1799-1800. Mi. 21-2.] PEOFESSOR DAVY. 315 



of twenty strokes, made me dance about the laboratory as a 

 madman, and has kept my spirits in a glow ever since. 



Yours, with affection and respect, 



HUMPHRY DAVY. 



Dr. Paris says Coleridge gave him this account of 

 of the caution of Davy at this time : 



Dr. Beddoes thought nitrous oxide gas would cure para- 

 lysis. A patient was to be treated by Davy, He first took 

 the temperature by means of a small thermometer placed 

 under the tongue. The patient immediately declared that 

 he felt better. The opportunity was too tempting to be 

 lost. Davy cast an intelligent glance at Mr. Coleridge, and 

 desired the patient to renew his visit on the following day, 

 when the same ceremony was again performed, and repeated 

 every succeeding day for a fortnight, the patient gradually 

 improving during that period, when he was dismissed as 

 cured, no other application having been used than that of 

 the thermometer. 



Southey thus wrote his opinion and that of Cole- 

 ridge regarding Davy at this time : ' He is a marvel- 

 lous young man, whose talents I can only wonder at/ 



Later he wrote : 



My residence at Westbury was one of the happiest 

 portions of my life. . . . J was in habits of the most 

 frequent and intimate intercourse with Davy, then in the 

 flower and freshness of his youth. We were within an 

 easy walk of each other over some of the most beautiful 

 ground in that beautiful part of England. When I went 

 to the Pneumatic Institution he had to tell me of some new 

 experiment or discovery and of the views which it opened 

 for him, and when he came to Westbury there was a fresh 

 portion of Madoc for his hearing. 



