On narcotism by the inhalation of vapours - John Snow

In May 1848, within 18 months of anaesthesia's introduction to Britain, John Snow began to write a sequence of 18 articles entitled "On Narcotism by the Inhalation of Vapours". They appeared first in the "London Medical Gazette", but later Snow assembled the articles for publication as three separate pamphlets, the last of which was produced in 1852. Few of the individual pamphlets have survived and a complete, three-volume set is extremely rare indeed. Dr Richard Ellis's extensive research located only one such set, and this has been used to prepare this facsimile edition.;During Snow's lifetime virtually no other anaesthetist followed his example and seriously investigated the principles underlying anaesthesia. The pages of this facsimile volume abound with examples of his foresight, and of his real understanding of the scientific foundations of inhalational anaesthesia.;A detailed index has been compiled for the work, and has added an introductory essay which provides both an insight and a historical perspective to this work of John Snow, whose views were to dictate the course of anaesthetic practice for decades after his premature death, in 1858, at the age of 45.