Researches, Chemical and Philosophical, Chiefly Concerning Nitrous Oxide, or Dephlogisticated Nitrous Air, and Its Respiration

London: J. Johnson, 1800.
First Edition.

21.5cm x 13.5cm. xvi, 580 pages, frontispiece. Quarter leather, gilt lettering.

Landmark work in chemistry and anaesthesia. Published when Davy was only 21, outlining his experiments with nitrous, popularising the term laughing gas, and suggesting its anaesthetic qualities, which were not regularly used in medicine for many years to come. Provenance: Pencil signature of British crime writer and anaesthetist William Stanley Sykes (1894-1961) with three lines of pencil annotation to front free endpaper.

Bound without the errata leaf. Marginal 1cm closed tear to fore-edge of frontispiece. Old repair to page 1/2, with minor soiling to the facing pages. Minor foxing, mostly confined to the title page and frontispiece. Good Condition.

AU$6,000