A very finely preserved 70pp MSs guide to surveying produced originally in the late 1790's by Revolutionary War veteran, Stephen Felton [1752-1857]. From there it seems to have been passed with ato his son, Stephen Felton Jr [1795-1880]. Junior appears to have added nothing to the volume save his signature at the top of the title, the "Jr's" flourish added to his father's original title, and a small note on the final leaf dated at the very end of his life. The remainder of the manuscript seems to be entirely in the hand of its original author, Stephen Felton Sr.
Felton was originally a Marlborough farmer. At the outbreak of the Revolutionary War, he joined in with the Company at Beverly, Massachusetts and marched with them from the very earliest days of the War, fighting at Lexington and Concord in April of 1775. At the wars end, he became constable and collector of taxes in Marlborough, Massachusetts, and took up the practice of surveying as well.
The book itself is comprised of a simple thin calf strip spine cover and two marbled boards, marbled over pre-existing remainder sheets from William Durell's 1794 first American imprint of Foxe's Martyrology, published as The New and Complete Book of Martyrs. Durell's imprint was a large 4to, i.e. four pages to a sheet. You can see the two right sid up pages, one on the front cover and one on the rear. At the head of both sides you can see the titling for the what would be the other two pages of the 4to, printed upside down as it would be before folded. One section of the marbling is lifted and we can see it was also printed with Durell's pages on the reverse. It was not unusual for overage sheets or misprints to be repurposed into low cost blank volume covers, etc.
This volume was likely originally only marbled papers with the calf being laid over when the marbled paper weakened. There is also evidence of a marbled paper overlay that would have likely been applied previous to the leather as well. So the leather is likely a third binding, second repair.
The manuscript contains a very attractive title, a section on basic geometry rules and definitions needed for the practice of surveying, a second section of gemoetrical problems and examples of solutions one might encounter, then a section on trigonometry, a section of trigonometric case studies, a separate title, beautiful executed, on surveying proper, case studies in surveying, each of which is really beautifully executed, a section of the surveying of irregular fields, a full page illustration of a mariner's compass, again, beautifully executed, then further case studies and solutions for complex surveying. Interestingly, the final section is on shorthand as an aid to expediting the surveying process apparently.
Complete as created. A superb late 18th century document.
