310 ifctnss of tbe 1Rot>, tRifle, ant> Oun 



in broad daylight to fasten up her boot-laces ! Fresh 

 from the Continent, with the distinction of Madame de 

 StaeTs friendship, and invested with a halo of romantic 

 interest as the alleged original of "Corinne," Mrs. 

 Apreece enjoyed a popularity greater even than Alison 

 Cockburn's or Bess Burnet's. Suitors, of course, the 

 rich and fascinating young widow had in plenty, but 

 none was favoured until she came up to London, to 

 spend the season at her mother's house in Portland 

 Place, and met Humphry Davy, then at the zenith 

 of his fame. 



To carry off from all other rivals the lion of London 

 Society, the man whose intellect commanded the homage 

 of the beaux esprits of both sexes, was a triumph worthy 

 of any woman's ambition. And then the brilliant 

 experimentalist and eloquent expositor of science was 

 a man of most attractive personality. In his earlier 

 days, indeed, Humphry Davy was something uncouth 

 in his appearance, round-shouldered, lumpish, and 

 bucolic. But contact with good society soon put a 

 polish upon the rustic Cornish lad. " The change," 

 says Dr. Paris, in his grandiose style, "which his ap- 

 pearance underwent after his introduction to the 

 Royal Institution was so rapid that in the days of 

 Herodotus it would have been attributed to nothing 

 less than the miraculous interposition of the Priestesses 

 of Helen." He was not tall 5 feet 7 inches was his 

 height but his figure was singularly well-proportioned 

 and his carriage was erect. His hands and feet were 

 remarkably small, but his chest was broad and full, 

 and his limbs extremely muscular. His compact, well- 



