HALES, Stephen (1677--1761)

Vegetable staticks : or, an account of some statical experiments on the sap in vegetables: being an essay towards a natural history of vegetation. Also, a specimen of an attempt to analyse the air, by a great variety of chymico-statical experiments; which were read at several meetings before the Royal Society

London: printed for W. and J. Innys; and T. Woodward, 1727.
8vot: A-Z8 2B4, 188 leaves, pp. [7] vii [2] 360. Plates: 19 engraved plates: un-numbered, with page references, signed 'S[imon]. Gribelin sculps' or 'S. G.' (placed according to the page references). Leaf size and condition: 192 x 120mm, a good fresh copy. Binding: Contemporary panelled calf, gilt spine, red morocco lettering piece. Rubbed, with some loss of gilt tooling on spine, lettering piece chipped, upper joint starting to crack but sound. Provenance and annotation: Printed shelf label on pastedown 'A121' References: ESTC t081048; Horblit 45a; Dibner 26.
First edition. A second edition was printed in 1731 as the first volume of Statical essays, the second volume, 1733, being Hales' Haemastatics.
§ In this work Hales laid the foundations of plant physiology; at the same time he inaugurated the experimental study of gasses. He discovered that plants take up an essential nutrient from the air, later identified as carbon dioxide, and discovered sap pressure and transpiration. He describes 124 experiments on gases and his invention of the pneumatic trough, a major advance in the experimental manipulation of gases. His work inspired both Priestley and Black. <<Without in any way detracting from the personal characteristics of Priestley's work as a scientist ... it is necessary to emphasize the great difference in his mode of working before and after his reading of Hales. In the paper of 1772 and thereafter, the experiments performed, the instruments used, and the way of using them -- but particularly the thinking that informed the experiments and guided their interpretation -- are all developed from the chapter on airs of the Vegetable staticks. >>Robert E. Schofield, 'Priestley', DSB 11, 144b.

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