Thomas Beddoes (1760-1808) lived in ‘decidedly interesting times’ in which established orders in politics and science were challenged by revolutionary new ideas. Enthusiastically participating in the heady atmosphere of Enlightenment debate, Beddoes' career suffered from his radical views on politics and science. Denied a professorship at Oxford, he set up a medical practice in Bristol in 1793. Six years later - with support from a range of leading industrialists and scientists including the Wedgwoods, Erasmus Darwin, James Watt, James Keir and others associated with the Lunar Society - he established a Pneumatic Institution for investigating the therapeutic effects of breathing different kinds of ‘air’ on a wide spectrum of diseases. The treatment of the poor, gratis, was an important part of the Pneumatic Institution and Beddoes, who had long concerned himself with their moral and material well-being, published numerous pamphlets and small books about their education, wretched material circumstances, proper nutrition, and the importance of affordable medical facilities. Beddoes’ democratic political concerns reinforced his belief that chemistry and medicine should co-operate to ameliorate the conditions of the poor. But those concerns also polarized the medical profession and the wider community of academic chemists and physicians, many of whom became mistrustful of Beddoes’ projects due to his radical politics. Highlighting the breadth of Beddoes’ concerns in politics, chemistry, medicine, geology, and education (including the use of toys and models), this book reveals how his reforming and radical zeal were exemplified in every aspect of his public and professional life, and made for a remarkably coherent program of change. He was frequently a contrarian, but not without cause, as becomes apparent once he is viewed in the round, as part of the response to the politics and social pressures of the late Enlightenment.

To je zelo dolgočasna knjiga. Tako kot slovar vsebuje samo dejstva: dejstva, ki jih ni mogoče najti drugje. Ljudje, ki so pomembni za preučevanje jam in krasa, so znani po tem, kaj so počeli, kaj so napisali in na koga so vplivali. Toda večkrat o njih poznamo zgolj ime. Morda o nekaterih vemo tudi kaj več, med njimi so kralji, romanopisci ali zdravniki. Nekateri, denimo Darwin ali Freud, so svet celo spremenili, toda večinoma so imeli le neizstopajoče normalno življenje, med katerim so tudi raziskovali, preučevali ali pisali o jamah. To so tista življenja, o katerih je težko najti kaj več. V knjigi je 4634 gesel, ki vsebujejo podatke iz rojstnih listov, osmrtnic, neobjavljenih pisem in omembe drugih ljudi. Šele ta širši pogled iz njih naredi prave ljudi. V nekaterih primerih je bilo njihovo zanimanje za jame del njihovega poklicnega življenja. V mnogih drugih le spodbuda in sprostitev v sicer napornem življenju. Toda v vsakem primeru so ista oseba in isti možgani uživali oboje; in oboje ju je osebnostno izoblikovalo. Razumemo jih lahko le s pomočjo tukaj zbranih bibliografskih virov.

Knjiga je digitalizirana verzija kartotečnih listov o osnovnih podatkih raziskovalcev in obiskovalcev krasa, ki jih je vrsto let zbiral zgodovinar krasoslovja, Trevor Shaw. V njej je po abecedi razvrščenih nekaj nad 4600 oseb iz vsega sveta, najzgodnejša imena so še iz antike. Struktura gesel je zelo osnovna: imenu sledijo biografski podatki in kratke opis, ob koncu pa je izbrana bibliografija, kot vir tega zapisa.

By the late nineteenth century, the city had become the dominant social environment of Britain, with the majority of the population living in large cities, often with over 100, 000 inhabitants. The central concern of this book, first published in 1976, is to assess how successful the late Victorians were in creating a stimulating social environment whilst these developing cities were being transformed into modern industrial and commercial centres. Using Bristol as a case study, Helen Meller analyses the new relationships brought about by mass urbanisation, between city and citizen, environment and society. The book considers a variety of important features of the Victorian city, in particular the development of the main cultural institutions, the provision of leisure facilities by voluntary societies and the expansion of activities such as music, sport and commercial entertainment. Comparative examples are drawn from other cities, which illustrate the common social and cultural values of an urbanised nation. This is a very interesting title, of great relevance to students and academics of town planning, Victorian society, and the history and development of the modern city.

This electronic version has been made available under a Creative Commons (BY-NC-ND) open access license. This book is available as an open access ebook under a CC-BY-NC-ND licence. At a time when payment is claiming a greater place than ever before within the NHS, this book provides the first in-depth investigation of the workings, scale and meaning of payment in British hospitals before the NHS. There were only three decades in British history when it was the norm for patients to pay the hospital; those between the end of the First World War and the establishment of the National Health Service in 1948. Payment played an important part in redefining rather than abandoning medical philanthropy, based on class divisions and the notion of financial contribution as a civic duty. With new insights on the scope of private medicine and the workings of the means test in the hospital, as well as the civic, consumer and charitable meanings associated with paying the hospital, Gosling offers a fresh perspective on healthcare before the NHS and welfare before the welfare state.

A priced and annotated annual record of international book auctions.