374 NINETEENTH CENTURY. PT. ill. 



Lyons's * Experiments on Electricity,' and other books of a 

 like kind made the lad long for more knowledge about these 

 wonderful sciences. He constructed an electrical machine, 

 and spent his evenings in making experiments, and he per- 

 suaded his brother Robert to pay a few shillings for him to 

 attend some lectures given by a Mr. Tatum on Natural 

 Philosophy. 



But one of the first great pleasures of his life was when 

 a customer at the bookshop, a Mr. Dance, took him to four 

 lectures at the Royal Institution, given by Sir Humphry 

 Davy. These lectures filled him -with an intense longing to 

 learn more, and he took the bold step of writing a letter to 

 Davy, enclosing the notes which he had made of the lectures, 

 and asking for some employment connected with science. It 

 will always be remembered to Davy's honour that he did not 

 throw this letter aside, but wrote a "kind reply, telling the 

 young man to come and see him, and in the end made him 

 his assistant at the Royal Institution in Albemarle Street, 

 where Faraday afterwards became Professor of Chemistry. 



It is impossible in a short sketch to give you any idea of 

 the simple and noble nature of the man who from that time 

 for more than fifty years laboured at science in the Royal 

 Institution. It is not yet many years since he died, and you 

 may talk with those who have known and loved him, or 

 read the story of his life in a little book called ' Michael 

 Faraday,' written by Dr. Gladstone. Even of his experi- 

 ments we can only mention a few, for these subjects are 

 becoming almost too deep for us ; but those which we must 

 now consider were some which have helped to make his 

 name famous. 



Faraday discovers the Mutual Rotation of Magnets 

 and Electrified Wires, 1821. It was in 1821 that Fara- 

 day began to repeat for himself Ampere's experiments on 



