'Igne constricto, vita secura.'
_Davy's Motto._
The pretty little homestead--or as it is called in Cornwall, the
'town-place'--of Varfel, (or Barfell as it was sometimes spelt) in
Ludgvan, lies on a southern slope, about two and a half miles N.E. of
Penzance, and is a somewhat less distance from St. Michael's Mount, a
view of which, as well as of the famous Mount's Bay and of the Lizard
district, it commands. Varfel seems to have belonged from an early
period to the Davy family, some of whose monuments in Ludgvan Church
are nearly 300 years old. Either here, on the 'paternal acres,' or in
the town of Penzance, on 17th December, 1778, at 5 a.m., was born to
'Carver' Robert Davy (so called from his proficiency in his trade as
a wood-carver and gilder) and his wife Grace Millett, their eldest
son,[101] who was destined to emerge from this remote and obscure
corner of England, and become President of the Royal Society--a man
of science so distinguished that Brande, in his celebrated 'History
of Chemistry,' spoke of Davy's death as nothing less than 'a serious
national calamity.'
The district of Penwith, with its wild furze-clad granite moors, its
rugged cliffs, and emerald bays, proved
'Fit nurse for a poetic child;'
and the imaginative faculties of the future illustrious chemist were
not nursed in vain. Like Pope, he 'lisped in numbers,' reciting,
when only five years old, his own rhymes at some Christmas gambols;
and his poetic vein never left him, even in the laboratory or in the
lecture-room, compelling the aristocratic idlers of London to love
Science, because, as they were constrained to confess, under his magic
guidance, Science was made beautiful, and was attired by the Graces. It
was said by Coleridge that had Davy not devoted himself to Science, he
would have shone with the highest lustre as a poet; and the following
youthful lines, full of true local colour, certainly show, as indeed
did his whole life, that he had drunk of 'the fount of Helicon:'
'TO THE LAND'S END.
'On the Sea
The sunbeams tremble; and the purple light
Illumes the dark Bolerium, seat of Storms!
Drear are his granite wilds, his schistine rocks
Encircled by the wave, where to the gale
The haggard cormorant shrieks; and, far beyond,
Where the great ocean mingles with the sky,
Behold the cloud-like islands[102] grey in mist.'
It was this poetic temperament, derived (as his brother, Dr. Davy,
thinks) from their grandmother, which induced the gifted Dr. Henry,
F.R.S., thus to refer to the subject of this memoir:
'Bold, ardent, enthusiastic, Davy soared to greatest heights; he
commanded a wide horizon, and his keen vision penetrated to its
utmost boundaries. His imagination, in the highest degree fertile and
inventive, took a rapid and extensive range in pursuit of conjectural
analogies, which he submitted to close and patient comparison with
known facts, and tried by an appeal to ingenious and conclusive
experiments. He was imbued with the spirit and was master in the
practice of inductive logic; and he has left us some of the noblest
examples of the efficacy of that great instrument of human reason in
the discovery of truth. He applied it, not only to connect classes
of facts of more limited extent and importance, but to develop great
and comprehensive laws, which embrace phenomena that are almost
universal to the natural world. In explaining those laws he cast upon
them the illumination of his own clear and vivid conceptions; he felt
an intense admiration of the beauty, order, and harmony which are
conspicuous in the perfect _Chemistry of Nature;_ and he expressed
those feelings with a force and eloquence which could issue only from
a mind of the highest powers and of the finest sensibilities.'
Davy's first school was at Penzance, his first schoolmaster a Mr.
Bushell; his next, the Rev. Mr. Coryton, seems to have been one of the
old rough sort, determined that his pupils should not lack correction,
even if they did not profit by his instruction. He used to address the
little boy in the following doggrel, whenever he thought he saw an
opportunity of administering castigation:
'Now, Master Davy,
Now, sir! I have 'ee!
No one shall save 'ee--
Good Master Davy!'
But neither Mr. Coryton, nor Dr. Cardew, the excellent master of the
Truro Grammar School, to which place Davy was for a short period
removed, when fourteen years old, seems to have perceived any
remarkable genius in the scholar--except that the latter discerned
at least his taste and skill in poetry, and in his translations from
the classics into English verse. One of the efforts of his muse was
an epic poem, 'The Tydidiad,' written when he was twelve years old.
In truth Davy, when a schoolboy, was generally composing either
ballads or valentines (in Latin or English) for his school-fellows,
in making fireworks, or in fishing or shooting, thus proving--what
has been so often proved before--that 'the boy is father to the
man.' His oratorical displays--sometimes addressed to a crowd of
juveniles assembled in front of the Star Inn at Penzance, sometimes
to a row of empty chairs in his own bedroom--and his turnip-lantern
exhibitions (which afterwards developed into the wonderful mimic
volcanoes with which he astonished and delighted his audience at the
Royal Institution) were highly popular; the price of admission to the
turnip-lantern shows is said to have been paid in an extremely low
currency--pins. It would moreover appear from an entry of his in the
blank page of his Schrevelius that Harlequin was his favourite part in
a pantomime. Of his youth, which all accounts agree in representing
as genial and amiable, little more remains to be said, but that he
was very awkward with his hands (often blotting out an error in his
MS. by dipping his fingers into the ink-bottle)--could never get out
of the 'awkward squad' in the Volunteer Corps which he joined--that
he was round-shouldered and clumsy--had no taste or ear for music,
and possessed a singularly inharmonious voice. Clearly, the outward
gifts of our hero were not such as were likely to help him forward
on his way through life. To judge what a change the fire of genius,
years of study, and the advantages of moving amongst cultured and
refined society can accomplish, his portrait, when he was about
thirty-three years old, by Lawrence,[103] prefixed to Dr. Paris's
'Life'--or perhaps rather that by Phillips, R.A., which will be found
in Polwhele's now rare little volumes the 'Biographical Sketches,' and
in the 'Gentleman's Magazine' for 1829, should be examined.
As he grew up he is described as being of about the middle height, of
remarkably active frame, and with a mobile countenance, which, though
the features were not regular, was full of expression and vivacity.
He had bright, wavy, brown hair, and eyes 'tremulous with light;' and
his voice so improved by cultivation and experience that it became
remarkably melodious. When to this are added his wonderful talents,
his grand discoveries, and his eloquence, his sanguine temperament,
his purpose firm, his spirits singularly cheerful and elastic, and his
disposition ever philanthropic, it will easily be believed that his
society was sought by all classes; and it is not to be wondered at if
the attractions which such opportunities presented laid him open to
the charge (from some quarters) of cultivating too much the wealthy
and the powerful.[104] Davy, however, was too wise not to perceive the
advantage of interesting such persons in the pursuits to which he was
himself through life devoted. But he was really fond of intelligence
in all classes, whenever and wherever he met with it; and there is an
amusing story told of one of his street acquaintances, who showed the
moon through a telescope, and who always refused to take Davy's penny,
because, as the man said, of their being 'brother philosophers.'
But, to return to his youthful days. Davy's schooling probably did not
cost his parents much, for in Dr. Cardew's time the charges were only
£18 a year for board, and £4 for teaching, and perhaps some of these
were paid by a very kind friend of the family, Mr. John Tonkin of
Penzance. He 'put on harness' in 1793, when little more than fourteen
years old (the year before his father died), by being articled on 16th
February, to Dr. J. B. Borlase of Penzance, a gentleman who seems to
have taken a kind and appreciative interest in the welfare of the lad.
Davy seems to have bestowed a fair amount of attention upon the studies
pertaining to his profession, and is said to have been particularly
kind and attentive to his master's patients, especially those of the
poorer classes; but 'nourishing a youth sublime' on the preparation of
pills and potions was out of the question; and we gladly find that, ere
long, a more intellectual banquet was to be laid before him. He was
at this time passionately fond of fishing and shooting, the former of
which pursuits he dearly loved to the last: casting longing looks, even
within a few days of his death, on the waters of Lake Leman on which
he had often in earlier days thrown a fly. His charming book 'Salmonia'
(_pace_ the shade of Christopher North) shows what a deep interest he
always took in fishing, and, indeed, in Natural History generally. It
is amusing to note here, that in later years his costume, hat included,
when he went fishing, was, for purposes of concealment, _green_; when,
however, he went shooting he adopted scarlet garments for distinction,
having a great dread of being shot. Declamations by the shores of
Mount's Bay were also a source of great pleasure to him, when a boy,
and many a time did he harangue the waves, when he could not secure a
human auditory.
We may be sure that chemistry was not omitted; and, in the attic of a
house belonging to that worthy friend of the family--Mr. Tonkin--such
apparatus as Davy could muster might have been found: phials,
wine-glasses, teacups, and tobacco-pipes, and a few acids and alkalies
were amongst the principal items, and--most treasured of all--an old
clyster-pipe, washed ashore from a wreck, out of which he had contrived
to manufacture an air-pump!
The crisis of Davy's life at length arrived. Mr. Davies Gilbert (then
named Giddy) a Cornish gentleman eminent for his attainments, had
his attention called to the youngster's scientific knowledge, and
became his friend and patron--little thinking at the time that he was
hereafter to become Treasurer of the Royal Society under Davy, and
at length to succeed his _protégé_ as a President. It is noteworthy
here--that Trelissick House, on the Fal, built by Davy's grandfather,
for Mr. Daniell, became afterwards the property of Mr. Gilbert, and is
now one of the seats of his grandson, Carew Davies Gilbert, Esq. Davies
Gilbert also brought into public notice the Rev. Malachi Hitchins, once
a miner, afterwards the principal calculator of the Nautical Almanac,
and (conjointly with Samuel Drew) an historian of Cornwall; also the
Rev. John Hellins, many years assistant to Dr. Maskelyne. He was
moreover an early friend and adviser of Richard Trevithick (_q.v._).
It is said that when the boy Davy first saw Mr. Davies Gilbert's
laboratory his tumultuous delight knew no bounds. Other appreciative
friends now came forward; amongst them Dr. Edwards of Hayle Copper
House, and Professor Hailstone, and Dr. Beddoes, representatives of
the rival geological schools of Neptunists and Plutonists, as they
were then called, to both of whom Davy was able to render valuable
information; though he himself, with his usual sagacity, sided with the
Plutonists. Gregory Watt, the youngest son of the renowned James Watt,
was another of Davy's early acquaintances at Penzance; and from Watt
the youth derived much valuable information and advice.
One result was the offer of an appointment, when he was about nineteen
years old, as assistant in Dr. Beddoes's Pneumatic Hospital, at Dowry
Square, Clifton,[105]--an establishment founded for the purpose of
investigating the nature of the gases, with especial reference to their
remedial influences.
This was an appointment after the young chemist's own heart. The salary
was sufficient for his modest wants, and he forthwith renounced all
claims to his share of the small family property, in favour of his
mother and sisters. He threw himself at once with ardour into his
work, and originated those celebrated but highly dangerous experiments
on the effects of nitrous oxide, which indeed nearly cost him his
own life, but which in their result have alleviated the sufferings
of tens of thousands of his fellow-creatures. The description of
one of the 'séances,' when experiments were tried on many different
persons--including Southey, then Poet Laureate--were described by Davy
in an amusing little poem.
The friendship with Southey was not only on a scientific basis;--the
Poet recognised his brother-poet's faculty: and accordingly Southey
submitted to Davy the proofs of his mystic poem 'Thalaba,' for
criticism; whilst the younger bard contributed to the 'Anthology' of
the elder. And while on this subject it may be added that Coleridge
(another of his Clifton acquaintances), who often referred to Davy's
enchanting manners, used to say, so Barrow tells us, that he was in
the habit of attending Davy's lectures at the Royal Institution,
'in order to increase his stock of metaphors.' On another occasion
Coleridge remarked: 'There is an energy and elasticity in Davy's mind
which enables him to seize on and analyze all questions, pushing them
to their legitimate consequences. Every subject in Davy's mind has
the principle of vitality--living thoughts spring up, like the turf
under his feet.' And Davy, of course, could not fail to admire the
genius of Coleridge--it was he who persuaded the dreamy poet to give
his well-known series of eighteen lectures on Shakespeare at the Royal
Institution in 1808. Horne Tooke was another of Davy's admirers, and
was so enchanted with him early in his career that he engaged Chantry
to make a bust of the Cornish philosopher.
It is further evident that Southey had the highest possible opinion of
Davy's talents, for he wrote thus to Taylor:
'Davy is proceeding in his chemical career with the same giant strides
as at his outset. His book upon the nitrous oxyd will form an epoch
in the science. I never witnessed such indefatigable activity in any
other man, nor ardour so regulated by cool judgment.'
In fact our poet-chemist must have been altogether a most fascinating
man. An old personal acquaintance of his writes in the 'Gentleman's
Magazine,' 1845, that 'when Davy is at ease, and excited in
conversation, his splendid eyes irradiate his whole countenance, and he
looks almost inspired.' But perhaps the best analysis of Davy's powers
is that given in _Good Words_ for 1879, by Professor Ferguson, who has
also written by far the most generally interesting account of the great
chemist's discoveries:
'Davy's mind,' he says, 'presents so many characteristics, that one
cannot help thinking of it when perusing the narrative of his life
and discoveries. It is that of the highest type of experimentalists.
There is never any straining after either facts or laws. If there was
a practical problem to solve, there was an instinctive perception
required of the means to be employed. He asked his questions; Nature
replied gently, kindly. How could she keep silent when the being
she had made to learn from her inquired? There was never anything
superfluous, for he always saw the aim of the replies no less than of
the questions, and knew what to do next.
'Was it a question in science? the same instinct guided him to the
means. The intensest perception of real analogies led either to
the discovery of new bodies, and to the unravelling of obscure and
perplexed phenomena, or to the enunciation of views of general action,
which are only now adopted in all their extent and recognised as true.
It was thus that he declared against the oxygen theory of acids--that
he was never a devoted convert to Dalton's atomic views--and that he
was so thoroughly a dynamician in a science which is still almost
entirely statical. The laboratory, rather than the study, was the
scene of his triumphs; it was there where his strength lay. No
phenomenon was too minute to escape him; no consequence too improbable
not to be brought into connection with the premises; no law too wide
to be grasped in its known entirety. In all his work, in all his
thinking, there is a magnificence, an ever-burning light which makes
us lift up the head and gaze with purified vision upon the world, and
a wild freshness, a provocative thought which, while we recur to it
again and again, and are never sent away empty, are no less proofs of
this man's vivid and enduring individuality.'
Davy's note-books now became rapidly filled with the Results of his
studies, with Reflexions, with Resolutions, and with the most ambitious
prospectuses of his future labours. Dr. Davy gives, in his 'Life' of
his brother, an interesting specimen, written in 1799, when Davy had
taken a house in Dowry Square, Clifton. Two hours before breakfast
were to be devoted to his 'Lover of Nature,' or the 'Feelings of
Eldon'--the five hours from nine to two to experiments--the time from
four to six was to be spent in reading, and from seven to ten p.m. in
the study of metaphysics. So passed the time away at Clifton, amidst
the most congenial pursuits, thoroughly sympathetic friends, and in the
enjoyment of an income which, modest as it was, enabled him to assist
his mother in the education of his younger brother. But for one thing
he bargained--John was _not_ to be placed under Mr. Coryton.
Clifton, however, ere long became too small a sphere for Davy; and in
1801 an appointment as Assistant Editor of the Journals, Director of
the Laboratory, and Assistant Lecturer (with a view to his ultimately
becoming the Professor of Chemistry) to the then newly-founded Royal
Institution, in London, was joyfully accepted; his salary being fixed
at 100 guineas a year, with a room, and coals, and candles. The Duchess
of Gordon, amongst other leaders of fashion, attracted by his youth
and simplicity, as well as by his enthusiasm and eloquence, took him
by the hand; and his success became assured. Compliments, invitations,
and presents, Dr. Paris tells us, were showered upon him from all
quarters; his society was courted by everybody, and all were proud
of his acquaintance. In 1802 he commenced a long series of lectures
before the Board of Agriculture, on the connexion of Chemistry with
Vegetable Physiology, which have been translated into almost every
European language: in fact, Sir Humphry has been well named the father
of Agricultural Chemistry.[106] In 1803 he obtained the enviable
distinction of being elected a Fellow of the Royal Society, and two
years afterwards, having become a Member of the Royal Irish Academy, he
found himself a correspondent of all the chief scientific men of the
day.
Davy's _début_ as a lecturer at the Royal Institution appears to have
been highly successful; 'the sparkling intelligence of his eye,[107]
his animated manner,' according to one critic, and 'his youth, his
natural eloquence, his chemical knowledge, his happy illustrations, and
well-conducted experiments, excited universal attention and unbounded
applause.' It has been well said that 'under his touch the coldest
realities blossomed into poetry.' But the real secret of his success
was this--that he was master of his subject; and that his whole heart
was in his work. His mode of life, his brother tells us, was at this
time extremely simple, his fare frugal, his rooms slightly furnished,
and the only 'thing of beauty' which they contained was an exquisite
little porcelain Venus, the gift of his early friend Wedgwood, with
whom he was associated in some of the very first attempts made in this
country in the art of photography.
In 1806 and 1807 he was selected to deliver the Bakerian Lecture (the
subject chosen being the 'Chemical Agencies of Electricity')--an
honourable distinction--leading, as it probably did, to his promotion
in the latter year to the posts of Secretary to the Royal Society, and
Member of the Council. Of this paper Dr. Whewell said, 'It was a great
event--perhaps the most important event of the epoch under review,' and
as such 'it was recognised at once all over Europe.' Probably no man's
life was happier than Davy's at this period; his income was ample, his
work was his pleasure, and his disposition was happy and sanguine.
Whilst holding constant and friendly intercourse with his brother
philosophers at home and abroad,[108] he had also plenty of time for
relaxation; and made several pleasant excursions to Scotland[109] and
Ireland; everywhere sketching, making notes, fishing, or pursuing his
inquiries amongst the natives with a vivid pertinacity and good-nature
which at once astonished and delighted them. His brother (who used
occasionally to occupy an adjoining bedroom at the Royal Institution)
tells how Humphry might frequently have been heard during the night
addressing in fervid tones some imaginary audience, or humming aloud an
angler's song. Indeed, it might almost be said that during this period
one cloud only darkened his horizon. He was seized with typhus fever,
caught during an inspection of Newgate Prison, which he visited with a
view to arranging for its disinfection; but, as Dr. Dibdin remarked in
his introductory lecture to the Institution:
'---- Death his dart
Shook, but delayed to strike.'
During Davy's visits to Ireland in 1810 and 1811 he lectured before the
Dublin Society, and whilst in the Irish metropolis had conferred upon
him by Trinity College the honorary degree of Doctor of Laws. During
the first week 550 tickets for his lectures were sold at 2 guineas
each, and the price ultimately rose to from 10 to 20 guineas. His
own pecuniary remuneration was also handsome; in the former year he
received 500 guineas, and in the latter £750.
The result of his researches during the eleven years whilst he
was officially connected with the Royal Institution may, Dr. Davy
thinks, be conveniently divided into two portions, viz., the _earlier
one_, terminating with his great discovery of the decomposition and
recomposition of the fixed alkalies, by the aid of an enormously
powerful voltaic pile which he had specially constructed for him, and
the cost of which was defrayed by subscription--the reward of his
triumphant and all-important electro-chemical researches; and the
_later period_, which re-established the simple nature of chlorine. His
views on these subjects were adopted by all the leading chemists of
the age; and, with few exceptions, were after a short time promulgated
in the schools. To the theory of tanning he also gave much attention,
experimentally wearing for some time one shoe tanned with oak bark, and
the other with catechu. He published the results of his inquiries in
the 'Philosophical Transactions' for 1803.
It is not uninteresting here to note that Davy, on becoming connected
with the Royal Society, did not entirely relinquish his intentions of
prosecuting--what might probably have been a more lucrative career--his
original profession of medicine. But not even such a prospect--nor even
that of an illustrious career in the Church--(to which it is said the
Bishop of Durham and others, charmed by his eloquence as a lecturer,
urged him)--could draw away his affection from science. And he was not
without his reward; for he had the satisfaction of reading in Cuvier's
address to the French Institute, whose members were of course rival
scientists, that--'Davy, not yet thirty-two, in the opinion of all who
could judge of his labours, held the first rank among the chemists of
this or of any other age.'
The month of April, 1812, was an eventful one in Davy's life. It saw
his retirement from the post of Secretary to the Royal Society; it
saw him receive the honour of Knighthood, then rarely bestowed upon
men of science;[110] and last, but not least, it saw him married to
Mrs. Apreece, whose maiden name was Jane Kerr (of Kelso), a wealthy,
amiable, and intellectual widow, to whom he appears to have been
devotedly attached: he described her, in a letter to his mother,
announcing the intended marriage, as 'a woman equally distinguished
for virtues, talents, and accomplishments;' and to his brother as
'the most amiable and intellectual woman I have ever known.' To this
tribute to her worth it may be added that, when Scott went on his tour
to the Hebrides, his 'dear friend and distant relation,' Mrs. Apreece
(afterwards Lady Davy), went with the family party: she had been,
Scott says in one of his letters, 'a lioness of the first magnitude
in Edinburgh' during the preceding winter. And when writing to Byron,
inviting him to Abbotsford, Sir Walter mentions as one of the visitors
who made his home attractive: 'The fair, or shall I say the sage,
Apreece that was, Lady Davy that is, who is soon to show us how much
science she leads captive in Sir Humphry.'
But there are 'cabinet' portraits of the lady and her husband in 'The
Life of George Ticknor' (p. 57, vol. i.) which may be introduced here.
'_1815, June 13._--I breakfasted this morning with Sir H. Davy, of
whom we have heard so much in America. He is now about thirty-three,
but with all the freshness and bloom of twenty-five, and one of
the handsomest men I have seen in England. He has a great deal of
vivacity--talks rapidly, though with great precision--and is so much
interested in conversation that his excitement amounts to nervous
impatience, and keeps him in constant motion. He has just returned
from Italy, and delights to talk of it; thinks it, next to England,
the finest country in the world, and the society of Rome surpassed
only by that of London, and says he should not die contented without
going there again.
'It seemed singular that his taste in this should be so acute, when
his professional eminence is in a province so different and remote;
but I was much more surprised when I found that the first chemist
of his time was a professed angler; and that he thinks, if he were
obliged to renounce either fishing or philosophy, that he should find
the struggle of his choice pretty severe.
'_15 June._--As her husband had invited me to do, I called this
morning on Lady Davy. I found her in her parlour, working on a dress,
the contents of her basket strewed about the table, and looking more
like home than anything since I left it. She is small, with black eyes
and hair and a very pleasant face, an uncommonly sweet smile; and
when she speaks, has much spirit and expression in her countenance.
Her conversation is agreeable, particularly in the choice and variety
of her phraseology, and has more the air of eloquence than I have
ever heard before from a lady. But, then, it has something of the
appearance of formality and display, which injures conversation. Her
manner is gracious and elegant; and though I should not think of
comparing her to Corinne, yet I think she has uncommon powers.'
The honeymoon, the greater part of which was spent in Scotland, was
scarcely over, before, in the month of June, he dedicated to his wife
his 'Elements of Chemical Philosophy,' as a pledge of his continued
ardour for science, as well as of his love for her; and Davy returned
to his scientific pursuits. In the following November he nearly lost
his eyesight, whilst performing the dangerous experiment of effecting
the combination of azote, as nitrogen was then called, and chlorine.
He soon, however, completely recovered the use of his eyes, and took
a trip into his native county; fishing and geologizing on the way.
It was about this time also that Davy made the first experiments in
electric lighting, by producing the voltaic arc by the use of carbon;
the discovery was improved by Foucault, who substituted retort-carbon
for wood-charcoal. (Comte du Moncel's 'L'Eclairage Electrique,' Paris,
1880.)
With reference to this, now highly important, subject, a writer in
the _Times_ for 22nd October, 1881, points out that 'Sir Humphry Davy
showed that when a powerful current passes across the point of contact
of two carbon rods, their points become heated; and on separating them
to a short distance, an arc of light shoots between them, and the
carbons are raised to a white heat.' The writer adds, that 'all lamps
(until lately) had this point chiefly in view; namely, to introduce an
arrangement which should keep the carbon-points at the fixed distance
found to be the most advantageous.' Surely here was the germ of that
discovery which is now becoming so rapidly developed.
In the autumn he went with Lady Davy for a long tour on the Continent,
accompanied by the illustrious Faraday, who was a bookseller's
apprentice when Davy first knew him, as his assistant and secretary;
and equipped (as on previous similar occasions) with a portable
chemical apparatus. He passed (with a special passport from Napoleon)
through Paris--fêted by all the Parisian savants, including Laplace,
Gay-Lussac, Thénard, etc., but treating them, it is said, somewhat
haughtily--thence through France and Switzerland into Italy, by way
of Nice to Genoa, where he rested a few days in order to make some
ineffectual experiments on the torpedo; and so on to Florence, visiting
_en route_ all the most remarkable extinct volcanoes in the south of
France. This year he was elected a Corresponding Member of the 1st
class of the French Institute, who had previously awarded to him their
prize of 3,000 livres for his treatise on 'Chemical Affinities.' In
the spring of 1814 he reached Rome, where he spent a month; and thence
visited Naples; all the while filling his note-books with interesting
entries, personal, scientific, and poetic. On his return homeward he
made the acquaintance of Volta, then seventy years old, at Milan, and
he records his pleasure at conferring with the ingenious and amiable
old man.
Midsummer found him at his beloved Geneva; and here he spent three
delicious months in a villa whose garden sloped down to the cool blue
waters of the lake. He wintered at Rome, busily occupied with his
scientific pursuits, with shooting wild-fowl in the Campagna, and in
the enjoyment of the intellectual society of the Eternal City;--not
omitting to transmit the results of his studies for publication in
the 'Philosophical Transactions.' It was about this time that the
Geological Society of Penzance was started; and it need scarcely
be said that it had from the first the best wishes of Davy, who
contributed specimens to its cabinets, and subscribed a handsome sum
towards its expenses.
This was not the only institution of a scientific nature of which
Davy was an early patron, if not indeed an originator. Sir Roderick
Murchison, in his 'Biography' by Geikie, mentions that Davy, Croker,
and Reginald Heber were the real founders and earliest trustees of the
Athenæum Club. And Sir John Rennie, in his 'Autobiography,' says as
follows:
'Sir Humphry Davy, in the year 1825, originated the Zoological
Society, and asked me to join, which I did most willingly; and perhaps
it has been the most popular and successful of any modern society
of that kind. It commenced operations by purchasing the well-known
Cross collection of Exeter 'Change, in which, in my early days, I
took an especial delight; for, considering all things, it was a very
wonderful collection, and it is difficult to understand how, in such
a confined and unhealthy spot, it could have been maintained in such
good condition. The only other exhibition of the kind in London was at
the Tower; the collection of animals there consisted of presents from
the sovereigns of different countries. These were afterwards lent to
the Zoological Society, who established their museum in the Regent's
Park; and taking it altogether, it is probably the finest and best
maintained in the world.'
In the spring of 1815 he returned to England, _viâ_ Mayence and
Brussels, and bought for his residence a house in Lower Grosvenor
Street, No. 28.
There is perhaps no subject connected with the career of Davy with
which his name is more inseparably and more honourably associated
than that now to be mentioned,--and it was a subject which even the
genius of a Humboldt had failed to master--namely, the brilliant and
philanthropical discovery of the Safety Lamp (the original lamp in its
first and simplest form is preserved in the Royal Institution), which
has often been described in detail. His brother goes fully into the
train of reasoning and of experiments which led to its construction.
It is, as he says, a cage of wire-gauze which actually makes prisoner
the flame of the deadly fire-damp, and in its prison consumes it.
This grand invention--and it is not the less grand because it is so
simple--by which in all probability more lives have been saved than
by any other invention of similar character,--Davy nobly refused to
patent, lest the sphere of its usefulness should be restricted: indeed,
throughout his life he was indifferent to mere money; he was constantly
giving away things for which he had no immediate use, and never kept
a book after he had once read it. He received for the invention of
the Safety Lamp unbounded praise and heartiest thanks from the great
body of coal-owners and coal-workers of the Tyne and Wear especially;
and was presented by them, on 11th October, 1817, with a magnificent
service of plate worth £2,500,[111] at a public dinner at the Queen's
Head Hotel, Newcastle, when the Earl of Durham (then Mr. Lambton) said
in the course of his speech: 'If your fame had needed anything to make
it immortal, this discovery alone would have carried it down to future
ages, and connected it with benefits and blessings.'
Of this lamp (which the miners call 'a Davy,') the inventor, with his
usual philanthropic spirit, often said, 'I value it more than ANYTHING
I EVER DID.' The Emperor of Russia sent him a magnificent silver-gilt
vase, the cover of which was surmounted by a figure of the God of Fire
weeping over his extinguished torch, and the present was accompanied
by an autograph letter. Early in the following year, his services to
Science and to Humanity were recognised, somewhat tardily, by his
having a baronetcy conferred upon him by the English Sovereign.[112]
In the summer of 1818 he contemplated a second visit, with Lady Davy,
to the Continent. The programme included Flanders, Austria, Rome, and
Naples,[113] to the two last of which places he went commissioned by
the Prince Regent to investigate at Pompeii the bases of the colours
employed by the ancients in their frescoes; and to discover, if
possible, some chemical process of unrolling the papyric MSS. affected
by the fire at Herculaneum: in this, however, he was unsuccessful; and
his want of success--a thing so unusual with him--afforded him infinite
chagrin. Most of the summer and part of the autumn of 1819 were spent
in luxurious repose at the baths of Lucca; but the winter found him
again at Rome, all the while making notes and storing up thoughts for
his delightful book, 'The Consolations of Travel.'
In the summer of 1820 he returned, by way of the south of France,
to his house in Grosvenor Street, and deeply interested himself in
an inquiry into the 'Connexion between Magnetism and Electricity,'
the result of which he communicated to the Royal Society on the 12th
November.
Again he visited Scotland; and Lockhart gives a graphic account of the
party at Abbotsford, in the autumn of this year, as they started on a
sporting expedition, in which, after sketching the portraits of some
members of it, Scott's biographer goes on to say:
'But the most picturesque figure was the illustrious inventor of the
safety-lamp. He had come for his favourite sport of angling, and had
been practising it successfully with Rose, his travelling companion,
for two or three days preceding this; but he had not prepared for
coursing fields, or had left Charlie Purdie's troop for Sir Walter's
on a sudden thought; and his fisherman's costume--a brown hat with
flexible brim, surrounded with line upon line, and innumerable
fly-hooks; jack-boots worthy of a Dutch smuggler, and a fustian
surtout dabbled with the blood of salmon--made a fine contrast with
the smart jackets, white cord breeches, and well-polished jockey-boots
of the less distinguished cavaliers about him.'
After a merry lunch at Newark Castle they all moved on towards
Blackandro, and, Lockhart continues:
'Davy, next to whom I chanced to be riding, laid his whip about
the fern like an experienced hand, but cracked many a joke, too,
upon his own jack-boots; and, surveying the long eager battalion of
bush-rangers, exclaimed: "Good Heavens, is it thus that I visit the
scenery of the 'Lay of the Last Minstrel'!" He then kept muttering
to himself as his glowing eye (the finest and brightest that I ever
saw) ran over the landscape, some of those beautiful lines from the
conclusion of the 'Lay':
"But still
When summer smiled on sweet Bowhill,
And July's eve with balmy breath
Waved the blue bells on Newark heath,
When throstles sang on Hareheadshaw,
And corn was green in Catterhaugh,
And flourished, broad, Blackandro's oak,
The aged harper's soul awoke," etc., etc.
'Mackenzie ("The Man of Feeling"), spectacled though he was, saw
the first sitting hare, gave the word to slip the dogs, and spurred
after them like a boy. All the seniors, indeed, did well as long
as the course was upwards; but when puss took down the declivity,
they halted, and breathed themselves upon the knoll, cheering gaily,
however, the young people who dashed past and below them. Coursing on
such a mountain is not like the same sport over a set of fine English
pastures. There were gulfs to be avoided, and bogs enough to be
threaded; many a stiff nag stuck fast, many a bold rider measured his
length among the peat-hags; and another stranger to the ground besides
Davy plunged neck-deep into a treacherous well-head, which, till they
were floundering in it, had borne all the appearance of a piece of
delicate green turf. When Sir Humphry emerged from his involuntary
bath, his habiliments garnished with mud, slime, and mangled
water-cresses, Sir Walter received him with a triumphant "_Encore!_"
But the philosopher had his revenge; for, joining soon after in a
brisk gallop, Scott put Sibyl Grey to a leap beyond her prowess, and
lay humbled in the ditch, while Davy, who was better mounted, cleared
it and him at a bound. Happily there was little damage done, but no
one was sorry that the "sociable" had been detained at the foot of the
hill.
'I have seen Sir Humphry in many places, and in company of many
descriptions; but never to such advantage as at Abbotsford. His host
and he delighted in each other, and the modesty of their mutual
admiration was a memorable spectacle. Davy was, by nature, a poet;
and Scott, though anything but a philosopher in the modern sense of
that term, might, I think it very likely, have pursued the study of
physical science with zeal and success, had he chanced to fall in
with such an instructor as Sir Humphry would have been to him, in
his early life. Each strove to make the other talk, and they did
so in turn more charmingly than I ever heard either on any other
occasion whatsoever. Scott, in his romantic narratives, touched upon
a deeper chord of feeling than usual, when he had such a listener as
Davy; and Davy, when induced to open his views upon any subject of
scientific interest in Scott's presence, did so with a degree of clear
energetic eloquence, and with a flow of imagery and illustration,
of which neither his habitual tone of table-talk (least of all in
London) nor any of his prose writings (except, indeed, the posthumous
"Consolations of Travel") could suggest an adequate notion. I say his
prose writings, for who that has read his sublime quatrains on the
"Doctrine of Spinoza" can doubt that he might have united, if he had
pleased, in some great didactic form, the vigorous ratiocination of
Dryden and the moral majesty of Wordsworth? I remember William Laidlaw
whispering to me one night, when their "rapt talk" had kept the circle
round the fire until long after the usual bed-time of Abbotsford:
"Gude preserve us! this is a very superior occasion! Eh, sirs!" he
added, cocking his eye like a bird. "I wonder if Shakespeare and Bacon
ever met to screw ilk other up!"'