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Inscribed in artist's hand on front enpapers in brown ink: "A few of ye innumerable incidents are represented here, which accompany a morning, a noon-tide, and an Evening sun. | 1 The sun rises ruddy, turbid, just touches ye tops of the highest ground. The intervening objects, & ground-shadows are, of course, dark & deep. | 2 The same idea is continued; only here ye sun rises with a fainter, & more wan lustre. | 3 The sun here gets more force, & beams along the surface of ye ground: but ye day is setting in cloudy, & obscure. | 4 The sun still gets more power, & objects begin to appear more distinctly. | 5 The same idea is continued; only ye atmosphere is some-what more hazy. | 6 The sun is clouded; but as there is not much haziness in ye atmosphere, the several parts of ye country appear very distinctly. | 7 As ye day advances, ye morning gets clearer. The sun shines out; but without much strength. | 8 The sun is obscured, & ye atmosphere inclines to rain. | 9 The effect here is intended, in that of ye reflection of a bright sky on ye water, when ye sun itself is obscured. | 10 As it is now high noon, wh. always affords an unfavou-rable light to ye painter, he avoids as much as he can the vertical rays of ye sun, & likes its mildest effusions best. It here shines wanly, & hazily upon ye cliffs. | 11 The same effect is here exhibited in a lake-scene | 12 This, and the three following, ye 13th, ye 14th and ye 15th, are all instances of landscape under meridian suns, chastised by different degrees of mist, & cloudy weather. | NB See ye pages at ye end of ye volume."; in brown ink on back endpapers: "16 Evening, ye picturesqe time of ye day, is now coming on. The sun, verging from its meridian, is beginning to descend, & the light is more contracted. | 17 The same idea is continued; but ye sky is still more tinged with its warm evening-hue. | 18 The evening-glow now pervades ye landscape strongly. | 19 The same idea is continued. | 20 The mild effusion of evening-light, which pervaded the two last landscapes, is here changed into a wild, turbid sky, prog-nosticating storm. | 21 A calm sunset. The sun is supposed to be setting behind ye rising ground, on wh. ye ruin stands. | 22 The idea of a calm, streaky sunset, upon a lake. | 23 The sun is now set, & ye evening closes in, but rather wild, & lowering. | 24 Here ye evening closes in more mildly. The sun leaves only a faint light on ye sky; but without ye power of touching even ye highest objects with its light."

William Gilpin bookplate; Paul Mellon / Oak Spring bookplate; each drawing with blind embossed collector's mark: William Gilpin (Lugt 2622a); attached stationary sheet from The University, Leeds: "This book of drawings, by the Revd William Gilpin, author of Forest Scenery et al, is one of those bound or mounted & indexed by himself, which he sold in aid of the fund for his parish school near Lymington. 1795"; attached stationary from The University, Glasgow: "This volume was purchased at the sale (Christie's) 1802 (lot 92) by James Forbes FRS."