62 Royal Society : — Anniversary Address of the President : 



room, without feelings of deep regret for the loss of his services and 

 of affectionate respect for his many virtues : it is hardly necessary 

 for me to add that I refer to our late associate and former President, 

 Mr. Da VIES Gilbert*. 



He was the only surviving son of the Rev. Edward Giddy, of St. 

 Erth in Cornwall, and his mother, whose maiden name was Davies, 

 was the representative of several ancient and distinguished families 

 in that county, and the heiress likewise of very considerable pro- 

 perty. His early education, which was almost entirely domestic, was 

 chiefly superintended by his father, who was an accomplished clas- 

 sical scholar; and in 1785 he became a gentleman commoner of 

 Pembroke College, Oxford, where he attended the lectures of Dr. 

 Beddoes on chemistry. Dr. Sibthorp on botany, and Mr. Hornby 

 on geometry and astronomy, and devoted himself with very unu- 

 sual diligence to the study of mathematics and the natural sciences. 

 He used to boast in after life, -with very becoming pride, that he was 

 the first student of his class in the University of Oxford, who had 

 ever read the Principia of Newton. 



In 1791, he was elected a Fellow of this Society, and became as- 

 sociated from that time forward with the most eminent men of sci- 

 ence in tlie metropolis. He had, in very early life, appreciated the 

 extraordinary combination of poetical and philosophical genius in 

 his friend and fellow-countryman Humphry Davy, at that time in 

 a very humble capacity ; and by recommending him, first, as an as- 

 sistant to Dr. Beddoes in his experiments on the medical effects of 

 gaseous inspirations, and, secondly, to the Royal Institution, he had 

 the merit and good fortune of contributing to rescue from obscurity 

 one of the greatest discoverers in modei-n chemistry f. In the year 

 1804, he became Member of Parliament for Helston, and in 1806 

 for Bodmin, a borough in his own immediate neighbourhood, which 

 he continued to represent until the era of Parliamentary Reform in 

 1832. He was emphatically the representative of scientific interests 

 in the House of Commons, and contributed by his exertions to carry 

 many very important projects, including amongst them the great 

 breakwater at Plymoutla and the bill for the revision of weights and 

 measures ; a bill founded upon the report of a commission of which 

 he was a member, in conjunction with Captain Kater, Dr. Young 

 and Dr. Wollaston. 



Mr. Davies Gilbert was the author of Papers in our Transactions 

 " On the Mathematical Theory of Suspension Bridges J," with parti- 

 cular reference to the Menai bridge, which was at that time in pro- 

 gress, and the curvature of which was considerably modified in con- 

 formity witli the results of his calculations : — " On the Progressive 

 Improvements made in the Efficiency of Steam-engines in Cornwall, 

 with investigations of the methods best adapted for imparting great 



[* Another obituary notice of Mr. Davies Gilbert appears in the Sup- 

 plementary Number for the present month, vol. xvii. p. 531. A third will be 

 given shortlv. — Edit.) 



[t See L.' & E. Phil. Mag. N. S. iii. p. 57, for Mr. Gilbert's own state- 

 ment of these circumstances.] 



J For 1826, Part III. p. 202. 



