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pp. 229, previous owner’s inscription on ffep, o/w vg, “Queen Victoria tended to plumpness, yet when one of her doctors suggested a reducing diet, she objected until she conceived a suitable compromise: adding the diet to her regular intake! Those already acquainted with Gordon’s writing, in the venerable British humor magazine Punch or any of his 45 books, know his clever literary allusions, delightful wit, and amusing contradictions and ironies (e.g., this opening sentence: “Paganini became a difficult patient only when he was dead”). As in his other works, his historical knowledge herein proves solid, often surprising, and always pertinent. You may think that George Washington, Hitler, FDR, Boswell, Whitman, Shaw, and similar worthies have probably had their medical histories worked to death, so to speak, but such is not the case. Gordon consistently comes up with remarkable details and presents them in an enlightening and enjoyable manner, making of them one of those rare books to be gulped whole or consumed in bits and pieces with equal pleasure.”