The talented and indefatigable editors of the 'Bibliotheca Cornubiensis' have observed that, since the formation of the Royal Society, fifty-eight persons, either born in Cornwall or long resident within its borders, have become, through their eminence in mineralogical and other pursuits, Fellows of that body. A full list of their names is printed in the index to Messrs. Boase and Courtney's work; and in it they rightly say that Cornishmen may be pardoned for believing that no such record of distinction in scientific knowledge could be drawn up from any English county of corresponding size and population. I will only add my opinion that, amongst the foremost in that bright roll of honour, stands forth the name of HUMPHRY DAVY. [Illustration: (end of chapter vignette.)] FOOTNOTES: [101] He was one of five children, two of whom were boys and three girls. [102] The Scilly Isles. [103] Presented to the Royal Society by Lady Davy, after her husband's decease. This picture had a narrow escape from being lost; it was, however, discovered by Mr. Davies Gilbert in the garret of a man named Newton, who was to have engraved it, and was rescued at the cost of £10, paid to the landlady, who was unable to get her rent from her impecunious lodger. There are other portraits of him by Lonsdale, as P.R.S.; by Howard (when Davy was twenty-three); by Jackson (when he was forty-five); a bust; and the statue erected in December, 1878 (after the portrait by Sir Thomas Lawrence, in front of the Market-house, Penzance, near Davy's old house in Market Jew Street, (now rebuilt,) and about half-way between it and the Star Inn.) He also appears in the print of the Woburn Sheep-shearing, published by Garrard in 1811. [104] More than enough has been made by Davy's critics of his admiration for the aristocracy; but 'it is not true' (as George Eliot observed) 'that a man's intellectual power is, like the strength of a timber beam, to be measured by its weakest point.' [105] The house was in the corner which formed the north angle of the square. [106] Just as another Cornishman--Richard Trevithick--was the first who applied steam to agriculture. [107] Becker tells us how the ladies so admired his handsome eyes that they vowed they were 'made for something besides poring over crucibles.' [108] Amongst the former of whom may be mentioned De Quincey, Godwin, and Coleridge, who used frequently to meet at the miserable rooms of the latter, then at the office of the _Courier_ newspaper, in the Strand. [109] It was on one of these occasions that Davy, when out shooting partridges one day at Rokeby, persuaded Roderick Murchison to come up to town, and '_set to_ at science.' [110] On 20th October, 1818, he was made a Baronet. [111] By his will Davy provided that, in certain contingencies, this service should be melted down in order to provide a fund for the reward of original, meritorious discoveries in Science, either 'in Europe or Anglo-America.'