Walpole, Horace, 4th earl of Orford (1717-1797) 
The history of the modern taste in gardening. (In 
his; Anecdotes of painting in England, with some account 
of the principal artists ••• collected by the late Kr. 
George Vertue and now digested and published from his 
original MSS by ••• H. Walpole. Strawberry-Hill, 
printed by Thomas Kirgate, 1771. v.4, p.117-151) 
(Lib. Cong.; Brit. Mus.) 
The title-page of the 4th vol. gives the 
title of the garden essay as above. The head¬ 
ing for the essay itself (p.ll7), however, is 
”0n modema gardening." 
"Horace Walpole’s essay is a brief history 
of landscape-gardening from the First Garden 
to ’Capability’ Brown." — cf. 1931 ed., p.x* 
The date on the title-page of vol.4 of the 
Anecdotes of painting in England is 1771. The 
"Advertisement," p.v-x, is signed October 1, 
1780, and gives T«alpole’s explanation for the 
delay in publication of the last vol. This was 
the fact that althO' he could not "dispense 
universel panegyric," he was reluctant to of¬ 
fend the families and friends of the artists 
discussed. This delay accounts for the date 
1780 which is given for v.4 in the review in 
Hirschfeld, GartenJcalendar 1782, p.94. See 
also Annual register (1780)23:164-178. 1781; 
Jour. Hort. 57:252 (1877); and the biblio¬ 
graphical note by W. £. Lewis in the 1931 ed., 
p . 75 . 
Lowndes, 5:2820, says that of v.4 only one 
ed. was printed at Strawberry-Hill. The 2d ed. 
of the Anecdotes, 1765-71, at the Lib. Cong, 
and Brit. Mus. is the 2d ed. of the let 3 vols., 
published 1765, and the Ist ed. of v.4, which 
as we have said was printed in 1771 but not ac¬ 
tually released to subscribers until 1780. 
—The 2d ed. with additions. London, J. Dods- 
ley, 1782. (In his: Anecdotes of painting in England. 
3d ed. with additions. London, 1782. v.4, p.[247]- 
316) (N.Y. Pub. Lib.; Boston Pub. Lib.; Lib. Cong.; 
Detroit Pub. Lib.; Vassar Coll. Lib.) 
Lib. Cong, printed card for 3d ed. has note: 
Vol.4 has title: Anecdotes of painting in En¬ 
gland ... to which is added the History bf«the 
modern taste in gardening ... The 2d ed., with 
additions. 
Lewis says, in the 1931 ed., p.76, that the 
text of this ed. has been followed in all sub¬ 
sequent ones. 
