Although not altogether unsuccessful at the Institution, Garnett--in spite of “the Northern accent which he still retained in a slight degree, and which rendered his voice somewhat inharmonious to a London audience”--was hardly the type of man required for such a place, and differences soon arose between him and Rumford. To add to his difficulties he had, just prior to his removal from Glasgow, lost his wife, and the event seems to have wholly unnerved him. He grew listless and melancholy; and eventually, in 1801, he was called upon to resign. After leaving the Institution, he struggled on for a time, giving courses of scientific lectures in his own house, and at Tom’s Coffee-House in the City, and seeking for practice as a physician. Sick in mind and weak in body, he soon broke down, and died in 1802, at the age of thirty-six, leaving his children penniless. The Managers so far bettered the condition of the poor as to subscribe, on behalf of the Institution, £50 towards the publication of his posthumous work on the “Laws of Animal Life,” and to allow the book to be dedicated to them. The accompanying illustration (p. 70), from a drawing by Gillray, entitled “Pneumatic Experiments at the Royal Institution,” shows the theatre during a lecture by Garnett, with Davy acting as assistant. Sir John Hippesley is represented as breathing the “pleasure-giving air.” The standing figure near the door is Rumford, and among the audience are Isaac Disraeli, Lord Stanhope, Earl Pomfret, and Sir H. Englefield. Accounts differ as to the precise means by which Davy was brought to the notice of Count Rumford, nor is it very important to know whether it was through the intervention of Davies Gilbert, or Dr. Hope, or Mr. Underwood, or, as was most probably the case, of all three. In a letter to Hope now before me Davy writes:-- “I believe it is in a great measure owing to your kind mention of me to Count Rumford, that I occupy my present situation in the Royal Institution. I ought to be very thankful to you; for most of my wishes through life are accomplished, as I am enabled to pursue my favourite study, and at the same time to be of some little utility to Society.” [Illustration: PNEUMATIC EXPERIMENT AT THE ROYAL INSTITUTION. (_After Gillray._)]