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    LITERATURE, SCIENCE, ART, &c-

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    SIR HUMPHRY DAVY'S BJEMAINS . Fragmentary Remains , Literary and Scientific , of Sir Humphry Davy , icith a Sketch of his Life , and Selec tions front his Correspondence * Edited by his Brother , John Davy , M . D . * FJI . S . John Churchill . Two Lives of Sir Humphry Davy have already come before the public , one by Dr . Paris , published in 1831 , the other by his brother , in 1839 . The present volume is supplemental to these , and contains materials which have gradually come into the author ' s hands , on the decease of such of Sir Humphry ' s early friends as Southey , Coleridge , and

    dis friend Cottle , the Bristol bookseller , who had been his cherished correspondents through his life . We gladly hail the opportunity once more to refresh our own . and our readers' memories by travelling over again the life of so great and good a man . We ought to add that no inconsiderable part of the interest of the volume attaches to those parts of it for the opportunity of the publication of which Dr . Davy expresses his acknowledgments to the relatives and executors of the witty and agreeable L * ady Davy , whose rejwions were till a few years ago a leading feature in . the literary society of the metropolis .

    We need not detain our readers with any recapitulation of the details of Davy ' s early life ; his birth at Penzance , of respectable middle-class parents , in 1778 , his obligations to the friend of his youth , Mr . John Tonkin , who received him into his house , provided for his education , and articled him to the profession , iu whose studies he laid the groundwork of his chemical proficiency . It is enough to say that the foots adduced in this volume , and in the previous biographies which lie before us , fully justify what his brother says in his former Life of Sir Humphry at this early stage of his life : — " There belonged to his mind , it cannot be

    doubted , the genuine quality of genius , or that power of intellect wbicl exalts its possessor above the crowd , and which , by its own energies and native vigour , grows and expands , and conies to maturity , aided indeed , and modified by circumstances , but in no Vise created by them . " The sequel proves that these ^ circumstances" were not so unfavourable as to entitle Davy to a place in the meritorious band of patient heroes whom Mr . Craifc lias grouped together in the noble gallery of those who have , par excellence , pursued knowledge

    under difficulties , yet not fortunately and accidentally propitious , but occurring at each stage just at the time when Davy ' s merits made each advancing step , while creditable to the discrimination of those who helped him on , in no degree , to be placed to the account of their pure disinterestedness . This applies in some measure to his almost adoption by Jar . Tonkin , and thoroughly to his appointment , at the age of twenty , to the care of the Pneumatic Institution at Bath , and his subse quent removal to the Royal Institution in its then humble establishment in Albemarle-street .

    The volume throws considerable light on his early " self-education , " that most interesting part of the histories of tliose who rise to greatness , From a note-book , ' with tlic date of the year of his apprenticeship on its fly-leaf , we gain this comprehensive plan chalked out by him for study : — " 1 . Theology or Religion , Ethics or Moral Virtues taught by Nature and by Revelation ; 2 . Geography ; 3 . My Profession : a , Botany ; b , Pharmacy ;

    patiently engaged-We can hardly choose whither to give most prominence , in our necessarily meagre summary , to the interesting mass of correspondence from men of letters which the volume contains , or to Davy ' s great discoveries as indicated by the new facts concerning t heir progress and completion now afforded to us . Perhaps our best course will be to consult varied tests by giving a few * sentences to each theme . One or two letters are given to and from Gregory , the son of James Watt , who was early cut down , but not till he had given promise of worthily maintaining his father ' s name in science and its useful applications . Both are eager , as their letters show , to discover new minerals . Imagination might indulge , in the conjecture that if he too miht have iven to che

    for chemistry and the wondrous and exciting combinations of the laboratory of Nature and of Nature's pupil and enlightened follower , experimental natural science . So early as 1798 he was in correspondence with Dr . Beddoes , on the subjects of heat and light , and had indicated those future important discoveries in this department , which paved the way for the final result at which such men as Arago and Davy ' s great pupil Faraday have arrived , that heat , light , magnetism , and electricity are the same force under different aspects and conditions . Our scientific readers need not be informed by us that the absolute identity of these four , although received as certain , awaits , for full and final confirmation , if not explanation , the results of those further researches in this field in which Faraday is understood to be

    " Watt had lived , g g - mistry his contributions of new metals , yet to be discovered , as against Davy ' s Sodium Potassium , and the like . Southey writes from his various temporary residences in the west of England , announcing the progress of his poems , and his projects for many never executed by him , and criticising Davy ' s own contributions to Cottle ' s annual Anthology His sense of Davy ' s poetic taste is best proved by this fact : When asked by a mutual friend , after J 3 ir Humphry ' death , "Might he have been a poet ?* ' he replied , " Davy was a mosfc extraordinary man . He had all the elements of a poet ; he only wanted the art . I have read beautiful verses of his ; when I went to Portugal I left it to Davy to revise and publish my p oem of Thala&a . "

    its ample laboratory . Ulie usefulness of his researches , and the immediate applicability of his discoveries to arts and avocations , are fairly urged and dwelt on . The trade of tanning owes to him much' of its economy and efficiency ; and his lectures on agricultural chemistry have perhaps been only less serviceable to the farmer . than the writings and predilections of Lichig . By the aid of voltaic electricity he performed the great feat of decomposing the fixed alkalis , adding to the number of the metals , and causing , a complete and fruitful rearrangement of the whole nomenclature of chemistrv .

    Letters to brother sav . ; and to illustrious literary friends , all of -them brca-ihing the warmth of personal regard , as well as enriched by the enthusiasm of common studies and sympathies , are cokl in comparison with the specimens we have of liis home correspondence to his mother , sisters , and his brother and biographer . Over his brother ' s professional studies , and equally over his character and conduct , he watches with the grave solicitude of a father on the equal footing oi" a brother . To his little sisters lie wrote as children of the same age might have written them ; and his letters home often tell you of the souvenirs contained in them to be bestowed on humble friends and old family

    being vitiated by the respiration of animals . One letter from Priestley to Davy is given . It is dated Northumberland ( U . S . ) , October 31 , 1 S 01 . He gracefully recognises the services Sir Humphry had already rendered to science , especially in his discovery of the anaesthetic and other influences of the gaseous vapour of nitrous oxide , now popularly known as laughing-gas . Although Dr . Davy does not profess to rewrite his brother ' s life , the new matter " presented is linked together by a sufficient and most unobtrusive chain of narrative . When he comes to Davy ' s removal to the lloyal Institution , lie summarises the objects to which he directed the first researches which he made with the aid of

    servants . .... We pass over without comment the pleasing piscatorial and venatorial episodes narrated by Dr . Davy and chronicled in Sir Hum play ' s letters ; and also—what we must confess we had rather the book had wanted , considering the sanctity of domestic- life , not without undeniably suflicieut cause to be invaded , and the obligations under which the author is indirectly placed for much of his materials to the late Lady l ) avy—some allusions to a want ot the-full'happiness of domestic life to which fcsir Humphry ' s childlessness and the highly nervous temperament and delicate health of his ^ vilci contributed . His love letters arc stately and methodical , though warm ; and the staple of then ; contents is literary , psychological , and geographical small

    To attempt to prove , as we believe , that the imagination of all discoverer in science is akin in its grandeur and fertility to the poetic fervour , would lead us away into a tempting but devious by-way . But it' will not be denied that if of any man this similarity could be established , Davy was that man . With the high gifts of nature which men denominate genius lie combined , like all poets who have made themselves as great as God gave them the power of being great , industry and zeal of research and accuracy of finish . Bold and high-soaring , Davy at once , as if by intuition , rose to the loftiest h he bis if not

    talk ! Ill ' boalth , produced by a too great devotion to the duties of the laboratory , and an excessive readiness to experimentalise on himself with chemical simples and compounds , carry him for rclnxn ion to the Continent more than once . Thither Ins biographer leads us with him ; in this , as m other . paits of the sketch / wisely leaving Sir Hump hry s notebooks and letters to tell their own story . Ho turns up again , near Ultima Thulc , living at D ™» Castle , eagerly stalking , shooting wild fowl , ana extending his angling practice from par ana gioyling to tlio strong salmon of northern f leams-Wherever we discover him , whether amid tho * uina of Prcstum , by Avon side , or in the 5 I )^ orC 1 H Highland brooks , wo find him hunting for hoaltn oi

    flight . And , however , hig rose , eye , quickly , at all events surely , swept the horizon . His imagination , fertile and inventive generally , was specially directed—and hence most of his discoveries —to the perception of conjectural analogies , which became to him the light gleaming , as to Bunyam ' s Pilgrim , from the bright battlements of the oity he was seeking , and to which , irradiated by the light his own soul had evoked , he worked up his way by slow and irrefragable induction t of Inductive Logic he had mastered the spirit , and clothed with warm flesh the bare skeleton of its letter . Not only , with it as a guide , did he classify facts of limited importance , in his hands it developed laws annlioable to natural phenomena almost universal .

    with the thorough zest of a hearty son ^ open to every enlivening influence ol grand oi bwcw scenery , nnd novcr for one do . y ceasing to c . vpcu mcntaliso , in practice or in husbanded intent . The discovery of tho safety-lamp , al ^ ndy . m « 8 details bofore the public and thorolore quickly flis missod by our author , is boon followed by baronetcy and his elevation to the chair ol ino Royal Sooicty . His labours directed to elcoiro magnetism and electro-chemistry arc alludocl io , ancfalso his dovioo for ' the prosiqrvntion ^ of tue coppcr-shcathing pf vessels . Tho col "WfJ ? failure oC the latter , however , is « ot ¦ » t ««« w-Honours , addresses , lol ; tors , medals , flowJ . »«* neither those nor " Consolations m Travo w * H save the " Philosopher" from " Last Days . AH « w

    His inspiration and incitement evor was a sense of tho beauty and harmony with which God has clothed the perfect chemistry of Nature . Besides tho other substantial grounds on which England , so ungrateful in his lifetime , ought , to revere tho memory of Dr . Priestley , it will bo recollected that his eoientiflo discoveries place him in a niohe second in honour to few English chemists . He ' was tho ¦ first , to discover o xygen ros , as also the part performed by vegetables in their growth under the influence of the , sun ' s rays , in , decomposing carbonic acid , and , whilst assimilating the carbon , throwing off the oxygon , thereby salubriously compensating tho danger of tho atmosphere

    to have developed the bent of his future life . Southey , indeed , evidently endorsing the untenable dictum of Dr . Johnson , that genius is but the direction of an original strength and activity of mind to an , object accidentally determined , explicitly expresscss tho opinion that in other fields , such even A 3 poetry ( here he judges from early and unfulfilled promise , nnd his judgment doubtless warped by the pardonable partiality of friendship ) , Davy would have gained as enduring ; laurels as those ho plucked from his batteries and crucibles . To , drawing and painting lie early devoted his attention , and his brothor believes that it was the mixture of pigments that first attracted and evoked his native prcdilooUon

    Untitled Article

    J 284 - THE IiEADEB . [ No . 453 , November 27 , 1858 .

    Literature, Science, Art, &C-

    LITERATURE , SCIENCE , ART , &c-

• Citation
  • Leader (1850-1860), Nov. 27, 1858, page 1284, in the Nineteenth-Century Serials Edition (2008; 2018) ncse2.kdl.kcl.ac.uk/periodicals/l/issues/vm2-ncseproduct2270/page/12/