"A PIONEER STUDY IN A PIONEER COUNTRY… A MAJOR MILESTONE IN THE FIELD OF PHYSIOLOGY": FIRST EDITION OF BEAUMONT'S LANDMARK EXPERIMENTS AND OBSERVATIONS ON… THE PHYSIOLOGY OF DIGESTION, 1833

BEAUMONT, William, M.D. Experiments and Observations on the Gastric Juice, and the Physiology of Digestion. Plattsburgh: F.P. Allen, 1833. Octavo, original tan paper boards early rebacked, later paper spine label. Housed in a custom clamshell box. $4500.

First edition of Beaumont's revolutionary work in the history of medicine, "a cornerstone of modern physiology and a great American medical classic," heralded as "the most important before Pavlov," in original boards.

"Beaumont was the first to study digestion and the movement of the stomach in vivo. His work on the subject was the most important before Pavlov" (Garrison & Morton 989). This unassuming first edition, cheaply printed, is nevertheless "a cornerstone of modern physiology and a great American medical classic" (Heirs of Hippocrates 1141). Beaumont, a U.S. Army surgeon stationed in Michigan in 1822, "was summoned to treat a French-Canadian voyageur, Alexis St. Martin, for a wound in the abdomen from an accidental musket shot at close range. A permanent gastric fistula formed in the wound, and Beaumont realized that the case offered a unique opportunity to investigate the process of digestion" (Notable Medical Books, 185). His extensive experiments, detailed in this pioneering work, "established the presence and role of hydrochloric acid in the stomach, the temperature of the stomach during digestion, the movement of the stomach walls and the relative digestibility of certain foods—all of which revolutionized current theories of the physiology of digestion. Beaumont's book is a remarkable example of brilliant investigation performed under the almost primitive conditions of an isolated Army outpost on the American frontier" (Norman 152).

Beaumont's Experiments and Observations "represents a discovery that proved to be a major milestone in the field of physiology" (Notable Medical Books, 185), and is considered the "most important American contribution to medical science" (Howes B291). Within its pages are "the greatest contribution ever made to the knowledge of gastric digestions… modern research has added but little to his findings" (Grolier American 38). First edition, first issue with Plattsburgh imprint on the title page dated 1833. While "the size of the first edition has long been a point of controversy, a reasonable interpretation… is that only 1000 copies were printed… Samuel Beaumont later claimed, when he wrote the preface to the second edition, that the first edition consisted of 3000 copies, but this seems exaggerated" (Grolier 100 Books Famous in Medicine 62). With three in-text woodcut illustrations; errata leaf at rear. Downs, Books that Changed America 4. Heralds of Science 130. Horblit 92. Waller 805.

Text and plates quite fresh, only lightest foxing mainly to preliminaries, minimal edge-wear to boards. A highly desirable near-fine copy of this seminal work.