LAMARCK (Jean-Baptiste de Monet de). Hydrogéologie ou Recherches sur l'influence qu'ont les eaux sur la surface du globe terrestre ; sur les causes de l'existence du bassin des mers, de son déplacement et de son transport successif sur les différens points de la surface de ce globe ; enfin sur les changemens que les corps vivans exercent sur la nature et l'état de cette surface. Paris : l'auteur, Agasse, Maillard, an X [1802]. -In-8, brown half calf with small parchment corners, smooth spine decorated (period binding). "Ward & Carozzi 1312. Rare first edition of this important work by biologist and paleontologist Jean-Baptiste de Monet de Lamarck (1744-1829). Lamarck was the first to introduce the term "hydrogeology", but to designate the study of the influence of water on the Earth's surface, without yet addressing that of groundwater. At the time, geology was still in its infancy, and Lamarck had the merit "of having understood that there had been no revolutions in geology, for slow actions a thousand times secular account much better than violent disturbances for the prodigious changes of which our planet has been the theater" (Charles Martin, "Un naturaliste philosophe", in:" Revue de deux mondes ", 1873, tome 104, p. 147). He structured his study in four chapters: What are the natural consequences of the influence and movements of water on the surface of the terrestrial globe? - Why does the sea constantly have a basin and boundaries that contain it, and separate it from the dry parts of the globe, which always protrude above it? - Has the basin of the seas always been where we see it today? And if we find evidence of the sea's presence in places where it no longer is, by what cause was it there, and why isn't it there now? - What is the influence of living bodies on the materials on the surface of the terrestrial globe, which make up the crust with which it is everywhere covered; and what are the general results of this influence? Two memoirs follow: one "on the matter of fire, considered as a chemical instrument in analyses", and the other "on the matter of sound". Professor Albert V. Carozzi describes this work as a "bibliographical rarity" that has been, and remains, virtually unknown to geologists and historians of science. He points out that a critical study highlights the modern character of the concepts addressed by Lamarck, asserting that his scientific rehabilitation as a geologist is essential for a proper understanding of the history of geology (preface to "Hydrogéologie", trans. Carozzi, 1964). Used rubbing and soiling to binding."