(DUNN, attributed to).   A DESCRIPTION OF KILLARNEY.       London: Printed For J. Dodsley,   1776.          This early picturesque guide to the scenery of the lakes and mountains of Killarney, Ireland, is especially notable for its evidence of formalized interest in picturesque travel several years before the publications of Gilpin and other popularizers of the Picturesque Tour. Unlike most prior published works on similar subjects, generally written by literary travelers after passing through the wilder scenery of mountain districts and observing them from an aesthetic point of view (Thomas Gray, for example), the text here is not a personal narrative of a particular trip, but an actual guide compiled for the benefit of other visitors who might travel to the area specifically to view its natural beauty. Halkett and Laing attribute the anonymous work to a Mr. Dunn, but we can find nothing else regarding his identity. His interest in Killarney derives almost entirely from its scenic values, and he opens the work with claims for the superiority of written description over pictorial representation in conveying these subjects to the imagination. "Resolving these advantages of the descriptive method, over the mere plastic, I wished to prove its excellence by an example; and meeting with a subject altogether engaging, I made the following attempt to exhibit it in its true colours. I inscribe it to the Academy of Royal Artists, as a poor atonement for my presumptuous encroachment upon the province of the picture." His methodical description, which refers regularly to a keyed map printed at the center of the title page, is divided into three sections. The first describes individually all the mountains, rivers and bays surrounding and feeding into the two lakes at the center of the region. In the second he describes the several islands within the lakes. It is in the final section, however, that the author's picturesque intent is most revealed. After having filled in the pictorial details of the district in the first two parts, this third part singles out ten distinct locations from which the most impressive and picturesque views of them may be obtained. Many of these are obtained from places high upon the surrounding mountains. Each is evaluated for its aesthetic merits and defaults. The wildness and irregular ridges viewed from Mount Mangerton are praised equally with the unstudied regularity of the view from Yellow Mountain over Lough Lane. The picturesque interest of Killarney was clearly equal to that of the more famous and accessible Lake District of England. The latter is generally regarded as the earliest British destination for picturesque travelers. In 1778 Thomas West published A GUIDE TO THE LAKES, and that work is often cited as "the earliest guide to picturesque mountain scenery" (see Bicknell, THE PICTURESQUE SCENERY OF THE LAKE DISTRICT). The present work obviously pre-dates West's guide, however, and may, in fact, be the earliest such guide published in Britain. Another edition, in smaller format, was published in Dublin in the same year, but we would presume that Dodsley's London printing is the first edition and that the Dublin printing was a pirated version.   4to (24.2 x 19 cm); (iv) + 50 + (2) pp. with engraved map on title and engraved landscape view printed on final leaf.            Later quarter cloth with paper-covered boards; damp stain in gutter on final two leaves. $750.00

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