DAVY 173 



imperious, and was " regardless of minor etiquette." 

 Snobbish to aristocrats, arrogant to inferiors, "it is 

 mortifying to think that this great man, captivated by 

 the flatteries of the fashionable world, lost much of the 

 winning simplicity of his early manner and his devotion 

 to science." 



Davy received every honour awarded to men of 

 science, but he was refused the Order of the Bath, 

 which he expected. 



Of posthumous honours, the Royal Society awards a 

 Davy medal ; Dr Ludwig Mond has endowed a research 

 laboratory (called the "Davy-Faraday Laboratory") at 

 the Royal Institution ; and there is a statue to his 

 memory in Market Jew Street, Penzance. 



It was Count Rumford who was instrumental in 

 bringing Davy to the Royal Institution ; therefore a few 

 words about him will not be out of place. Benjamin 

 Thompson Rumford was born in America in 1753, and 

 at the outbreak of the War of Independence he embraced 

 the royalist cause. He was a commander of the King's 

 American Dragoons; in 1784 he entered the Bavarian 

 service, rose to be Minister of War, and was created 

 Count of the Holy Roman Empire. In 1806 he married 

 the widow of Lavoisier, but the marriage was a failure, 

 and they separated in 1809. 



Rumford was a celebrated physicist. He invented the 



