148 SIR HUMPHREY DAVY. 



Chloe. When very small, and about to be drowned, 

 he begged her as a gift, and with great care reared 

 her to be his hunting and fishing companion. At 

 first she did not know him, but when, with his 

 peculiarly musical voice, he called her by name, 

 " she was in a transport of joy." 



Davy never forgot his early life at Penzance. In 

 his will he left a sum of money to be paid annually 

 to the master of the grammar school, " on condition 

 that the boys may have a holiday on his birthday." 



One secret of Davy's early success was, no doubt, 

 his ambition. He used to say that he had been 

 kept largely from the temptations of youth by " an 

 active mind, a deep ideal feeling of good, and a look 

 toivards future greatness." The young man or 

 woman who definitely plans to be somebody seldom 

 finds any obstacles along the road too great to be 

 overcome. 



He wrote in his note-book : " I have neither 

 riches, nor power, nor birth to recommend me ; yet, 

 if I live, I trust I shall not be of less service to 

 mankind, and to my friends, than if I had been born 

 with these advantages." 



At the Pneumatic Institution he found in Mrs. 

 Beddoes "the best and most amiable woman in the 

 world," a helper in the development of his genius. 

 Like the wife of William Humboldt, and like any 

 other woman who combines heart and intellect, Mrs. 

 Beddoes gathered about her, in her home, Coleridge 

 and Southey, and other bright minds of Clifton. 

 Here Davy, scarcely more than a boy, with his soft 



