/items/itemKey/UR9I39RN view on Zotero].</ref>
 :“Mr. M’Mahon has parcelled his work into twelve great divisions. These correspond to the months of the year. In each he prescribes the work to be done, and the way of doing it. In this manner he has constructed a Calendar, beginning with January, and proceeding regularly to June, and thence forward to December. By attending to this arrangement, the person who consults the volume can readily find the months, by casting his eye to the top of the pages, and below them the labour and preparation during each.
-:“Besides this distribution of his precepts and directions, according to the sun’s place in the zodiacal signs, the author has made a methodical disposition of the business of every month. The operations in the kitchen-garden, fruit-garden, orchard, vineyard, nursery, flower-garden, green-house, and hot-house, are placed under distinct heads; and its is easy to find under one or another of these titles, whatever the Calendar contains for all the months of the year. By adverting thus to a division of his publication, into twelve parts or months, and these again into a subdivision of each into eight sections, Mr. M. has rendered it very easy to find any thing it contains. And, by attending to this, it is scarcely more difficult to examine the directions for the pleasure garden in September, the orchard in March, or the hot-house in December, &c. &c. Than to search for a word and its correlatives in the Encyclopaedia, or to examine passages in the Bible by the aid of a Concordance.
+:“Besides this distribution of his precepts and directions, according to the sun’s place in the zodiacal signs, the author has made a methodical disposition of the business of every month. The operations in the [[kitchen-garden]], fruit-garden, [[orchard]], vineyard, [[nursery]], [[flower-garden]], [[green-house]], and [[hot-house]], are placed under distinct heads; and its is easy to find under one or another of these titles, whatever the Calendar contains for all the months of the year. By adverting thus to a division of his publication, into twelve parts or months, and these again into a subdivision of each into eight sections, Mr. M. has rendered it very easy to find any thing it contains. And, by attending to this, it is scarcely more difficult to examine the directions for the [[pleasure garden]] in September, the orchard in March, or the [[hot-house]] in December, &c. &c. Than to search for a word and its correlatives in the Encyclopaedia, or to examine passages in the Bible by the aid of a Concordance.
-:“The reader is not to expect that the work should be wholly original. The author does not pretend to this. A candid acknowledgement is made, that in writing the treatise, he consulted the best publications in the American States, and in the transatlantic countries, especially those extant in the English, French, and Latin tongues. To bring into one compendious tract the information scattered in many books, composed in different languages, hard and costly to procure, laborious to examine when procured, and requiring more literature than falls to the lot of the great body of cultivators, is a very laudable and useful undertaking. Our fellow citizens, we confidently believe, will concur with us in opinion, that he has done them worthy and acceptable service. He is perfectly aware that in some cases he may be mistaken, and in others may have made omissions; and these he is ready to amend as soon as they shall be discovered. But he has employed a good share of judgment in the directions he has given for the rearing of thorn-quicks and other plants for live fences; for cultivating liquorice, manna-ash, and rhubarb for medicines; planting madder and weld for dyeing; cork tree, fuller’s teazel, tanner’s-sumac, and paper mulberry for the economical arts; sea-kale for the dining table; grapes for the preparation of wine; and mulberry trees and insects for the manufacture of silk. And, in addition to all his knowledge derived from preceding authors, Mr. M. lays claim to the attention of his readers, by the experimental skill derived from a large and extensive course of practical gardening, pursued for almost thirty years. . . .
+:“The reader is not to expect that the work should be wholly original. The author does not pretend to this. A candid acknowledgement is made, that in writing the treatise, he consulted the best publications in the American States, and in the transatlantic countries, especially those extant in the English, French, and Latin tongues. To bring into one compendious tract the information scattered in many books, composed in different languages, hard and costly to procure, laborious to examine when procured, and requiring more literature than falls to the lot of the great body of cultivators, is a very laudable and useful undertaking. Our fellow citizens, we confidently believe, will concur with us in opinion, that he has done them worthy and acceptable service. He is perfectly aware that in some cases he may be mistaken, and in others may have made omissions; and these he is ready to amend as soon as they shall be discovered. But he has employed a good share of judgment in the directions he has given for the rearing of thorn-quicks and other plants for live [[fence]]s; for cultivating liquorice, manna-ash, and rhubarb for medicines; planting madder and weld for dyeing; cork tree, fuller’s teazel, tanner’s-sumac, and paper mulberry for the economical arts; sea-kale for the dining table; grapes for the preparation of wine; and mulberry trees and insects for the manufacture of silk. And, in addition to all his knowledge derived from preceding authors, Mr. M. lays claim to the attention of his readers, by the experimental skill derived from a large and extensive course of practical gardening, pursued for almost thirty years. . . .
-:“We were pleased to find that the American plants which beautify the woods, fields, and swamps, had not been overlooked or neglected by our author. Many of them are duly noticed, and the cultivator’s attention called to them among the instructions for the flower-garden in the month of August. And we were gratified also with a piece of convenient economy, by substituting oak leaves newly fallen in autumn, instead of tanner’s bark, as described in the section which relates to the hot-house department for October.
+:“We were pleased to find that the American plants which beautify the woods, fields, and swamps, had not been overlooked or neglected by our author. Many of them are duly noticed, and the cultivator’s attention called to them among the instructions for the [[flower-garden]] in the month of August. And we were gratified also with a piece of convenient economy, by substituting oak leaves newly fallen in autumn, instead of tanner’s bark, as described in the section which relates to the [[hot-house]] department for October.
-:“But we forbear any further comments or criticisms. A book of such great extent, and various contents, cannot be easily analized [sic] in a general way further than we have gone. And to proceed more deeply into particulars would be inconsistent with our plan and limits: we therefore observe, that as the taste for gardening is increasing, and the appearance of the book is opportune, we expect it will be sought with avidity, and thereby become the incentive and the guide to capital improvements in that interesting art. And we shall be disappointed, if nursery-men, florists, and gentlemen of taste, leisure, and fortune, do not add to their libraries, however select and small, M’Mahon’s American Calendar.”
+:“But we forbear any further comments or criticisms. A book of such great extent, and various contents, cannot be easily analized [''sic''] in a general way further than we have gone. And to proceed more deeply into particulars would be inconsistent with our plan and limits: we therefore observe, that as the taste for gardening is increasing, and the appearance of the book is opportune, we expect it will be sought with avidity, and thereby become the incentive and the guide to capital improvements in that interesting art. And we shall be disappointed, if nursery-men, florists, and gentlemen of taste, leisure, and fortune, do not add to their libraries, however select and small, M’Mahon’s American Calendar.”
 *M’Mahon, Bernard, 3 January 1809, letter to [[Thomas Jefferson]] describing a [[nursery]] and [[botanic garden]] in Philadelphia, Pa. (quoted in Jefferson 1944: 401)<ref>Jefferson 1944, 401, [https://www.zotero.org/groups/54737/keywords_in_early_american_landscape_design/items/itemKey/8ZA5VRP5/q/thomas%20jefferson's%20garden%20book view on Zotero].</ref>