10 Professor T. E. Thorpe [Jiiii. 17, 



thread. He had been in a low feverish condition for some time 

 previously, and a great dread had fallen upon him that he should die 

 before he had completed his discoveries. It was in this condition of 

 body and mind that he had applied himself to the task of putting 

 together an account of his results. Four days after this was given to 

 the world he took to his bed, and he remained there for nine weeks. 

 Such a blow following hard on the heels of such a triumph aroused 

 the liveliest sympathy. The doors of the Royal Institution were 

 beset by anxious inquirers, and written reports of his condition at 

 various periods of the day had to be posted in the hall. The strength 

 of the feeling may be gleaned, too, from the sentences with which the 

 Rev. Dr. Dibdin, who had been hurriedly engaged to take his place 

 in the theatre, began the lecture introductory to the Session of 1808. 



" The Managers of this Institution have requested me to impart to 

 you that intelligence, which no one who is alive to the best feelings 

 of human nature can hear without the mixed emotion of sorrow and 

 delight. 



"Mr. Davy, whose frequent and powerful addresses from this 

 place, supported by his ingenious experiments, have been so long and 

 so well known to you, has, for the last five weeks, been struggling 

 between life and death. The effects of these experiments recently 

 made in illustration of his late splendid discovery, added to con- 

 sequent bodily weakness, brought on a fever so violent as to threaten 

 the extinction of life. Over him it might emphatically be said in the 

 language of our immortal Milton, that 



' . . , . Death his dart 

 Shook, but delayed to strike.' 



" If it had pleased Providence to deprive the world of all 

 further benefit from his original talents and intense application, 

 there has certainly been sufficient already effected by him to entitle 

 him to ]je classed among the brightest scientific luminaries of his 

 country." 



After having, " at the particular request of the Managers," given 

 an outline of Davy's investigations, Dr. Dibdin proceeded to say : — 



" These may justly be placed among the most brilliant and 

 valuable discoveries which have ever been made in chemistry, for a 

 great chasm in the chemical system has been filled up ; a blaze of light 

 has been diffused over that part which before was utterly dark ; and 

 new views have been opened, so numerous and interesting, that the 

 more any man who is versed in chemistry reflects on them, the more 

 he finds to admire and heighten his expectation of future important 

 results. 



" Mr. Davy's name, in consequence of these discoveries, will be 

 always recorded in the annals of science amongst those of the most 

 illustrious philosophers of his time. His country, with reason, will 

 be proud of him, and it is no small honour to the Royal Institu- 



