Le Bon Jardinier du Midi de la France. Contenant 1. L'indication des travaux horticoles à exécuter chaque mois; 2. La culture des plantes potagères; 3. La culture et la taille des arbres fruitieres et forestiers, ainsi que la liste des arbres fruitieres cultivables dans le Midi; 4. La culture des fleurs et arbustes d'agréments, oignons et plantes de serre, suivie de plusieurs tableaux de végétaux groupes d'après la place qu'ils doivent occuper dans les jardins, pelouses massifs, etc.; 4. [sic] Un vocabulaire des principaux termes de botanique et de jardinage. 5e édition

Paris; Montpellier: Ch[arles] Delegrave et Ce Libraires-Éditeurs; Imprimerie Centrale du Midi Hamelin Frères, 1875. Bibliotèque agricole du Midi, 4. Small octavo (18.5 x 11.5 cm.), 451 pages. Illustrated. Fifth Edition. An unassuming handbook for gardeners, and at the same time a summation of horticultural knowledge by a leading pedagogue in the French tradition. Beginning with a calendar of activities calibrated to the seasons of southern France, the work propels readers into a systematic accounting of requirements and expectations for cultivating both domestic staples and imports from abroad. Especially precise and detailed are diagrams illustrating pruning, grafting, and training en espalier of fruit trees. But a better gauge of Fabre's comprehensiveness might be the more than one hundred varieties of pear known by him to be in cultivation, with notes on their adaptability, the size and texture of their fruit, and the months in which they ripen. The popular title Le bon jardinier would have been known to horticulturists of all stripes from its use by no less than the venerable Pierre Antoine Poiteau (who had worked at Versaille), by Jean-Claude-Michel Mordant de Launay (at the start of the 19th century director of the Ménagerie du Jardin des plantes à Paris), and in Louis Fabre's own time by the prolific agriculturalist Henri de Vilmorin; but it had not before been incorporated into so comprehensive a multi-volume venture by a single author as Fabre's Bibliotèque agricole du Midi. The first installment, Principes d'agriculture, had already appeared in an updated edition by the time the series was recognized with a medallion of merit at the second World's Fair to be held at Paris in 1867. In similar demand was this volume dedicated to garden flowers, fruits, and vegetables, which had appeared first in 1865. A third edition dated 1872 is known from bibliographies of the time. A bit of minor publishing confusion is explained by a fourth edition, apparently undated but with the first record of the Montpellier publishing house seen on the title page of the present volume, below which is noted: (Ancienne Maison Gras). The fifth edition dispenses with Gras and adds the name Hamelin Frères, but also introduces a uniquely-identifying typographical error: chapter 5 is listed as a "second" chapter 4. The region around Vaucluse, a geographical department in the southeast, was-and is still today-famous for the cultivation of fruits and vegetables on one of the most fertile plains of southern Europe. (The Chamber of Agriculture of Vaucluse has even trademarked the phrase "Bienvenue à la ferme"!) It is where Louis Fabre (1806-1882), a native of nearby Carpentras, had served as director of the agriculture school (here he is credited as "ex-directeur"). In buff, black-lettered wrappers; some bumping to corners. Very good. [OCLC locates no copy identified as the fifth edition; but five copies from the 1860s and 70s, all published by Gras in Montpellier].