255 
Pembroke and its vicinity. During many years it was his great 
delight to pass a few days at Oxford, and he always considered the 
diploma Degree of Doctor of Laws, conferred on him by the Uni- 
versity in 1832, as one of the most gratifying events of his life. 
During his early residence his taste for chemistry and othe! 
branches of physical science had introduced him to the acquaint- 
ance of Dr. Beddoes, at that time a resident Member of Pembroke 
College, and who subsequently dedicated to him his pamphlet on 
mathematical evidence. This acquaintance was the remote cause 
of the first step in the public life of Sir Humphry Davy; when Mr. 
Giddy, who had discovered young Davy’s genius for chemistry whilst 
yet a boy at Penzance, introduced him to Dr. Beddoes, to assist in 
his laboratory at Bristol, little dreaming that he should himself one 
day become the successor of this boy in the chair of the Royal So- 
ciety. 
Mr. Davies Giddy was elected a fellow of the Royal Society 
in 1791, and subsequently of the Antiquarian, Linnean, Geological, 
and Astronomical Societies of London. He was also an honorary 
member of the Royal Society of Edinburgh, the Royal Irish Aca- 
demy, and of the New University of Durham. In 1814 he was 
elected first President of the Royal Geological Society of Cornwall 
and afterwards Vice-Patron of the Cornwall Royal Polytechnic So- 
ciety, in both which offices he continued till the day of his death. 
He held the distinguished office of President of the Royal Society, 
during three years, from 1827 to 1830, and contributed several im- 
portant papers to their Transactions; one upon the Mathematical 
Theory of Suspension Bridges (vol. 116, 1826, Part I., p. 202); 
also a Table for facilitating the Computations relative to Suspension 
Bridges (vol. 121, 1831, p. 341); a third paper, entitled Observa- 
tions on Steam Engines (vol. 117, 1827, p. 25); and a fourth on the 
Efficacy of Steam Engines in Cornwall, with Investigations of the 
Methods best adapted for imparting great Angular Velocity (vol. 120, 
1830, Part I., p. 121;) likewise a paper on the nature of Negative 
and Imaginary Quantities (vol. 121, 1831, p.91). He also printed 
three Addresses as President of the Royal Society, 1828, 1829, 
1830*. 
* Mr. Gilbert was also the author of the following papers in the Quar- 
terly Journal of Science and the Arts: Observations on the properties of 
