1817. 12mo, pp. [ii] half-title, xxv, [i] advertisement, 191, [i] title-page ‘Descriptive Catalogue’, 59, [i] advertisement; with a couple of small text engravings; a little foxed and dust-soiled throughout, though often marginal, the ‘Descriptive catalogue a little more foxed, with prominent staining affecting lower gutter between pp. 25-48 and from p. 47 to the end of the ‘Descriptive Catalogue’ also affecting final endpaper; uncut in the original publisher’s grey paper boards, with printed label on spine (cracked and somewhat soiled), head and tail of spine worn with slight loss, joints cracked but holding, covers somewhat spotted and a little ink stained, corners and extremities bumped and lightly worn; with the bookplate of Benjamin Flounders [Flanders] on front paste-down; overall a good copy, and uncommon in the original boards. Uncommon first edition, and of appeal being in the original boards. ‘One of the most popular expositions of elementary chemistry of the time, which did much to bring the study of the science to the attention of the general public. The book was “written with a view, to blend chemical science with rational amusement” (preface). Five English editions appeared in quick succession: 1817, 1818 (2 eds.), 1819, and 1821, as well as translations into German (1819, 1824), Italian (1820, 1829, 1854), French (1825, 1835), and Spanish (1836). At the end is A descriptive catalogue of the apparatus & instruments employed in experimental and operative chemistry manufactured and sold by Frederick Accum (1817), comprising a detailed list of the apparatus and chemicals used at the time, complete with prices. Accum supplied apparatus to Harvard and Yale universities and even universities in India. The first edition is very scarce’ (Neville, p. 4-5).
Of the 103 experiments, a considerable number involve the properties of silver and other substances later applied to the photographic process.
Friedrich Christian Accum (1769-1838) ‘came to England in 1793 as an assistant in the firm of Brande, apothecaries to George III. By about 1800 he had his own laboratory and was soon giving lecture courses which proved popular. Accum was one of the forerunners of the developing class of professional chemists, seeing and exploiting the technological possibilities created by the rapid advance of chemical knowledge. He was active as a lecturer, author, merchant, consultant and did fundamental work on gas-lighting and food adulteration’ (Cole, p. 1). Cole notes that the first edition was sold out within two months, leading to Accum to issue the revised and expanded second edition in the following year.
Provenance: Benjamin Flounders (1768-1846) was a prominent English Quaker with business interests in key new industries and developments at the time of the mid-industrial revolution, such as The Stockton and Darlington Railway (of which he was a founding Director) and new canals in his native Northeast of England.

1840. Two parts in one volume, small folio; I. ff. [1] title-page, [1] blank, 25 samples on 13 leaves, sample 25 in small paper envelope, sample 17 no longer present; II. ff. [1] title-page and ‘Fautori’, [1] blank, a further 25 samples (nos 26-50) on 12 leaves, samples 41, 47 and 50 in envelopes; each sample with small typed label mounted below; a number of samples somewhat fragile, so only partially remaining, but predominantly intact; some offsetting caused by samples, notably to first title-page; small hole in first blank, paper a little browned throughout with some occasional minor finger-soiling; with a few small neat manuscript corrections in brown ink; in contemporary blue paper-backed boards, title in ink on spine, head and tail of spine bumped, joints a little rubbed and worn with minor loss of paper, most prominent at tail of upper joint, some minor dampstaining evident, covers lightly spotted and scuffed, extremities a little rubbed and worn; three contemporary signatures on front paste-down, two dated 1843 and 1847, though neatly crossed out; a good copy. A rare, albeit somewhat fragile, mid 19th century scientifically published album of Scandinavian algae specimens, containing 50 mounted dried examples, gathered by the noted botanist and phycologist John Areschoug (1811 - 1887), Associate professor of botany in Lund from 1839, and professor of botany at Uppsala from 1859, and who made a special study of algal flora of Scandinavian coastlines and of the Bohuslän archipelago in particular. He was one of the first at Uppsala to give practical lessons in microscopy. The red algae genus Areschougia from the the family Areschougiaceae is named in his honour.
The delicate samples have each been carefully mounted on paper, with some of the smaller examples folded into smaller paper envelopes for added protection - 25, 41, 47 and 50, with 41 and 47 seemingly microscopic slide preparations. Only sample 17 appears missing, though a number of samples are only partially complete, emphasising the fragility of such collections. At the bottom of each leaf has been mounted a printed label, giving the number, name, physical and geographical location, and month in which they were collected: ‘1. Fucus serratus Linn. Mollsund Bahsusiae – Aug’. For the most part, however, the specimens still retain their vibrant colour and texture, a great variety of species on display, of various shapes and sizes, some being almost transparent, others far more robust, with a couple partially calcified. They retain an elegance and beauty, and one can easily imagine them once floating in the sea.
Further parts were to follow, all of which are scarce, the third part containing samples 51-84 being published in the following year, though which is not present here. In total, according to the University of Auckland, the series ran to 12 volumes, concluding in 1879.
A contemporary review in ‘Botaniska Notiser för å 1839 och 1840’ (1841) provides some interesting insight into the issues surrounding the publication of such a work, stating that Areschough had previously attempted to published a dried collection of Scandinavian algae, but which did not reach ‘bookstores on the ground that he did not have a sufficient number of instructive specimens of all the species’. He therefore began a new collection, of ‘well-chosen’ specimens, in the words of the reviewer.
He is probably best remembered for his 1850 work Phyceae Scandinavicae Merinae.

[1838.]. 8vo, pp. [iv], 102; with four large folding lithograph plates; lightly foxed and browned throughout due to paper quality, with some further occasional minor soiling, minor ink staining on verso of first plate, with other three plates a little creased and with evidence of previous folds; bound in contemporary marbled boards, neatly rebacked and recornered in calf, spine ruled and lettered in ink, with some minor abrasions to surfaces; with presentation inscription from the author to Mr. Fildes at the tail of the dedication leaf; a good copy. Uncommon first edition of this detailed work, based very much on first hand experience, on the design and management of boilers, and the work of the Manchester engineer Robert Armstrong. The work bears testament, therefore, to the many technical and mechanical advances which emanated from the town, thanks to the rapid growth of the cotton industry which had transformed Manchester from being a small market town with a popular of 10,000 at the turn of the century, to becoming Britain’s second city by the 1840s, and home to nearly 400,000.
Indeed Armstrong dedicates his work to the ‘Cotton Manufacturers and other Proprietors of Steam engines, in Manchester and its vicinity, who have afforded him many opportunities of obtaining a variety of information on practical details’. This first edition is printed on rather cheap paper, the four large folding plates containing somewhat crude illustrations done reproduced from his original drawings in lithograph, a fact which Armstrong rather ruefully acknowledges in his concluding remarks, his publisher clearly having had little faith in its sale and suggesting only a limited initial print run ‘to meet a merely local sale’. Whilst he prides himself upon his boiler-making workmanship, his limited budget had not allowed him to use skilled engravers and printers, when it came to his bookmaking. An interesting commentary, perhaps, upon how lithography was considered to be a less skilled profession.
The poor design and management of boilers was frequently the Achilles heel of the steam engine, preventing their efficient and economic running. Armstrong focuses in particular upon boilers for mill engines, though there is a small section describing locomotive boilers. He deals with high and low pressure boilers, form and proportions, the capacity of the steam chamber and what happens when the boiler is too small, together with rules for alteration and improvement. There is advice on re-setting boilers in order to save fuel, methods of estimating power, the best form of fire-grate, boiler cleansing machinery and ways to get rid of scale and boiler balls, which clogged up pipes and flues, and on the cause and prevention of explosions. Various types of boiler, such as the Boulton and Watt boiler or Durham and Cornish boilers are referred to and some leading contemporary books, such as Tredgold and Pambour, are cited. A practical and thorough work.

ca. 1947. Small photograph album, 175 x 210mm, sheet size 166 x 180mm; ff. 15 leaves of brown card, containing 73 photographs of varying sizes, most presumably taken by the compiler, one larger and more formal photograph embossed with the stamp ‘Forest Hall Observatory, Northumberland’, and with four later newspaper clippings loosely inserted at rear; with evidence of at least two further images no longer present; the majority neatly annotated in a single hand in ink; some occasional light scuffing to the card, fore-edge of a few leaves a little thumbed and rubbed; contemporary ‘faux crocodile’ brown stiff card photograph album, lettered in gilt on upper cover, bound with gold and red silk cord through eyelet's, head and tail of spine a little rubbed and worn, corners lightly bumped; good. A striking personally compiled photograph album from the mid 20th century, assembled by the noted local astronomer and Fellow of the Royal Astronomical Society, Frank J. Acfield (1905-1975). A large striking photograph is found on the verso of f. 4, and annotated ‘Circumpolar Star Trails by F. J. Acfield, Forest Hall Observatory’, whilst another photograph is annotated ‘F.J.A’ and shows him standing by his own telescope. A previous owner has also had the handwriting verified, by the archivist of the British Astronomical Society, as being that of Acfield.
The 73 photographs of varying sizes were taken during the late 1940s and early 1950s, and depict a number of UK and European Observatories and buildings, their astronomers (including one of Acfield himself at work), 26 images of telescopes, and 25 depicting various observations of the solar system, including images of the sun, the moon, Jupiter, ‘Comet Honda’, and auroral light. Amongst the observatories visited include Seaton, Hepple, the Royal Observatory Edinburgh, Paris, Whickham, with a number taken of, and from, Acfield’s own observatory at Forest Hall in Newcastle, which he set up at his home in 1949. Using a 10-inch reflecting telescope, Acfield undertook extensive celestial photography, and according to Harold Gooch in his ‘Appreciation’ of Acfield in the Journal of the British Astronomical Association (Vol 89, p. 504-505, 1979) ‘did much for the Jupiter Section of the BAA and also worked extensively in the fields of cometary and auroral work as well as in the patient pursuit of the minor planets. Much of his outstanding photographic work is still widely reproduced’ (Gooch, p. 504). In addition he was a tireless astronomy populariser, writing weekly newspaper columns, and giving regular lectures. In 1970 an episode of the famous ‘Sky at Night’ series, hosted by Patrick Moore, was transmitted from Forest Hall, with the programme dedicated to his work and expertise.
Acfield was born in Southampton and trained and worked in the woollen industry, moving to Newcastle upon Tyne in 1936. He was elected a Fellow of the Royal Astronomical Society in 1945 and later was honoured by the Société Astronomique de France.

1810. 8vo, pp. [iv], [4] ‘Annonce’ giving times and dates of the sessions of the auction; [v]–xx 338; with duty paid stamp at head of the ‘Annonce’; some light foxing and spotting, but generally clean and crisp; in later nineteenth-century half calf over marbled boards, spine tooled in blind and gilt, with green morocco label lettered in gilt, head and tail of spine nicked and rubbed, lower joint starting to split, extremities lightly bumped and worn with some minor surface wear. First and only edition of this uncommon and important catalogue intended to be used as a bibliography as well as a sale catalogue of the library of the renowned chemist Fourcroy (1755-1809), including a classification scheme and indexes of authors and anonymous titles. Over 2,700 items in Fourcroy’s library are listed, 1800 of which are on science or medicine, with many rare chemical books being listed. It is preceded by a brief biography of Fourcroy including a bibliography of his own works. The sale dates are given in the separately paginated announcement. The library was sold on consecutive days, Monday to Saturday 19 November to 22 December 1810, 29 days in all. Fourcroy’s library is interesting in its own right, but also valuable as it provides a point of comparison with the library of Lavoisier who was his near contemporary and collaborator on the Méthode de nomenclature chimique (1787) which ushered in the chemical revolution. Lavoisier’s library was about the same size, 2,500 titles including pamphlets. Of the 1,746 books (excluding pamphlets) Beretta classifies 844 as scientific and medical (another 145 are on mineralogy and mining and 91 on agriculture and husbandry). According to Peignot, the compiler of the catalogue was François Henri Stanislas de l'Aulnay (1739-1831), the author of a book published in 1786 on Pilâtre de Rozier's antimephitic respirator, upon which he improved.

1874. 4to, pp. 39, [1] blank; with three original photographs signed by C. Bräunlich of Jena (two mounted on one folding sheet), and four text diagrams; title-page somewhat browned and spotted, with further marginal browning and occasional spotting throughout; contemporary (publishers?) morocco-grained red cloth with blind-stamped borders, rebacked, covers a little soiled and cockled, extremities lightly bumped and rubbed; from the Anatomy Department, University of Cambridge with stamps and shelf mark on end leaves and title page. First edition of this treatise by the noted German anatomist Karl von Bardeleben (1849-1919). Von Bardeleben obtained his doctorate in 1872 as a research assistant at the University of Leipzig, and from 1873 worked as prosector at the University of Jena, where he later served as an associate professor (from 1878) and as full professor from 1898. As the present work illustrates, he specialised in the fields of topographic and comparative anatomy, and the present treatise is notable for the three original photographs mounted at the rear of the work, illustrating sections of the human vertebral column. It is his first work after his dissertation on arteriovenous fistula (1871). The photographs were made by Carl Braunlich Jr. (1850–1900) who specialised in carte-de-visite portraits and architecture.
In 1886, Bardeleben founded of the Anatomischer Anzeiger (Annals of Anatomy), considered to be one of the more authoritative journals devoted to anatomical morphology. His Atlas der topographischen Anatomie des Menschen für studierende und ärzte – with wood-engraved illustrations – was published in 1894.

1779. Single engraved sheet, sheet size 300 x 640mm, image size 285 x 625mm; hand-coloured; evidence of three previous vertical folds, with small hole in centre of left fold with minor loss, some light surface wear, paper a little browned and foxed, with neat repair along lower margin; very good. A rare hand-coloured engraving showing the side elevation and top view plan of an attractive six arch self-supporting stone bridge, and the design of the noted Montpellier architect Jean-Antoine Giral (1713-1787). According to the running headline the bridge ‘a été exécuté à Montpellier, en pierre de taille sur l’Echelle d’un pied par toise; c’est a dire, le sixieme du Grand, au quel on a done trente pouces de largeur. Representant quinze pieds en grand pour la moité de trente pieds de largeur d’une cette a l’autre il est entre pour les six arches sans les culées, 1000 pieds cubes de pierre de taille, pezant 2000 quintaux, qui sont soutenus sans aucune pille ni pillier sur lequel pont on roule des brouettes remplies de boulets de canon pesant douze à quinze quintaux sans que les arches reçoivent le plus petit mouvement, présentant au contraire, la plus grand solidité, depuis environ une année, que ce pont est construit’. The attractive engraving is signed by Giral and dated August 24th 1779.
Despite our best efforts, we have been unable to identify the bridge, or to ascertain for certain whether it was ever constructed, or whether this is merely a proposal for future discussion - which seems more likely.
We have found no other mention of this engraving. Giral, from a distinguished family of architects, was named state architect for Languedoc and he was entrusted with the design of a number of municipal and public edifices, most notably the water fountain at Peyrou, and the Royal Promenade which linked the water tower to the Montpellier Aquaduct. He was also responsible for the design of the new Pont sur la Mosson at Villeneuve-lès-Maguelone, built to replace one destroyed by a severe flood, and completed in 1766. The present engraving certainly bears some resemblance to that bridge, and as a number of other bridges in the area had been damaged during flooding, it seems likely that he had been called upon for new proposals.

1754.]. 8vo, pp. [ii], 5-138, with engraved title-page vignette; pp. 7, [1]; aside from some light spotting and foxing, clean and bright; abridgement loosely inserted, with some dust-soiling and light wear along fore-edge; in later stiff marbled wrappers, spine somewhat nicked and worn with small loss at head and approximately 2cm loss at tail, covers slightly creased with some light surface wear and minor staining. Separate edition, issued with a general title the year after it had received Royal Assent, of the act which saw the inception of the British Museum, the ‘Act for the purchase of the Museum, or collection of Sir Hans Sloane, and of the Harleian collection of manuscripts; and for providing one general repository for the better reception and more convenient use of the said collections; and of the Cottonian Library, and of the additions thereto’ (p. 5 and known formerly as Public General Act 1753 26. Geo. II. c.22).
Sir Hans Sloane died on January 11th 1753, aged 83, leaving behind a magnificent collection consisting of around 71000 objects, including 50,000 printed books and manuscripts, natural history specimens including 337 volumes of dried plants, coins and medals, prints and drawings, and antiquities, acquired from around the globe. Like many of the great collections and cabinets of curiosities of the time, Sloane had used developing global networks created by European imperial expansion to collect these materials, some of his income partly derived from Jamaican sugar plantations and enslaved labour. His will had placed the collection in the care of several trustees who were entrusted to ensure that his wishes that it be bequeathed to the nation were achieved. They were instructed to approach king or parliament with an offer for the collection in return for the payment of £20,000 - not the full value of the collection which was nearer 80,000 - to be paid to his executors for his daughters. Further, it was his wish that they secure an act of Parliament to vest the collection in their care, with all necessary property, powers, and money to ensure its preservation and accessibility by creating a new and freely accessible public museum to house it. So confident was Sloane over the collection’s scientific and educational value, that should this offer be declined it was to be offered in turn to four academies - St. Petersburg, Paris, Berlin, and Madrid - where Sloane held honorary memberships. Should this fail, the collection was not to revert to the daughters, but rather was to be sold at auction, with his heirs receiving the cash.
As chair of the executors, the Earl of Macclesfield presented a petition to King George II to purchase the legacy, but being famously uninterested in championing either the arts or sciences, he dismissed it as being too expensive. This rebuff led the executors to approached parliament, and whilst some did not fully embrace the idea of purchasing a museum, others, notably Henry Pelham, recognised that such a valuable bequest should not slip through its hands. After deliberation, parliament took the opportunity to combine Sloane’s museum with the great Cottonian and Harleian libraries, to create a larger institution than originally envisaged. The Act set in place the rules of governance for the museum, with a new body of forty-two Trustees appointed, and which included holders from some of the greatest offices in church and state. The Act was passed and given Royal Assent on June 7th 1753, the collections thus becoming the foundation not only of the British Museum, but subsequently of the Natural History Museum and the British Library.
The King having refused to pay the £20,000, the Act provided for the establishment of a national lottery to raise £300,000 to build the museum. It proved to be a scandalously run affair, with virtually all of the tickets sold before they were put on offer to the public. The market was covered especially by a rich financier, Sampson Gideon, and also by one of the four receivers of the lottery money, Peter Leherpe. They managed to sell the tickets in large chunks before the lottery opened. The Act had specified that no one person should have more than 20 tickets. Leherpe, however, allowed people to submit a list of fictitious names so that they could buy many more. After two days, the British Museum lottery tickets were said to be selling for a premium of 16 shillings, with various financiers reselling them at a profit. Gideon himself had more than 5,000 tickets. When he died he left an estate worth more than half a million pounds, and during his lifetime was so rich that he bankrolled the Government. The identity of the eventual lottery winner is not known, but the winning ticket number was 46885. The British Museum, after the payment of expenses, received £95,194 8s 2d, some of which went towards buying Montague House, the house on the present site into which the various collections were sent. It was eventually opened as a museum on January 15th 1759.

1841. Large 8vo, pp. xiii, [i], 148; with 49 lithograph plates; pp. 25/26 misbound after p. 30 and partially adhered to p. 30, with small paper tear; printed on poor quality paper and heavily foxed throughout as usual, with some sporadic marginal dampstaining, and evidence of finger-soiling throughout in lower right-hand corner, a couple of gatherings a little loose; with faint and sadly illegible signature in pencil on title-page, dated ‘1846’; scarce in the original printed boards, though somewhat shaken and with book-block and gatherings sitting somewhat proud along fore-edge, rather crudely rebacked in blue cloth, faded and lightly rubbed, covers soiled and scuffed, heavily in places and with loss of paper at tail of upper cover, extremities and corners bumped and worn; despite wear, a sound copy and clearly used and appreciated by a former owner. Uncommon first edition, and unusual being in the original printed boards, of this concise and excellent obstetrical manual and lithograph atlas, each chapter discussing a specific plate, each of which themselves contain a number of figures. Amongst other things, the fine plates show various pelvises and the various stages of pregnancy, but concentrates primarily upon the delivery itself, highlighting numerous different presentations. In a number of these where instruments (mostly forceps) would be needed, their use is illustrated. The Caesarean operation is also represented in two plates (plates 47 and 48), the first of which shows the abdomen with five different types of incision indicated.
Busch was one of the earliest obstetricians to recommend episiotomies: he himself confined their use to cases of 'organic anomalies' and was wary about other surgeons using the procedure too freely and inappropriately. He was the author of several noted works, including an earlier noted text-book and atlas ‘Die theoretische und practische Geburtskunde durch Abbildungen erläutert’, and ‘Atlas der in funfzig lithographirten Tafeln’ both published in 1838.
As with previous copies of the first edition handled, the present copy is quite prominently foxed and soiled, due to the paper quality. It has also clearly been extensively and frequently used by the previous owner, suggesting it was considered to be a valuable reference source and text-book.

1765. Two works in one volume, first work in two parts, small folio; pp. [x], 10, 152, 151-8, [159] part title dated 1761, [160] blank, [161]-200, with attractive woodcut head- and tail-pieces and initials, with one half page copper engraving on p. 163, and 20 copper engraved plates (of which four folding, plate XII particularly large): pp. [iv], 316, with woodcut headpieces, and with 28 copper engraved plates (of which three folding, plate IV another large and striking image); pp. [x], vi, 254, [2] errata and blank, with attractive woodcut head- and tail-pieces and initials; paper a little browned throughout due to quality, with some occasional faint marginal dampstaining, with some slightly more prominent staining in a couple of places in part II of the Acta at pp. 120-124 and p. 141-3, small stamped monograph of ‘G.D.’ on verso of both main title-pages, and some occasional neat pencil annotations and ink corrections in text; overall clean and crisp; in contemporary half-sheep over marbled paste-paper boards, spine in compartments with raised bands, ruled in blind, head of spine worn and exposing headband which is frayed, faint and illegible manuscript at head of spine, spine a little nicked in places, joints cracked but holding, extremities somewhat worn and rubbed, with slight surface wear; still a good copy. First editions of two classic late eighteenth century works on mining technology and the history of mining in Germany, attractively illustrated with a number of detailed copper engravings, the work of Hans Calvör (1686-1766), a teacher at Clausthal and pastor at Altenau.
The ‘Acta historico-chronologico-mechanica’ is one of the most impressive and important German works on mining technology of the 18th century. “A valuable record of mining machinery and mining operations, as practised in Germany during the middle of the XVIIIth century. It was intended as a supplement to Schlüter’s Gründlicher Unterricht von Hüttenwerken” (Sotheran 1st supplement 6384). The attractive plates depict machinery, tunnels, and metallurgical apparatus. It is here bound together with Calvör’s invaluable historical companion volume, and which prints for the first and only time much original material which is now lost concerning the most important mining area of Germany. Mining had been carried on in the Harz mountains since the middle of the 10th century and Clausthal and St Andreasberg in the Upper Harz were the chief centres, and were sources of a number of metals and minerals including silver, lead, gold, copper, iron, sulphur, alum, and arsenic. The two works thus provide an important and invaluable insight late eighteenth century mining practices.

1947. Large 8vo, pp. xxxvi, 618; copiously illustrated without, with 177 text figures and half tones (including 3 full page coloured figures 142, 148 and 149 on two leaves), and coloured plates numbered 1-46 on 36 leaves; generally clean and crisp, with slight kink in upper margins of pp. 491-516; in the original grey publisher’s cloth, spine ruled and lettered in black and gilt, head and tail of spine lightly worn, joints, surfaces and extremities lightly scuffed, rubbed and bumped. First edition of this landmark work, considered to be the foundation for pediatric cardiology, and for which the author received the 1954 Albert Lasker Award for outstanding contribution to medicine. Describing the diagnosis and cure of innumerable congenital malformations, the book had an immediate and vast influence on pediatric cardiology worldwide. Helen Brooke Taussig (1898-1986) ‘conceived the idea of anastomosing the subclavian artery to the pulmonary circulation to improve the blood supply of the lungs; the operation was carried out by Alfred Blalock in 1944, and is now know as the Blalock-Taussig operation’ (Bedford, 821).
‘As a pediatric cardiologist, she carefully observed her patients, listened to their hearts, studied their x-rays and fluoroscopies and, when they died, examined their hearts at autopsy. Her precise records and correlation of observations made possible accurate diagnosis and understanding of pathological cardiac physiology resulting from congenital malformations. Her studies led her to design an operation to solve a problem of post-birth anoxia, the Blalock-Taussig procedure, known as “the blue baby operation” that has saved countless infants from death’ (Grolier, p. 141)
‘To arrive at her great achievements, Helen Taussig had much to overcome - the early death of her mother, dyslexia, severe hearing impairment and the discrimination of much of the medical establishment’ (ibid). The daughter of Frank W. Taussig, the eminent Harvard professor of economics, Helen overcame severe dyslexia to matriculate as one of the first students in which is now Radcliffe College ‘but seeking broader social and educational experience, she transferred to the University of Berkeley, California and graduated in 1921. Determined to study medicine, she was forced, like so many others, to travel the long way round to fulfil her goal... Since Harvard Medical School would not accept a women (first doing so only in 1945) she applied to Harvard School of Public Health, which allowed her to attend classes but would not award her a degree. She was also allowed to study histology at the Harvard Medical School but with a caveat: she was kept in a room by herself so as ‘to not contaminate’ the male students. She finally found a sympathetic mentor in Alexander Begg, professor of anatomy at Boston University, who led her to study isolated heart muscle contractions. This resulted in her first publication and set the stage for her life’s work in cardiology... Even with her major publication, Harvard Medical School would not permit her to matriculate, so she applied to The Johns Hopkins School of Medicine, admitted as a function of the legacy of Mary Elizabeth Garrett and the Women’s Fund Committee that stipulated that women be accepted on the same terms as men, and she graduated from Hopkins in 1927’ (ibid).
In 1959 she became Hopkins’ first woman full professor in clinical medicine. She was awarded the Presidential Medal of Freedom by President Lyndon Johnson in 1964, and was elected the first female president of the American Heart Association in 1965. It was Taussig who was instrumental in recognising the link between thalidomide and the rise in cases of congenital malformations, and helped to end its use in the US. She died in a car accident in 1986.

1760. 8vo, pp. [viii], xvi, 93, [1] blank; with attractive woodcut head- and tail-pieces; title-page a little dust-soiled, with some light foxing and browning, but overall clean and crisp; in modern decorative paper boards, an appealing copy. First Danish edition, most attractively printed, of this important and influential work on the safe transport of natural history specimens by sea, by the French botanist and polymath Henri-Louis Duhamel du Monceau (1700-1782), first published in 1752 as ‘Avis pour le transport par mer des arbres, des plantes vivaces, des semences et de diverses autres curiosités d’histoire naturelle’. The present translation has been taken from the second edition of 1753. It was further translated into German in 1756, and in 1758 was appended to a larger text on the collection and transportation of quadrupeds, birds, fish, shells, and other naturalia, by Étienne-François Turgot (1721-1789) ‘Mémoire instructif sur la manière de rassembler, de préparer, de conserver et d’envoyer les diverses curiosités d’histoire naturelle’ (see item below).
The study of the natural sciences during the 18th century relied upon the observations made, and collections gathered by, individuals - be they merchants, explorers, or scientists, as they travelled throughout the Atlantic world and beyond. The transportation and circulation of botanical and zoological specimens, however, was a hazardous affair, with existing methods of preserving the plants, fish, birds, and land animals - the vital raw materials for European scientific study - often insufficient for the long voyages that brought them from around the globe. Specimens arrived dead when they were needed alive, rotten and damaged when they were needed whole, and they frequently suffered through either the neglect of uninterested sailors, or fell victim to rats and other shipboard pests. Whilst methods of financing and securing berths for transportation may have differed between nations, the physical dangers of the shipboard environment transcended imperial boundaries. Reflecting the universalising tendencies of Enlightenment science, naturalists of all nationalities strove to produce and procure fungible specimens, to help enable comparative study and research, and so became increasingly focused on how best to surmount the difficulties of transportation. Through the shared correspondence of experiences, they came to develop some common material practices that could protect specimens during weeks at sea - a knowledge acquired through hard experience and frequent loss. They came to better understand that the ships were ecosystems onto themselves, complete with predators, micro-climates, and symbiotic relationships, all of which needed to be better understood. It led too, to a greater appreciation of the need to preserve as much of the native ecology as possible, particularly of plants, through the recreation of growing conditions, preserving organic matter, and thus help to maintain the specimens’ natural equilibrium.
The result of shared correspondence and personal experience, as well as collaboration with Roland-Michel Barrin de La Galissoniere (1693-1756), governor of New France between 1747-1749, and with whom Duhamel had worked to help establish the Académie de Marine in 1741, the present treatise became an influential guide as to the best practices and precautions to be taken to ensure the safe transportation of trees, herbs and plants in particular. For example the avoidance of pots and glass containers is advised, with wooden boxes, barrels, and baskets suggested as more durable alternatives. To protect delicate seeds, Duhamel recommends keeping them whole, and storing them in closed, dry cases, surrounded by earth that is almost dried and well mixed. He notes that some seeds stored in this way have germinated during the voyage, and have then been successfully replanted. The retention of some of the original organic matter around the roots of plants is also advised, and that they should be watered during transport. Where-ever possible, naturalists should seek to avoid lodging their specimens with the sailors, (rumoured to sometimes resorting to drink the preserving spirits), but rather entrust them to the care of passengers, ship surgeons, or most preferably, within the captain’s personal cabin - deemed to be the choicest position onboard ship. Live trees should be placed, as much as possible, in the open air and at the top of the vessel away from contamination by sloshing sea water, but that in storms, extreme temperature changes, or pre-longed spells of rain, that they should be taken inside or covered.
Together with other naturalists, such as Turgot and Nicolas (see below), the present work therefore did much to help improve the safe transportation and circulation of vital material objects, which made possible intellectual and scientific advances. As Parsons and Murphy argue, the environmental science of ships gained in importance, and ‘therefore ships, as much as gardens, museums, and cabinets of curiosity, constituted a space of natural history’ (p. 537).

1801. 8vo, pp. [vi], viii, [9] - 228, [2] blank; with 10 folding engraved plates; some occasional light soiling and spotting, but otherwise clean and crisp; contemporary calf-backed marbled boards, spine tooled in gilt with red morocco label, light rubbed to head and tail of spine and joints, fore-edge of upper board nicked splitting paper, corners a little bumped, extremities rubbed and lightly worn. First edition of this contribution to the growing number of taxidermy handbooks published during the late eighteenth and early nineteenth century, in response to growing demands amongst the wider scientific community for better methods of preserving natural history specimens.
The French physician and biologist Pierre-François Nicolas (1743-1816) taught natural history at the university at Nancy between 1795-1798. After resigning, he worked in Paris for two years before becoming professor of chemistry in Caen in 1801. In the present work, Nicolas presents a summary of contemporary knowledge and practices of the day. The ten folding plates, drawn by himself, illustrate the tools required, and the methods for preserving various animals, birds, insects and reptiles. Nicolas is critical of a number of contemporary methods which he deems to be inadequate, offering up many of his own techniques as being superior. In particular, he addresses the problem of insect damage to specimens. The use of poison to deter insects was a matter of some debate at the time, and many were trying to find alternative methods. It was believed that the insects were attracted to bird skins in particular by the decomposing fat left on skins. To counter this, Nicolas proposed a two step procedure that called for soaking the skin in a tanning solution then treating it with a soapy pomade. He claims to have had extraordinary success with his technique, but other naturalists failed to duplicate his results, and for this reason his method did not win many adherents.
The present work is dedicated to the Minister of the Interior, Lucien Bonaparte, a younger brother of Napoleon. One wonders whether this dedicated helped to secure his position at Caen in the same year.

2015. The Swedish Dental Society, founded in 1860, accumulated an important historical collection of over 850 odontological books, the majority printed before 1920, and which today forms one of the major special collections deposited in the Hagströmer Medico-Historical Library in Stockholm. The catalogue comprises 208 pages and 161 illustrations with descriptions of 65 books including the earliest printed works from the sixteenth century entirely devoted to dentistry, as well as on how to cure toothache, on extraction, and on the replacement of false teeth. The collections includes first editions of several odontological classics, from Eustachi's Libellus de dentibus (1583) through to Jackson's Orthodontia of 1904 on the regulation of teeth, and including the most famous of them all, Pierre Fauchard's Chirurgien Déntiste, Paris, 1728. Each item is given a bibliographical description and at least one page with a historical commentary on the author and the importance of his work.

1825. Small folio; pp. [ii] original printed green paper wrapper to first fascicle bound in as general title, [64] of biographical text; with 32 lithograph portraits; somewhat foxed throughout, with the text leaves for Linné, Aldrovani, Celsus, Sydenham and Bartez rather browned, and those for Chaussier and Haller at the end of the work heavily browned; in black morocco backed pebble boards, spine in compartments with raised bands, ruled and lettered in gilt, with marbled endpapers, inner hinge cracked but holding firm, spine somewhat faded and lightly rubbed, extremities more prominently bumped and worn; with small library stamp on verso of final leaf ‘Don du Docteur Ch, Leroux, Hopital Civil de Versailles’. Rare. A complete set bound together of this most striking lithograph ‘gallery’ of some of the most notable figures in medical history.
The inspiration of the physician Guillaume Tell Doin (1794-1845), the lithographer Pierre Roche Vigneron (1789-1872), and the publisher G. Engelmann (1788-1839), according to a contemporary review in the ‘Archives générales de médecine; Journal publié par une société de médecins’ (Tome IX, p. 312, Sept 1825), the original intention was to produce one hundred portraits, the whole publication issued in a series of monthly fascicles containing four portraits together with accompanying biographical text. Normal copies on plain paper would cost 6fr, whilst more luxurious copies on China paper priced at 9fr. However, as later notices reveal, the plan was revised down to a proposed series of 10 fascicles - and indeed ultimately only eight were produced, with 32 fine lithograph portraits issued. No more were published, and being issued in individual fascicles, the plates more often than not, now appear individually. It is thus uncommon to find a bound copy of the complete series.
In the present copy beginning with Hippocrates, (the order of the copy found at Padova is different) Doin and Vigneron have concentrated upon Western luminaries both ancient and modern, and thus we find included Galen, Leonard Fuchs, Andreas Vesalius, William Harvey, Albrecht von Haller, Philippe Pinel, Herman Boerhaave, Paul Joseph Barthez, and Edward Jenner. From the wider sphere, portraits of Carl Linnaeus and Nicolas Copernicus are also included, with the medieval Islamic polymath Averroes chosen as the sole representative from the Arabic world.

1836. Large 8vo, pp. [iv], viii, 188; with steel engraved frontispiece, folding steel engraved plate, and wood-engraved title-page vignette; plates a little browned and foxed, with some offsetting from frontispiece onto title-page, lightly browned throughout, gutter cracked at p. ii; ex-libris from Gloucester County Council with their stamp on front pastedown, and loosely inserted presentation bookplate at rear of book; contemporary maroon pebble-grained cloth, black morocco label lettered in gilt on spine, head and tail of spine lightly bumped and worn, joints cracked but holding, spine and covers a little sunned and faded, corners a little worn. First edition of this extensive catalogue, compiled by the Keeper of the Museum, Philip Bury Duncan (1772-1863). His brother, John Shute (?1769-1844), had preceded him in the role, and since 1824 had done much to improve the organisation of the Museum, which had been fallen into neglect. His appointment coincided with an upsurge of interest at Oxford in the study of natural history, and so with the general approval of the university, J. S. Duncan set about rearranging the collections, and undertaking much needed preservation and conservation work. Philip succeeded his brother in 1829, making further improvements, a note at the tail of p. viii stating that ‘since his appointment the Museum, in consequence of the addition of the Lower room, has been in a great measure newly arranged, and considerable additions have been made... the printed books and MSS. have been repaired, and catalogues made of these as well as the other contents of the Museum’. As Brock notes further ‘no other arrangement could have ensured a greater continuity of purpose than that which marked the transfer of the office from one brother to the other. Philip Duncan too promoted the cause of the natural sciences in Oxford, although his term of office saw the final alienation from the Ashmolean of the geological material which had once formed the principal element of its scientific collections. With the freeing of the ground-floor premises consequent on the departure of the geology professor and his specimens, Philip Duncan put in motion another radical programme of reorganization of the displays’ (Brock and Curthoys, The History of the University of Oxford Volume VI, Nineteenth Century Oxford, p. 600).
The catalogue begins with a brief history of the collection. ‘It is agreed on by all our antiquarian, that the Tradescant collection, which was the foundation of the Ashmolean Museum, was the earliest exhibited in Great Britain... It is well known that the first collection of the curiosities, natural and artificial.. was made by John Tradescant, by birth a Dutchman, who is supposed to have come to England about the end of queen Elizabeth’s, or the beginning of James the First’s reign. He was a considerable time in the service of lord treasure Salisbury and Lord Wootton. He travelled in various parts of Europe as far as Russia; was in a fleet sent against the Algerines, and collected plants in Barbary and the isles of the Mediterranean. He had a garden at Lambeth, and in the reign of Charles the First, in 1629, bore the title of the king’s gardener. He was a man of extraordinary curiosity, was the first who in this country made any considerable collection of the subjects of natural history. His son, of the same name, went to Virginia, and imported many new plants from thence. His Museum, called Tradescant’s Ark, attracted the curiosity of the age, and was much frequented by the great, by whose means it was also considerably enlarged, as appears by the list of his benefactors, printed at the end of his Museum Tradescantianum... The son inherited his collection, and bequeathed it by a deed of gift to Elias Ashmole, who lodged in Tradescant’s house. It afterwards becoming a part of the Ashmolean Museum... He was successively a solicitor in chancery, when Oxford was garrisoned by the royal army, an exciseman, a comptroller of the ordnance, a freemason, astrologer, botanist, chemist, anatomist, physician, and though last not least, a very learned herald... Ashmole enriched the Tradescant collection (which consisted chiefly of the skins and bones of animals) with a collection of medals, coins, and gold chains... and with manuscripts and printed books on heraldry and astrology, for he had purchased the library of Lilly the celebrated astrologer. The Museum has since been increased by Sir W. Dugdale’s, Anthony Wood’s, and the Aubrey manuscripts... It has also been enlarged by Martin Lister’s collections of shells and fossils, Lloyd’s, Plot’s, and Borlase’s, and other objects of natural history, and by Mr. Rheinhold Forster’s collection of the dresses and various instruments of the natives of the South Sea islands, and those of the Esquimaux Indians... It has been from time to time enriched by the valuable donations of many other benefactors, particularly by those of the Alfred gem, the large magnet, the very curious group of figures made with humming-birds’ feathers, and lately by a great portion of antiquities described in the Naemia Britannica, presented by the liberal antiquarian Sir Richard Colt Hoare’ (p. vi).
The wood-engraved title page vignette is by Orlando Jewitt after W. A. Delamotte. The frontispiece is a steel-engraved view of the museum, engraved by John Le Keux after Frederick Mackenzie. The folding engraved plate depicts the giant lodestone presented to the Museum by the Countess of Westmoreland in 1756 (unsigned).

1873.]. Set of ten large, thick card tablets, 480 x 320 x 5mm; each with mounted printed sheet, with engraved vignette either at head or centrally, sheets all a little browned with some staining, soiling and scuffing or creasing in places, plain blue paper on verso, boards 1- 7 with the original green mottled paper edging (somewhat chipped and worn), boards 8 & 9 with later green cloth edging, and final board with no edging remaining and exposing the inner board; though extremities all somewhat rubbed, worn and a little dog-eared, otherwise a striking and rare survivor of an ephemeral teaching aid. A wonderfully striking and extremely scarce set of this didactic French ‘ABC’. The ‘Cours Désir’ was a private quasi-religious Catholic educational establishment set up by the Adeline Désir (1819-1875) in 1853. In particular it welcomed girls from the Parisian upper middle class, and its specific aim was to produce ‘cultured women’, with a focus upon religious education, and the arts, although Désir did place importance upon the role of science in the education of young women. The school took in full-and half boards, as well as some day pupils, from primary stage through to the baccalaureate, and also included a school for the training of women teachers. As the famous alumnus, Simone de Beauvoir, recounted in her ‘Memoirs of a Young Girl’, the school took care to distinguish itself from similar secular establishments, with the young girls enlisted into a ‘Eucharistic crusade’ as soon as they arrived. The number of hours of teaching a week did not exceed 12, and annual retreats were an important part of the school calendar. Students of the school were instantly recognisable by the manner of their bow: ‘un coup de pied droit en arrière avec un léger fléchissement de la jambe gauche’.
The series of ten printed teaching aids, introduce the young child to the basic principles of the ‘Abécdaire français’, through a series of engraved images with accompanying moralistic printed text or verse, starting with the nativity, the farm, ‘Creator God’, a nest, the tale of the ‘Good little Marie’, ‘the two Ceciles’, the good brother, and the Innocent Saints, together with the remaining two boards giving an overview of the linguistic principles so far introduced.

1863. Large 8vo, pp. [iv], 440; with 20 steel engraved portraits, each retaining original tissue guards (all now somewhat browned); some occasional foxing throughout; retaining original two-colour silk marker; a lovely wide-margined copy, bound in full red morocco and signed by Tinot, spine with elaborate mosaic gilt tooling, covers ruled in gilt with green morocco detailing, inner gilt dentelles, all edges gilt, covers a little soiled and scuffed, with minor wear to extremities and corners. First edition, and a beautifully bound copy, of this work celebrating the life of twenty famous 18th century women, accompanied by steel engraved reproductions of their contemporary portraits by noted artists such as Largillière, Nattier, La Tour and Mme Lebrun. Amongst those featured include Madame de Pompadour, Madame du Chastelet, and of course Marie-Antoinette.
Arsène Houssay (1815-1896) was a noted French novelist and man of letters, who wrote a number of works on history and art criticism.
The present copy has been most attractively bound in mosaic red morocco by Jean-Baptiste Tinot.

1890-1900. Oval composite plaque made from brass and nickel?, 70 x 115 x 1 mm, with horizontal central moulding, both sides engraved; together with pp. [4] folded explanatory leaflet 212 x 135 mm, further folded down into four; paper a little browned; plaque slightly burnished; retained within the original printed card box, 120 x 80 x 7 mm, box a little foxed and soiled, with minor rubbing and wear to extremities; a very good example. A scarce medical curiosity - a French Vitalist-Mettalotherapeutic device from the turn of the century, made from brass and seemingly nickel, patented and made by the ‘Société Électrogénique’, established in the mid 1890s by Eugène Legras (1856-?) and Édouard Moron (1850-1909). Particularly appealing, the device is housed within the original card box, and retains the printed explanatory relief, which guarantees the user of its authenticity and not a counterfeit. Recommended for the treatment of all pain by application to sensitive areas, and by extension supposed to cure all internal diseases, the plaque, sold for 4 francs, and was designed to be attached to clothing, and in particular night-gowns, patients recommended to keep between 3 and 7 plates close to the skin during the night, the number depending on the severity of the ailment.
Different metals are known to generate small electric currents when brought together, and this was thought to confer healing properties when held against the skin. The French physician Victor Burq, in around 1849, discovered that placing various metals on the bodies of female patients being treated for hysteria, triggered various physiological, muscular and nervous reactions, and in a number of instances seemed to offer some kind of cure. Thus ‘mettalotherapy’ was born, and Burq’s work soon became quite influential and was adopted by many contemporaries. Innumerable electro- or magnetotherapeutic pendants and devices were developed by physicians, chemists, and businessmen at the time, often without much medical knowledge, and were widely marketed across both America and Europe at the end of the 19th century when electrotherapy hit its peak. We have previously held pendants patented by E. Osselin and Joseph Raspail.
In late 1881 Charles Pinel (1828-1895, son of Scipion, and brother of Philippe), founded the first l’Institut d’Electrothérapie together with a colleague, with the commercial aim of distributing metal plates for medical use, called ‘dynamodermic plates’, so called because of the reactions they caused during application to the skin. An exponent of vitalism, the company expanded rapidly, but Pinel died unexpectedly in 1895, at which point Eugène Legras and Édouard Moron, neither men physicians, became involved. Moron appears to have used a number of pseudonyms, including Doctor Édouard de Monplaisir (named after a district of Sainte-Radegonde where his parents lived), Doctor Sosthène Faber (used in particular at the Rochecorbon Sanitorum they established in 1901), E. de Salerno, and De la Palette. Legras, whose name appears at the end of the present instruction leaf, oversaw the financial side of the business, which seemingly was renamed the Dynamodermic Institute and later the Electrogenic Society. Clearly two entrepreneurial men, the business became very successful, thanks to prominent advertising in local, national and international newspapers, the creation of ‘Le Médecine Nouvelle’ Journal, and through a prestigious establishment in a Paris mansion at ‘19, rue de Lisbonne’, where as the instruction leaf reveals, free consultations were available from both ‘Dr. Péradon’, chief vitalist physician, who would also give correspondence consultations, as well as from the Director, ‘Dr. Dumas’. Personal consultations were given every day between 10am and 5pm. The sale of devices such as the present ‘plaque dynamodermique’ no doubt helped to pay for this free service. Demand was so strong that a production plant is established in Vernou-sur-Brenne, as noted on the present example. Priding itself on relieving and even curing a multitude of both nervous and physical diseases (including tuberculosis and cancer), the company prospered for more than 20 years, eventually opening their famous Rochecorbon Sanitorium in 1901, in Château de la Tour, on the outskirts of the town. Fortunes quickly changed however, and by 1905 the company had been declared bankrupt, although Legras and Moron, under the pseudonym of Doctor Sosthéne Faber, continued to run the Sanatorium until 1909, when Moron died. Despite attempts by Legras to keep the sanatorium going, it had closed by the start of WWI, when it was used as a military hospital.
Later examples of the ‘plaque dynamodermique’ were engraved ‘Rochecorbon’, and were used extensively as part of treatment plans.

1760. Later seemingly 19th century music box, the mechanism housed within hollowed out 8vo, with the winding key located at the rear of the book; in the original mottled calf, spine in compartments with raised bands, expertly repaired and rebacked, with attractive gilt floral endpapers; ex-libris bookplate on front pastedown, ‘Ex Bibliotheca Joseph-Claudii-Anthelmi Recamier, Doctoris magni Parisiensis nosocomii Medici’; a most appealing example. An unusual example of a faux book, ‘buch atrappe’, ‘faux livre’, or ‘blook’ (the term coined by Mindell Dubansky for her own collection of ‘things that look like a book, but aren’t’), in this case housing what we believe to be a 19th century music box mechanism, added to a hollowed out and customised volume of the 18th century French medical ‘Journal de Medecine, Chirurgie, Pharmacie’, from January 1760. The winding key is located in at the rear of the volume, and once turned, the music plays when the front cover is lifted. The tune is frustratingly familiar, and as yet unidentified, though possibly a Strauss Waltz.
The volume has an interesting provenance, having the bookplate on the front paste-down of Joseph Claude Anselme Recamier (1774-1852), the noted French gynaecologist and a pioneer in the study of cancer metastasis. A unique example.