SIR HUMPHREY DAVY. 157 



his life. During the preceding year he had become 

 acquainted with Mrs. Appreece, towards whom es- 

 teem gradually ripened into affection. When their 

 marriage had been decided upon, he wrote his 

 mother : " I am the happiest of men, in the hope of 

 a union with a woman equally distinguished for 

 virtues, talents, and accomplishments. . . . You, I 

 am sure, will sympathize in my happiness. I be- 

 lieve I should never have married but for this 

 charming woman, whose views and whose tastes 

 coincide with my own, and who is eminently 

 qualified to promote my best efforts and objects 

 in life." 



To his brother he writes : " I have been very 

 miserable. The lady whom I love best of any hu- 

 man beings has been very ill. She is now well, and 

 I am happy. Mrs. Appreece has consented to marry 

 me : and when the event takes place I shall not 

 envy kings, princes, or potentates. ... I am going 

 to be married to-morrow ; and I have a fair prospect 

 of happiness, with the most amiable and intellectual 

 woman I have' ever known." How love idealizes 

 all things, makes a new heaven and a new earth 

 for us ! He found in her the two needed qualities 

 for happiness; amiability, without which the life 

 of a man is usually made wretched, and intellectu- 

 ality, without which a cultivated man can have 

 little companionship in a wife. 



The marriage seems to have been a happy one, 

 for he writes to John later : " Lady D. is a noble 

 creature, and every day adds to my contentment by 



