Paris, Jean-Thomas Herissant, Imprimeur du Roi, 1765. iv, [5]-134, [ii blank], 7, [i blank] pp. Small 8vo (12,5 x 19,5 cm.). Finely rebound in half marbled calf (antique style), spine gilt lettered on red morocco label, marbled boards and new endpapers, red edges.
A fine copy of this rare obstetrical polemic. The last 7 pages are: "Mmoire a consulter Pour les Hritiers de la Veuve de Charles...". "Bouvart, physician and doctor regent of the faculty of Paris, and associate-veteran of the Academy of Science, was born a Chartres. Many of his ancestors having been physicians, he determined on the same profession, which he practised at Paris with so much success that no other physician was more consulted; yet this did not prevent him being jealous of Tronchin, Bordeu, and some others, of whom he spoke very illiberally, but he was a man otherwise of great kindness and benevolence. One anecdote is recorded as characteristic. A banker, who had experienced some heavy losses, was taken ill, and Bouvart, who was called in, suspected that his weighed on his mind, but could not obtain the secret from him. The banker's wife, however, was more communicative, and told him that her husband had a payment of twenty thousand livres to make very shortly, for which he was unprovided. Bou