First complete account of plant physiology and important study on blood pressure

HALES, Stephen.

Statical Essays, I: Vegetable Staticks; or, an account of some Statical Experiments on the Sap in Vegetables. Also . . . an Attempt to analyse the Air, by a great Variety of Chymio-Statical Experiments... - II: Statical Essays: containing haemastatic.

London: for W. Innys and R. Manby, and T. Woodward, 1731.

2nd Edition. Hardcover. Very Good. Item #001510

1731, (6) viii (4) 376 pp., 19 engraved plates by S. Gribelin (Vol. I); 1733, xxii, (26), 361, (23) pp. (Vol. II). 8vo (19.5x12.5cm). Interior browned, Vol. II with the leaf before the title announcing the Royal Society's authorisation of publication, some dampstaining to the end. Ownership inscription H. Pemberton on flyleaf of Vol. 1. Contemporary full calfs, rebacked.

PMM 189, Horblit 45b. - FIRST EDITION of Vol. 2 and SECOND EDITION of vol. 1. Hales applied his training in biology and mathematics (including physics) to make important scientific investigations presented in these separately published volumes. The first volume, Vegetable staticks, Hales describes his investigations of plant physiology, including the movement of water in plants and determining the three factors of water movement: root suction, root pressure and leaf suction. He also established that plants lose water continuously during transpiration through leaves. His quantitative measurements of these phenomena enabled him to show the rate of transpiration varied with temperature. Hales established that plants do not have true circulation system, and developed techniques of measuring the varying growth rates in different plant structures. The second volume, or Haemastaticks, 'contains the studies on blood pressure which make Hales one of the founders of modern experimental physiology. The application of the principle of the pressure-gauge or manometer enabled him to measure blood pressure during the contraction of the heart. He computed the circulation rate and estimated the velocity of the blood in the veins, arteries and capillary vessels and by showing that the capillary vessels are liable to constriction and dilation he made an important contribution both to the study of physiology and the practice of the physician of today ... Hales' work marked the greatest advance in the physiology of the circulation between Harvey and the introduction of the mercury manometer and other instruments for the measurement of blood pressure by J.L.M. Poiseuille in 1828' (PMM).

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