Experiments & observations on the gastric juice

Plattsburgh: F.P. Allen, 1833. FIRST EDITION. With 3 wood engravings. Original boards, rebacked in cloth, spine label; a very good copy with only minor browning. Preserved in a clamshell case. First edition of Beaumont's brilliant clinical investigation into the physiology of digestion. Beaumont (1785-1853), a United States Army surgeon, was the first to study the digestion and actions of the stomach in a living person. The patient received a near mortal gunshot wound to his abdomen and chest. He recuperated over a period of many months, sustaining a permanent fistula in the stomach wall through which Beaumont was able to undertake his study of the process of digestion. Beaumont began his observations in 1825 and they continued over the next eight years in which time his patient fully recovered. G&M, 989; Horblit, 10.