297-PEUCHET (Jacques). Mémoires tirés des archives de la police de Paris, pour servir à l'histoire de la morale et de la police, depuis Louis XIV jusqu'à nos jours. Paris, Levavasseur, 1838, 6 vol. in-8, raspberry half-calf, smooth spine decorated throughout (Romantic binding). First edition. Jacques Peuchet had been involved in police affairs since the Ancien Régime, and became its archivist under the Restoration. This privileged vantage point provided him with a wealth of facts and anecdotes on the great figures of the Ancien Régime, on certain troubled cases and, more broadly, on what we now call the "police des moeurs", as well as on censorship under the Empire and the Restoration. Although for some the testimony remains suspect, the burning of the archives in 1871 made it the only source, unfortunately unverifiable, for many police cases for over a century. A fine copy. Spine a little faded. Some brown spots.