8vo; 54 pages. Very rare offprint.

Inscribed by author on front cover; "To William Ticknor with the Author's respect."

This address to members of the Boylston Medical Society of Harvard University was published the same year that Bigelow observed and reported the first surgical operation performed under ether anesthesia. Bigelow, described as the "leading surgeon of New England during his lifetime," warned his audience of Harvard medical students: "Distrust surgical intrepidity and boldness ... the bold operator does not hazard his own person, but that of the patient is perhaps not less endangered. Science never hears of the ten or twenty quiet sufferers who fall victims to the publicity of an exceptional escape from surgical intrepidity." In the same address, he alluded to the role he would play a few months later in publicizing the discovery of ether anesthesia: "Few have the ability and the good fortune to make discoveries in science. Most of us have to be content to learn what others have added to it. But we may all contribute our humble share in disseminating what we conceive to be just views." See Kelly Burrage 95-97.

William Ticknor (1810-1864) was a prominent Boston-based publisher who founded the firm Ticknor and Fields.