Edwin Lees was a Worcester printer and bookseller who sold his business in his mid-thirties to focus on writing about the natural history and antiquities of Worcester and the Malvern Hills. Lees had an unrivalled knowledge of the area and became a renowned authority, effectively founding Worcester’s natural history society and the Worcester Literary and Scientific Institute. This book is his natural history of the Malvern Hills and the Severn valley. The work consists of 12 excursions taken with the Malvern & Worcestershire Naturalists Club and was intended to serve as a handbook for locals wishing to explore the neighbourhood further, as well as tourists to the area.