The Practical Surveyor by Samuel Wyld might best be thought of as the Practical Surveying for Dummies of it's time. Wyld writes in his preface that “[I]n Handling this, I have not chose the most Accurate Method I could think of, but rather the most Plain and Simple, as being most Agreeable to the Conception of a Stranger to the Art, to whom nothing can be too plain.” Which is to say that the book is a hands-on guide for laymen and not a formal textbook for would-be professionals.

This volume comes to us essentially as Wyld intended. The contributing editor, David Manthey's idea was to preserve the book with all of it's original character. He writes: The text is identical to the 1725 first edition. It has been re-typeset for clarity using the original font, spelling, and punctuation. The long-S (which looks like an 'f' to modern readers) is used as per the original. The book includes reproductions of the original figures from six copperplates, all of the original advertisements, and all of the original woodcut illustrations.

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