One outcome of Davy’s association with the matter may be seen in his paper, published by the Royal Society in 1805, on “An Account of some analytical Experiments on a mineral Production from Devonshire, consisting principally of Alumine and Water.” The mineral referred to was discovered by Dr. Wavel in an argillaceous slate near Barnstaple, and hence was termed _wavellite_. Davy failed to recognise its true nature, which was first correctly ascertained by Berzelius. A few weeks later, he sent to the Royal Society a second paper “On a Method of Analyzing Stones containing fixed Alkali, by Means of the Boracic Acid.” The method, however, is of comparatively limited application, and is seldom, if ever, now used in analysis. Determinative chemistry was never one of Davy’s strong points, and few of his analytical processes are now employed. Patient manipulation, and minute and sustained attention to detail, were altogether foreign to his disposition and habits, although he had the highest appreciation of these qualities in men like Cavendish and Wollaston. The lectures on agriculture however, were a great success, and brought increased fame and no small profit to the lecturer. His association with the Board of Agriculture developed into a permanent appointment; for ten successive years he continued to lecture on the subject before its members, and in 1813 he put together the results of his labours in his well-known “Elements of Agricultural Chemistry.” In simplicity and absence of ornament the style of these lectures is in marked contrast to that which he usually employed at the Royal Institution. Dealing with men to whom the matter was of paramount importance, he had no need to stimulate their interest by the arts he employed in the theatre in Albemarle Street. The very nature of the subject, perhaps, served to remind him that tropes and metaphors were here as much out of place as “the brilliant wild flowers in the field of corn--very pretty, but which did very much hurt the corn.” It would be impossible in the space at our disposal to attempt to give a minute analysis of Davy’s work in connection with agriculture. Its interest now is, for the most part, historical; what is of permanent importance in the way of fact has long since been woven into the common web of knowledge. Its greatest value was not in the novelty or the abundance of its facts, but rather as a closely-reasoned exposition of the relation of agriculture to science, and of the necessity for applying the principles and methods of science to the art. The philosophic breadth of his views, supported, on occasion, by apt example and striking analogy, might be illustrated by many extracts. This, for example, is how he speaks of the value of the scientific method, and of chemistry, to husbandry:--