There are many more of the most eminent men in England from whom I have received kindness, and with whom, even as a young man, I had some interesting intercourse. But I become more and more doubtful whether I can trust my memory, and whether, in writing down my recollections, I am doing my friends full justice. When I gave my first lectures at the Royal Institution (in 1861), I came into frequent contact with Faraday. He was then what I thought an old man, and though it was quite beyond my power to estimate his greatness, he was one of those men who at once gave one the impression that they are really great. There was dignity and composure in his conversation, and at the same time a kindly welcome in his dark bright eyes which made one feel at home with him from the very first meeting. Though the subject I had to lecture on was quite new to him, he took the liveliest interest in my lectures. I told him how disappointed his assistant had been—I believe his name was Anderson or Robertson—when he offered me his services for my lectures, and I had to tell him that I wanted nothing, no gas, no light, no magnets, that there would be no experiments, not even diagrams to pull up and down. “O yes,” said Faraday, “I know how he tells his friends that he does all the hard work at my lectures, all the experiments, but that he lets me do the talking.” He seemed much amused when I told him that I had had just the same experience, and that one of my compositors was fully convinced that he was really responsible for my books, and told his fellow-compositors that I could not have brought out a single book without him. Faraday sat patiently through most, if not all of my lectures, and it was a pleasure to look at his face beaming with intelligence. When I lectured for the first time on the Science of Language, I had in the beginning to clear the ground of many prejudices, and amongst the rest, to dispose of what was then almost an article of faith—namely, that all the languages of the world were derived from Hebrew. I gave a whole lecture to this question, and when it was over, an imposing old lady came up to shake hands with me and to thank me for the beautiful lecture I had delivered. “How delightful it is to know,” she continued, “that Adam and Eve spoke Hebrew in Paradise, and that all the other languages of the world, English not excepted, have come out of Hebrew and out of Paradise.” I really felt very much humiliated, and when Faraday came up I told him what had happened. “Oh, you must not be discouraged,” he said, “I hardly ever lecture on chemistry without an old dowager coming up to me with an incredulous smile and saying: ‘Now, Mr. Faraday, you don’t really mean to say that the water I drink is nothing but what you call oxygen and hydrogen?’ Go on,” he said, “something will always stick.”