In writing years after to Dr. Paris, he says: "My desire to escape from trade, which I thought vicious and selfish, and to enter into the service of science, which I imagined made its pursuers amiable and liberal, induced me at last to take the bold and simple step of writing to Sir Humphry Davy, expressing my wishes, and a hope that, if an opportunity came in his way, he should favor my views; and at the same time I sent the notes I had taken of his lectures." Davy called, not long after, on one of his friends, who was at the time honorary inspector of the models and apparatus at the Royal Institution, and with the letter before him asked: "Here is a letter from a young man named Faraday; he has been attending my lectures and wants me to give him employment at the Royal Institution. What can I do?" "Do?" replied the inspector; "put him to wash bottles. If he is good for anything, he will do it directly; if he refuses, he is good for nothing." "No, no," replied Davy, "we must try him with something better than that." Davy wrote a kind reply, and arranged for an interview with young Faraday. In this, however, he candidly advised him to stick to his business, telling him very plainly that "science was a harsh mistress, and, from a pecuniary point of view, but poorly rewarded those who devoted themselves to her service." He apparently put an end to all further consideration of the subject by promising Faraday the book-binding work of the Institution, and his own besides. Faraday was not satisfied to go back to the book-shop, even with all this kindly patronage, but there was nothing else for it, and so for a time he continued at his duties and spent his spare moments reading science and his evenings at scientific lectures, or in remaking the experiments he had seen and others suggested by them, and above all in rewriting the notes that he had taken. There is no livelier picture in all the history of science, of how a man will, in spite of all obstacles, get the things he cares for, if he really cares for them, than that of Faraday thus teaching himself science in the face of what seems almost insurmountable discouragement. Fortunately, not long after he had been thus forcibly called to the attention of Sir Humphry Davy, the former assistant in the laboratory of the Royal Institution not only neglected his duties, but became a source of considerable annoyance. His misfortune proved Faraday's opportunity. He was offered the post. The salary was only twenty-five shillings a week, but he accepted it very willingly. One might think that at last his scientific career was opened for him, but his new post was no sinecure. The labors required from him, indeed, were so manifold that it is somewhat surprising that he found any time for his own improvement. His duties as set forth in writing were: