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Amongst the scientific societies of Great Britain, the Royal Institution of London occupies a conspicuous place. It has had many imitators in its time, yet it remains unique. A “learned society” it may claim to be, in the sense that it publishes scientific transactions, and endeavours to concentrate within itself and promote the highest science, within a certain range of subjects. In some respects it resembles a college; for it appoints professors, and provides them with space, appliances, and materials for research, and a theatre wherein to lecture. For its members it provides a comfortable, well-stocked library, and a reading-room where daily and periodic journals may be consulted. But it has achieved a reputation far in excess of any it would have held, had that reputation depended solely on its publications, or on the numerical strength of its membership.

Founded in the year 1799 by that erratic genius Count Rumford, as a sort of technical school,10 it would speedily have come to an end had not others stepped in to develop it in new ways. From the certain ruin which seemed impending in 1801, it was saved by the appearance upon the scene of the brilliant youth Humphry Davy, whose lectures made it for ten years the resort of fashion. In 1814 it was again in such low water that Faraday, travelling on the Continent at that time as amanuensis to Sir Humphry, was every month expecting to hear of its collapse. Until about 1833, when the two Fullerian Professorships were founded, it was continually in financial difficulties. The persistent and extraordinary efforts made by Faraday from 1826 to 1839, and the reputation of the place which accrued by his discoveries, were beyond all question its salvation from ruin. When it was founded it was located in two private houses in Albemarle Street, then regarded as quite out of town, if not almost suburban; the premises being altered and an entrance hall with staircase added. A little later the lecture-theatre, much as it still exists, was constructed. The exterior at first remained unchanged. The stucco pilasters of Grecian style, which give it its air of distinction, were not erected until 1838. The fine rooms of the Davy-Faraday laboratory at the south end were only added in 1896 by the liberality of Mr. Ludwig Mond. Besides the laboratories for research in physical chemistry, which have thus been associated with the older part of the Institution, additional rooms for the library have been provided in this munificent gift to science. The older laboratories of the Institution, though they retain some features from Rumford’s time, have been considerably remodelled. The old rooms where Davy, Young, Brande, Faraday, Frankland, and Tyndall conducted their researches are still in existence; but the chief laboratory was reconstructed in 1872 in Tyndall’s time; and it has been quite recently enlarged and reconstructed to accommodate the heavy machinery required in Professor Dewar’s researches on liquid air and the properties of bodies at low temperatures.

The spirit of the place may be summed up very briefly. It has existed for a century as the home of the highest kind of scientific research, and of the best and most specialised kind of scientific lectures. It was here that Davy first showed the electric arc lamp; that he astonished the world by decomposing potash and producing potassium; that he invented the safety lamp. It was here that Faraday worked and laboured for nearly fifty years. Here that Tyndall’s investigations on radiant heat and diamagnetism were carried on. Here that Brande, Frankland, Odling, Gladstone, and Dewar have handed on the torch of chemistry from the time of Davy. Professorships, of which the educational duties are restricted to a few lectures in the year, giving leisure and scope for research as the main duty, are not to be found anywhere else in the British Islands; those at colleges and universities being invariably hampered with educational and administrative duties.

ROYAL INSTITUTION LABORATORIES.

As for the lectures at the Royal Institution, they may be divided under three heads: the afternoon courses; the juvenile lectures at Christmas; the Friday night discourses. The afternoon lectures are thrice a week at three o’clock, and consist usually of short courses, from three lectures to as many as twelve, by eminent scientific and literary men. Invariably one of these courses during the season, either before or after Easter, is given by one of the regular Professors; the remaining lecturers are paid professional fees in proportion to the duration of their course. The Christmas lectures, always six in number, are given, sometimes by one of the Professors, sometimes by outside lecturers of scientific reputation. But the Friday night discourses, given at nine o’clock, during the season from January till June, are unique. No fee is paid to the lecturer, save a contribution toward expenses if applied for, and it is considered to be a distinct honour to be invited to give such a discourse. There is no scientific man of any original claim to distinction; no chemist, engineer, or electrician; no physiologist, geologist, or mineralogist, during the last fifty years, who has not been invited thus to give an account of his investigations. Occasionally a wider range is taken, and the eminent writer of books, dramatist, metaphysician, or musician has taken his place at the lecture-table. The Friday night gathering is always a brilliant one. From the salons of society, from the world of politics and diplomacy, as well as from the ranks of the learned professions and of the fine arts, men and women assemble to listen to the exposition of the latest discoveries or the newest advances in philosophy by the men who have made them. Every discourse must, so far as the subject admits, be illustrated in the best possible way by experiments, by diagrams, by the exhibition of specimens. Not infrequently, the person invited to give a Friday evening discourse at the Royal Institution will begin his preparations five or six months beforehand. At least one instance is known—the occasion being a discourse by the late Mr. Warren De la Rue—where the preparations were begun more than a year beforehand, and cost several hundreds of pounds. And this was to illustrate a research already made and completed, of which the bare scientific results had already been communicated in a memoir to the Royal Society. A mere enumeration of the eminent men who have thus given their time and labours to the Royal Institution would fill many pages. It is little cause for wonder then that the lecture-theatre at Albemarle Street is crowded week after week in the pursuit of science under conditions like these; or that every lecturer is spurred on by the spirit of the place to do his subject the utmost justice by the manner in which he handles it. There are no lectures so famous, in the best sense of the word so popular, certainly none sustained at so high a level, as the lectures of the Royal Institution.

THE FAMOUS LECTURES.

But it was not always thus. Davy’s brilliant but ill-balanced genius had drawn fashionable crowds to the morning lectures which he gave. Brande proved to be a much more humdrum lecturer; and though with young Faraday at his elbow he found his work of lecturing a task “on velvet,” he was not exactly an inspiring person. During Davy’s protracted tour abroad things had not altogether prospered, and his return was none too soon. Faraday threw himself whole-heartedly into the work of the Institution, not only helping as lecture assistant, but giving a hand also in the preparation of the Quarterly Journal of Science, which had been established as a kind of journal of proceedings.

But now Faraday was to take a quiet step forward. He appears at the City Philosophical Society in the character of lecturer. He gave seven lectures there, in 1816, on chemistry, the fourth of them being “On Radiant Matter.” Extracts are given from most of these lectures in Bence Jones’s “Life and Letters of Faraday”; they show all that love of accuracy, that philosophic suspense of judgment in matters of hypothesis, which in after years were so characteristic of the man.

He also kept a commonplace book filled with notes of scientific matters, with literary excerpts, anagrams, epitaphs, algebraic puzzles, varieties of spelling of his own name, and personal experiences, including a poetical diatribe against falling in love, together with the following more prosaic aphorism:—

What is Love?—A nuisance to everybody but the parties concerned. A private affair which every one but those concerned wishes to make public.

It also includes a piece in verse, by a member of the City Philosophical Society—a Mr. Dryden—called “Quarterly Night,” which is interesting as embalming a portrait of the youthful Faraday as he appeared to his comrades:—

Neat was the youth in dress, in person plain;

His eye read thus, Philosopher in grain;

Of understanding clear, reflection deep;

Expert to apprehend, and strong to keep.

His watchful mind no subject can elude,

Nor specious arts of sophists ere delude;

His powers, unshackled, range from pole to pole;

His mind from error free, from guilt his soul.

Warmth in his heart, good humour in his face,

A friend to mirth, but foe to vile grimace;

A temper candid, manners unassuming,

Always correct, yet always unpresuming.

Such was the youth, the chief of all the band;

His name well known, Sir Humphry’s right hand.

At this date there were no evening duties at the Royal Institution, but Faraday found his evenings well occupied, as he explains to Abbott when rallied about his having deserted his old friend. Monday and Thursday evenings he spent in self-improvement according to a regular plan. Wednesdays he gave to “the Society” (i.e. the City Philosophical). Saturdays he spent with his mother at Weymouth Street; leaving only Tuesdays and Fridays for his own business and friends.

CITY PHILOSOPHICAL SOCIETY.

And so the busy months pass, and he gives more lectures in the privacy of the City Society, one of them, “On some Observations on the Means of obtaining Knowledge,” attaining the dignity of print at the hands of Effingham Wilson, the enterprising City publisher, who a few years later printed Browning’s “Paracelsus” and Alfred Tennyson’s first volume, “Poems: Chiefly Lyrical.” By the time he has given nine lectures he has gained confidence. The discourses had all been written out beforehand, though never literally “read.” For the tenth lecture—on Carbon—he wrote notes only. This is in July, 1817, and in these notes he touches on a matter in which he had been very busily aiding Sir Humphry Davy, the invention of the safety lamp. Many of the early forms of experimental apparatus constructed, and some of the early lamps, are still preserved in the museum of the Royal Institution. Dr. Clanny had, in 1813, proposed an entirely closed lamp, supplied with air from the mine, through water, by bellows. After many experiments on explosive mixtures of gas and air, and on the properties of flame, Davy adopted an iron-wire gauze protector for his lamp, which was introduced into coal mining early in 1816. In Davy’s preface to his work describing it, he says: “I am myself indebted to Mr. Michael Faraday for much able assistance in the prosecution of my experiments.”

A RIFT WITHIN THE LUTE.

And well might Davy be grateful. With all his immense ability, he was a man almost destitute of the faculties of order and method. He had little self-control, and the fashionable dissipations which he permitted himself lessened that little. Faraday not only kept his experiments going, but made himself responsible for their records. He preserved every note and manuscript of Davy’s with religious care. He copied out Davy’s scrawled researches in a neat clear delicate handwriting, begging only for his pains to be allowed to keep the originals, which he bound in two quarto volumes. Faraday has been known to remark to an intimate friend that amongst his advantages he had had before him a model to teach him what he should avoid. But he was ever loyal to Davy, earnest in his praise, and frank in his acknowledgment of his debt to his master in science. Still there arose the little rift within the lute. The safety lamp, great as was the practical advantage it brought to the miner, is not safe in all circumstances. Davy did not like to admit this, and would never acknowledge it. Examined before a Parliamentary Committee as to whether under a certain condition the safety lamp would become unsafe, Faraday admitted that this was the case. Not even his devotion to his master would induce him to hide the truth. He was true to himself in making the acknowledgment, though it angered his master. One Friday evening at the Royal Institution—probably about 1826—there was exhibited an improved Davy lamp with a eulogistic inscription; Faraday added in pencil the words: “The opinion of the inventor.”

At this time he began to give private lessons in chemistry to a pupil to whom he had been recommended by Davy. His lectures at the City Society in Dorset Street were continued in 1818, and at the conclusion of those on chemistry he delivered one on “Mental Inertia,” which has been recorded at some length by Bence Jones.

In 1818 he attended a course of lessons on oratory by the elocutionist Mr. B.H. Smart, paying out of his slender resources half a guinea a lesson, so anxious was he to improve himself, even in his manner of lecturing. His notes on these lessons fill 133 manuscript pages.

His other notes now begin to partake less of the character of quotations and excerpts, and more of the nature of queries or problems for solution. Here are some examples:—

“Do the pith balls diverge by the disturbance of electricity in consequence of mutual induction or not?”

“Distil oxalate of ammonia. Query, results?”

“Query, the nature of the body Phillips burns in his spirit lamp?”

The Phillips here mentioned was the chemist Richard Phillips (afterwards President of the Chemical Society), one of his City friends, whose name so frequently occurs in the correspondence of Faraday’s middle life. Phillips busied himself to promote the material interests of his friend who—to use his own language—was “constantly engaged in observing the works of Nature, and tracing the manner in which she directs the arrangement and order of the world,” on the splendid salary of £100 per annum. The following note in a letter to Abbott, dated February 27, 1818, reveals new professional labours:—

I have been more than enough employed. We have been obliged even to put aside lectures at the Institution; and now I am so tired with a long attendance at Guildhall yesterday and to-day, being subpœnaed, with Sir H. Davy, Mr. Brande, Phillips, Aikin, and others, to give chemical information on a trial (which, however, did not come off), that I scarcely know what I say.

Shortly afterwards Davy again went abroad, but Faraday remained in England. From Rome Davy wrote a note, the concluding sentence of which shows how Faraday was advancing in his esteem:—

Rome: October, 1818.

Mr. Hatchett’s letter contained praises of you which were very gratifying to me; for, believe me, there is no one more interested in your success and welfare than your sincere well-wisher and friend,

H. Davy.

In the next year Davy wrote again, suggesting to Faraday that he might possibly be asked to come to Naples as a skilled chemist to assist in the unrolling of the Herculaneum manuscripts. In May he wrote again, from Florence:—

It gives me great pleasure to hear that you are comfortable at the Royal Institution, and I trust that you will not only do something good and honourable for yourself, but likewise for science.

I am, dear Mr. Faraday, always your sincere friend and well-wisher,

H. Davy.

The wish that Davy expressed that Faraday might “do something” for himself and likewise for science was destined soon to come to fulfilment. But in the case of one who had worked so closely and had been so intimately associated as an assistant, it must necessarily be no easy matter always to draw a distinction between the work of the master and that of the assistant. Ideas suggested by one might easily have occurred to the other, when their thoughts had so long been directed to the same ends. And so it proved.

BEGINS ORIGINAL RESEARCHES.

Reference to Chapter III. will show that already, beginning in 1816 with a simple analysis of caustic lime for Sir Humphry Davy, Faraday had become an active worker in the domain of original research. The fascination of the quest of the unknown was already upon him. While working with and for Davy on the properties of flame and its non-transmission through iron gauze, in the investigation of the safety lamp, other problems of a kindred nature had arisen. One of these, relating to the flow of gases through capillary tubes, Faraday had attacked by himself in 1817. The subject formed one of the six original papers which he published that year. In the next two years he contributed in all no fewer than thirty-seven papers or notes to the Quarterly Journal of Science. In 1819 began a long research on steel which lasted over the year 1820. He had already given evidence of that dislike of half-truths, that aversion for “doubtful knowledge” which marked him so strongly. He had exposed, with quiet but unsparing success, the emptiness of the claim made by an Austrian chemist to have discovered a new metal, “Sirium,” by the simple device of analysing out from the mass all the constituents of known sorts, leaving behind—nothing.

HE FALLS IN LOVE.

And now, Faraday being twenty-nine years of age, a new and all-important episode in his life occurred. Amongst the members of the little congregation which met on Sundays at Paul’s Alley, Red Cross Street, was a Mr. Barnard, a working silversmith of Paternoster Row, an elder in the Sandemanian body. He had two sons, Edward Barnard, a friend of Faraday’s, and George, who became a well-known water-colour artist; and three daughters; one who was already at this time married; Sarah, now twenty-one years of age; and Jane, who was still younger. Edward had seen in Faraday’s note-book those boyish tirades against falling in love, and had told his sister Sarah of them. Nevertheless, in spite of all such misogynistic fancies, Faraday woke up one day to find that the large-eyed, clear-browed girl had grown to a place in his heart that he had thought barred against the assaults of love. She asked him on one occasion to show her the rhymes against love in his note-book. In reply he sent her the hitherto unpublished poem:—

R.I.

Oct. 11th, 1819.

You ask’d me last night for the lines which I penn’d,

When, exulting in ignorance, tempted by pride,

I dared torpid hearts and cold breasts to commend,

And affection’s kind pow’r and soft joys to deride.

If you urge it I cannot refuse your request:

Though to grant it will punish severely my crime:

But my fault I repent, and my errors detest;

And I hoped to have shown my conversion in time.

Remember, our laws in their mercy decide

That no culprit be forced to give proof of his deed:

They protect him though fall’n, his failings they hide,

And enable the wretch from his crimes to receed (sic).

The principle’s noble! I need not urge long

Its adoption; then turn from a judge to a friend.

Do not ask for the proof that I once acted wrong,

But direct me and guide me the way to amend.

M. F.

What other previous passages between them are hinted at in the letter which he sent her, is unknown; but on July 5, 1820, he wrote:—

Royal Institution.

You know me as well or better than I do myself. You know my former prejudices, and my present thoughts—you know my weaknesses, my vanity, my whole mind; you have converted me from one erroneous way, let me hope you will attempt to correct what others are wrong.

* * * * *

Again and again I attempt to say what I feel, but I cannot. Let me, however, claim not to be the selfish being that wishes to bend your affections for his own sake only. In whatever way I can best minister to your happiness either by assiduity or by absence, it shall be done. Do not injure me by withdrawing your friendship, or punish me for aiming to be more than a friend by making me less; and if you cannot grant me more, leave me what I possess, but hear me.

Sarah Barnard showed the letter to her father. She was young, and feared to accept her lover. All her father would say by way of counsel was that love made philosophers say many foolish things. The intensity of Faraday’s passion proved for the time a bar to his advance. Fearing lest she should be unable to return it with equal force, Miss Barnard shrank from replying. To postpone an immediate decision, she went away with her sister, Mrs. Reid, to Ramsgate. Faraday followed to press his suit, and after several happy days in her company, varied with country walks and a run over to Dover, he was able to say: “Not a moment’s alloy of this evening’s happiness occurred. Everything was delightful to the last moment of my stay with my companion, because she was so.”

Of the many letters that Faraday wrote to his future wife a number have been preserved. They are manly, simple, full of quiet affection, but absolutely free from gush or forced sentiment of any kind. Extracts from several of them are printed by Bence Jones. One of these, written early in 1821, runs as follows:—

I tied up the enclosed key with my books last night, and make haste to return it lest its absence should occasion confusion. If it has, it will perhaps remind you of the disorder I must be in here also for the want of a key—I mean the one to my heart. However, I know where my key is, and hope soon to have it here, and then the Institution will be all right again. Let no one oppose my gaining possession of it when unavoidable obstacles are removed.

Ever, my dear girl, one who is perfectly yours,

M. Faraday.

Faraday obtained leave of the managers to bring his wife to live in his rooms at the Institution; and in May, 1821, his position was changed from that of lecture assistant to that of superintendent of the house and laboratory. In these changes Sir Humphry Davy gave him willing assistance. But his salary remained £100 a year.

Obstacles being now removed, Faraday and Miss Barnard were married on June 12. Few persons were asked to the wedding, for Faraday wished it to be “just like any other day.” “There will,” he wrote, “be no bustle, no noise, no hurry ... it is in the heart that we expect and look for pleasure.”

A HAPPY MARRIAGE.

His marriage, though childless, was extremely happy. Mrs. Faraday proved to be exactly the true helpmeet for his need; and he loved her to the end of his life with a chivalrous devotion which has become almost a proverb. Little indications of his attachment crop up in unexpected places in his subsequent career; but as with his religious views so with his domestic affairs, he never obtruded them upon others, nor yet shrank from mentioning them when there was cause. Tyndall, in after years, made the intensity of Faraday’s attachment to his wife the subject of a striking simile: “Never, I believe, existed a manlier, purer, steadier love. Like a burning diamond, it continued to shed, for six and forty years, its white and smokeless glow.”

In his diploma-book, now in possession of the Royal Society, in which he carefully preserved all the certificates, awards, and honours bestowed upon him by academies and universities, there may be found on a slip inserted in the volume this entry:—

25th January, 1847.

Amongst these records and events, I here insert the date of one which, as a source of honour and happiness, far exceeds the rest. We were married on June 12, 1821.

M. Faraday.

And two years later, in the autobiographical notes he wrote:—

On June 12, 1821, he married—an event which more than any other contributed to his earthly happiness and healthful state of mind. The union has continued for twenty-eight years, and has nowise changed, except in the depth and strength of its character.

When near the close of his life, he presented to the Royal Institution the bookcase with the volumes of notes of Davy’s lectures and of books bound by himself, the inscription recorded that they were the gift of “Michael and Sarah Faraday.”

Every Saturday evening he used to take his wife to her father’s house at Paternoster Row, so that on Sunday they should be nearer to the chapel at Paul’s Alley. And in after years, when he was away on scientific work, visiting lighthouses, or attending meetings of the British Association, he always tried to return for the Sunday.

A letter from Liebig in 1844 (see p. 225) gives one of the very few glimpses of contemporary date of the impression made by Mrs. Faraday upon others.

One month after his marriage Faraday made his profession of faith before the Sandemanian church, to which his wife already belonged, and was admitted a member. To his religious views, and his relations to the body he thus formally joined, reference will be found later.

FIRST ELECTRICAL DISCOVERY.

Faraday now settled down to a routine life of scientific work. His professional reputation was rising, and his services as analyst were being sought after. But in the midst of this he was pursuing investigations on his own account. In the late summer of this year he made the discovery of the electro-magnetic rotations described in Chapter III.—his first important piece of original research—and had in consequence a serious misunderstanding with Dr. Wollaston. On September 3rd, working with George Barnard in the laboratory, he saw the electric wire for the first time revolve around the pole of the magnet. Rubbing his hands as he danced around the table with beaming face, he exclaimed: “There they go! there they go! we have succeeded at last.” Then he gleefully proposed that they should wind up the day by going to one of the theatres. Which should it be? “Oh, to Astley’s, to see the horses.” And to Astley’s they went. On Christmas Day he called his young wife to see something new: an electric conducting-wire revolving under the influence of the magnetism of the earth alone. He also read two chemical papers at the Royal Society, announcing new discoveries; one of them in conjunction with his friend Phillips. In July, 1822, he took his wife and her mother to Ramsgate, whilst he went off with Phillips to Swansea to try a new process in Vivian’s copper works. During this enforced parting, Faraday wrote his wife three letters from which the following are extracts:—-

“A MERE LOVE-LETTER.”

(July 21, 1822).

I perceive that if I give way to my thoughts, I shall write you a mere love-letter, just as usual, with not a particle of news in it: to prevent which I will constrain myself to a narrative of what has happened since I left you up to the present time, and then indulge my affection.

Yesterday was a day of events—little, but pleasant. I went in the morning to the Institution, and in the course of the day analysed the water, and sent an account of it to Mr. Hatchett. Mr. Fisher I did not see. Mr. Lawrence called in, and behaved with his usual generosity. He had called in the early part of the week, and, finding that I should be at the Institution on Saturday only, came up, as I have already said, and insisted on my accepting two ten-pound bank-notes for the information he professed to have obtained from me at various times. Is not this handsome? The money, as you know, could not have been at any time more acceptable; and I cannot see any reason, my dear love, why you and I should not regard it as another proof, among many, that our trust should without a moment’s reserve be freely reposed on Him who provideth all things for His people. Have we not many times been reproached, by such mercies as these, for our caring after food and raiment and the things of this world? On coming home in the evening, i.e., coming to Paternoster Row home, I learned that Mr. Phillips had seen C., and had told her we should not leave London until Monday evening. So I shall have to-morrow to get things ready in, and I shall have enough to do. I fancy we are going to a large mansion and into high company, so I must take more clothes. Having the £20, I am become bold....

And now, how do my dear wife and mother do? Are you comfortable? are you happy? are the lodgings convenient, and Mrs. O. obliging? Has the place done you good? Is the weather fine? Tell me all things as soon as you can. I think if you write directly you get this it will be best, but let it be a long letter. I do not know when I wished so much for a long letter as I do from you now. You will get this on Tuesday, and any letter from you to me cannot reach Swansea before Thursday or Friday—a sad long time to wait. Direct to me, Post Office, Swansea; or perhaps better, to me at — Vivian Esq., Marino, near Swansea, South Wales....

And now, my dear girl, I must set business aside. I am tired of the dull detail of things, and want to talk of love to you; and surely there can be no circumstances under which I can have more right. The theme was a cheerful and delightful one before we were married, but it is doubly so now. I now can speak, not of my own heart only, but of both our hearts. I now speak, not with any doubt of the state of your thoughts, but with the fullest conviction that they answer to my own. All that I can now say warm and animated to you, I know that you would say to me again. The excess of pleasure which I feel in knowing you mine is doubled by the consciousness that you feel equal joy in knowing me yours.

FROM HUSBAND TO WIFE.

Marino: Sunday, July 28, 1822.

My Dearly Beloved Wife,—I have just read your letter again, preparatory to my writing to you, that my thoughts might be still more elevated and quickened than before. I could almost rejoice at my absence from you, if it were only that it has produced such an earnest and warm mark of affection from you as that letter. Tears of joy and delight fell from my eyes on its perusal. I think it was last Sunday evening, about this time, that I wrote to you from London; and I again resort to this affectionate conversation with you, to tell you what has happened since the letter which I got franked from this place to you on Thursday I believe.

* * * * *

We have been working very hard here at the copper works, and with some success. Our days have gone on just as before. A walk before breakfast; then breakfast; then to the works till four or five o’clock, and then home to dress, and dinner. After dinner, tea and conversation. I have felt doubly at a loss to-day, being absent from both the meeting and you. When away from London before, I have had you with me, and we could read and talk and walk; to-day I have had no one to fill your place, so I will tell you how I have done. There are so many here, and their dinner so late and long, that I made up my mind to avoid it, though, if possible, without appearing singular. So, having remained in my room till breakfast time, we all breakfasted together, and soon after Mr. Phillips and myself took a walk out to the Mumbles Point, at the extremity of this side of the bay. There we sat down to admire the beautiful scenery around us, and, after we had viewed it long enough, returned slowly home. We stopped at a little village in our way, called Oystermouth, and dined at a small, neat, homely house about one o’clock. We then came back to Marino, and after a little while again went out—Mr. Phillips to a relation in the town, and myself for a walk on the sands and the edge of the bay. I took tea in a little cottage, and, returning home about seven o’clock, found them engaged at dinner, so came up to my own room, and shall not see them again to-night. I went down for a light just now, and heard them playing some sacred music in the drawing-room; they have all been to church to-day, and are what are called regular people.

The trial at Hereford is put off for the present, but yet we shall not be able to be in town before the end of this week. Though I long to see you, I do not know when it will be; but this I know, that I am getting daily more anxious about you. Mr. Phillips wrote home to Mrs. Phillips from here even before I did—i.e. last Wednesday. This morning he received a letter from Mrs. Phillips (who is very well) desiring him to ask me for a copy of one of my letters to you, that he may learn to write love-letters of sufficient length. He laughs at the scolding, and says that it does not hurt at a distance....

It seems to me so long since I left you that there must have been time for a great many things to have happened. I expect to see you with such joy when I come home that I shall hardly know what to do with myself. I hope you will be well and blooming, and animated and happy, when you see me. I do not know how we shall contrive to get away from here. We certainly shall not have concluded before Thursday evening, but I think we shall endeavour earnestly to leave this place on Friday night, in which case we shall get home late on Saturday night. If we cannot do that, as I should not like to be travelling all day on Sunday, we shall probably not leave until Sunday night; but I think the first plan will be adopted, and that you will not have time to answer this letter. I expect, nevertheless, an answer to my last letter—i.e. I expect that my dear wife will think of me again. Expect here means nothing more than I trust and have a full confidence that it will be so. My kind girl is so affectionate that she would not think a dozen letters too much for me if there were time to send them, which I am glad there is not.

Give my love to our mothers as earnestly as you would your own, and also to Charlotte or John, or any such one that you may have with you. I have not written to Paternoster Row yet, but I am going to write now, so that I may be permitted to finish this letter here. I do not feel quite sure, indeed, that the permission to leave off is not as necessary from my own heart as from yours.

With the utmost affection—with perhaps too much—I am, my dear wife, my Sarah, your devoted husband,

M. Faraday.

Faraday’s next scientific success was the liquefaction of chlorine (see Chapter III., p. 93). This discovery, which created much interest in the scientific world, was the occasion of a serious trouble with Sir Humphry Davy; for doubtless Davy was annoyed that he had left such a simple experiment to a mere assistant. Writing on the matter years after, Faraday said:—

When my paper was written, it was, according to a custom consequent upon our relative positions, submitted to Sir H. Davy (as were all my papers for the “Philosophical Transactions” up to a much later period), and he altered it as he thought fit. This practice was one of great kindness to me, for various grammatical mistakes and awkward expressions were from time to time thus removed, which might else have remained.

In point of fact, Davy on this occasion added a note (which was duly printed) saying precisely how far he had any share in suggesting the experiment, but in no wise traversing any of Faraday’s claims. Although he thus acted generously to the latter, there can be no question that he began to be seriously jealous of Faraday’s rising fame. The matter was the more serious because some who did not have a nice appreciation of the circumstances chose to rake up a charge which had been raised two years before against Faraday by some of Dr. Wollaston’s friends—in particular by Dr. Warburton—about the discovery of the electro-magnetic rotations, a charge which Faraday’s straightforward action and Wollaston’s frank satisfaction ought to have dissipated for ever. And all this was doubly aggravating because Faraday was now expecting to be proposed as a candidate for the Fellowship of the Royal Society, of which Sir Humphry was President.

PROPOSED FOR THE FELLOWSHIP.

At that time, as now, the proposal paper or “certificate” of a candidate for election must be presented, signed by a number of influential Fellows. Faraday’s friend Phillips took in hand the pleasant task of drawing up this certificate and of collecting the necessary signatures. The rule then was that the certificate so presented must be read out at ten successive meetings of the Society; after which a ballot took place. Faraday’s certificate bears twenty-nine names. The very first is that of Wollaston, and it is followed by those of Children, Babington, Sir John Herschel, Babbage, Phillips, Roget, and Sir James South.

On the 5th of May, 1823, Faraday wrote to Phillips:—

A thousand thanks to you for your kindness—I am delighted with the names—Mr. Brande had told me of it before I got your note and thought it impossible to be better. I suppose you will not be in Grosvenor Street this Evening, so I will put this in the post.

Our Best remembrances to Mrs. Phillips.

Yours Ever,

M. Faraday.

The certificate was read for the first time on May 1st. The absence of the names of Davy and Brande is accounted for by the one being President and the other Secretary. Bence Jones gives the following account of what followed:—

That Sir H. Davy actively opposed Faraday’s election is no less certain than it is sad.

Many years ago, Faraday gave a friend the following facts, which were written down immediately:—“Sir H. Davy told me I must take down my certificate. I replied that I had not put it up; that I could not take it down, as it was put up by my proposers. He then said I must get my proposers to take it down. I answered that I knew they would not do so. Then he said, I as President will take it down. I replied that I was sure Sir H. Davy would do what he thought was for the good of the Royal Society.”

Faraday also said that one of his proposers told him that Sir H. Davy had walked for an hour round the courtyard of Somerset House, arguing that Faraday ought not to be elected. This was probably about May 30.

Faraday also made the following notes on the circumstance of the charge made by Wollaston’s friends:—

1823. In relation to Davy’s opposition to my election at the Royal Society.

Sir H. Davy angry, May 30.

Phillips’ report through Mr. Children, June 5.

Mr. Warburton called first time, June 5 (evening).

I called on Dr. Wollaston, and he not in town, June 9.

I called on Dr. Wollaston, and saw him, June 14.

I called at Sir H. Davy’s, and he called on me, June 17.

On July 8 Dr. Warburton wrote that he was satisfied with Faraday’s explanation, and added that he would tell his friends that “my objections to you as a Fellow are and ought to be withdrawn, and that I now wish to forward your election.”

Bence Jones adds:—

On June 29, Sir H. Davy ends a note, “I am, dear Faraday, very sincerely your well wisher and friend.” So that outwardly the storm rapidly passed away; and when the ballot was taken, after the certificate had been read at ten meetings, there was only one black ball.

FELLOWSHIP AND MAGNANIMITY.

The election took place January 8, 1824.

Of this unfortunate misunderstanding,11 Davy’s biographer, Dr. Thorpe, writes:—

The jealousy thus manifested by Davy is one of the most pitiful facts in his history. It was a sign of that moral weakness which was at the bottom of much of his unpopularity, and which revealed itself in various ways as his physical strength decayed....

Faraday allowed himself in after days no shade of resentment against Davy; though he confessed rather sadly that after his election as F.R.S. his relations with his former master were never the same as before. If anyone recurred to the old scandal, he would fire with indignation. Dumas in his “Éloge Historique” has given the following anecdote:—

Faraday never forgot what he owed to Davy. Visiting him at the family lunch, twenty years after the death of the latter, he noticed evidently that I responded with some coolness to the praises which the recollection of Davy’s great discoveries had evoked from him. He made no comment. But, after the meal, he simply took me down to the library of the Royal Institution, and stopping before the portrait of Davy he said: “He was a great man, wasn’t he?” Then, turning round, he added, “It was here12 that he spoke to me for the first time.” I bowed. We went down to the laboratory. Faraday took out a note-book, opened it and pointed out with his finger the words written by Davy, at the very moment when by means of the battery he had just decomposed potash, and had seen the first globule of potassium ever isolated by the hand of man. Davy had traced with a feverish hand a circle which separates them from the rest of the page: the words, “Capital Experiment,” which he wrote below, cannot be read without emotion by any true chemist. I confessed myself conquered, and this time, without hesitating longer, I joined in the admiration of my good friend.

Dr. Thorpe in his life of Davy adds:—