. Humphry Davy, poet and philosopher . ewhich lies behind the Corinthian facade in AlbemarleStreet. But to the chemist this spot is what the Kaba atMecca is to the follower of Mohammed, or what Iona wasto Dr. Johnson : and, if we may venture to adapt thelanguage 0f the English moralist, that student has littleto be envied whose enthusiasm would not grow warmeror whose devotion would not gain force within the placemade sacred by the genius and labours of Davy andEaradav. And yet, were these great men to revisit the scene oftheir triumphs, they would hardly recognise it, so com-pletely altered i
. Humphry Davy, poet and philosopher . ewhich lies behind the Corinthian facade in AlbemarleStreet. But to the chemist this spot is what the Kaba atMecca is to the follower of Mohammed, or what Iona wasto Dr. Johnson : and, if we may venture to adapt thelanguage 0f the English moralist, that student has littleto be envied whose enthusiasm would not grow warmeror whose devotion would not gain force within the placemade sacred by the genius and labours of Davy andEaradav. And yet, were these great men to revisit the scene oftheir triumphs, they would hardly recognise it, so com-pletely altered is it by adaptations and rearrangementsrendered necessary by their discoveries. How it appearedin their own time may be seen from the illustration onpage 91, taken from a water-colour drawing by MissHarriet Moore, in the possession of the Managers of theRoyal Institution. The first year of the century is memorable for theinvention of the voltaic pile, and for the discovery, byNicholson and Carlisle, on April 30th, 1800, of the electro-. 02 HUMPHRY DAVY, lytic decomposition of water. As Davy said, the voltaicbattery was an alarm-bell to experimenters in every partof Europe ; and it served no less for demonstrating newproperties in electricity, and for establishing the laws ofthis science, than as an instrument of discovery in otherbranches of knowledge ; exhibiting relations between sub-jects before apparently without connection, and servingas a bond of unity between chemical and physicalphilosophy. The capital discovery of Volta was madeknown in England at the earliest possible moment throughthe mediation of Sir Joseph Banks, and the study ofvoltaic electricity, its effects and applications, wasimmediately afterwards entered upon by many Englishmen of science with great zeal and ardour. Davy at thistime had just completed his work on Nitrous Oxide ; and,powerfully impressed with the significance of Nicholsonand Carlisles observation, he at once turned his attentionto the subject
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