Count Rumford, Sir Humphry Davy 109 



generally been supposed necessary first to make them vir- 

 tuous. But why not reverse this order? Why not make 

 them first happy and then virtuous ? " He adopted the 

 name Rumford on being created a Count of the Holy Roman 

 Empire in 1791. Some years later he returned to England 

 and founded the Royal Institution, which received its charter 

 in 1800. His later years were spoilt by an unhappy attach- 

 ment he had formed to the widow of Lavoisier, the great 

 French chemist, who had suffered death on the guillotine 

 during the Revolution. Their marriage took place in 1804, 

 but resulted in an uncomfortable life for several years, until 

 a separation was agreed upon. He died in France in the 

 sixty-second year of his age. 



Rumford probably rendered his greatest service to 

 science when, in 1801, he selected Humphry Davy for 

 appointment as first lecturer on Chemistry and Director of 

 the Laboratory at the Royal Institution. Davy (1778-1828) 

 had already shown his intense enthusiasm for research, 

 though his first attempts at original work were remarkable 

 for great power of scientific imagination, rather than for 

 sobriety of judgment. A trial lecture at which Rumford 

 was present, settled, however, the question of his appoint- 

 ment. 



" I consider it fortunate that I was left much to 

 myself when a child, and put upon no particular plan of 

 study, and that I enjoyed much idleness at Mr. Coryton's 

 school. I, perhaps, owe to these circumstances the little 

 talents that I have and their peculiar application." 

 These words of Davy's, written to his mother at a later 

 date, show that Davy did not establish any reputation 

 for studiousness as a boy ; but his literary gifts must have 

 appeared at an early age, for we are told that the love- 

 sick youths of Penzance employed him to write their 

 valentines and letters. 1 Davy's father had died in poor 

 circumstances, and the mother established a milliner's shop 

 in Penzance to provide the means of educating her younger 

 children. Humphry, the eldest of them, had then already 



1 The account of Davy's life and work is almost entirely derived 

 from Sir Edward Thorpe's most excellent and interesting little volume, 

 " Humphry Davy Poet and Philosopher " (Century Science Series). 



