A very great matter; a history of anaesthesia.

A technically detailed and pictorially attractive historical review of the history of surgical anaesthesia in Britain and the U.S. from the 1840s to the present, with particular emphasis on the mid-nineteenth century pioneers of anaesthesia and on developments during the last 50 years. Includes contemporay photgraphic records of mid- and late- nineteenth century surgical operations using ether and archive film of chloroform anaesthesia by the "open drop" technique in the 1930s and 1940s.