8vo. Manuscript on paper. [108] leaves, [26] completed in a single, close, legible hand; the remainder unused. Contemporary green calf, tooled in gilt and blind, contrasting red morocco lettering-piece, A.E.G. Extremities rubbed and marked, spine dulled. Marbled endpapers, with five engraved illustrations bound in, one as a 'frontispiece', later genealogical notes in three distinct hands to verso of RFEP.

The 'third edition' of a manuscript diary in the hand of Charles Poulter (b. 1822), an out-of-work London plumber who is forced to leave his young family for Hampshire in his search for employment.

Poulter, an unsophisticated wordsmith possessed of a modest vocabulary, was evidently a rather hapless gentleman. The personification of the expression 'jack of all trades, master of none', Poulter's itinerant existence - travelling primarily between London, Winchester, and Southampton - sees him turn his hand to, not only his chosen profession of plumbing, but house painting, shoemaking, and glazing. Money however, whether earnt or borrowed, seems to have slipped easily through his fingers, leading to recurring protestations of penury and a constant reliance on the charity of relatives.