That the Trustees were satisfied with the performance of Panizzi’s duties there can be no doubt, and it will be interesting to record his earliest labours. His first report is dated May 4th, 1831, in which it is stated that he was engaged in transcribing a catalogue of duplicates to be submitted to the Royal Society for their selection. This duty was soon followed by cataloguing an extraordinary collection of tracts, illustrative of the history of the French Revolution, and formerly the property of Mr. Croker. That it was no easy task, and that it demanded special attention, may be gathered from a letter which the cataloguer addressed on the 18th of April, 1834, to Mr. Baber, then his superior officer:— “1st. As to the omission of the Christian name of the author, when his family name is given. 2nd. As to the great proportion of anonymous tracts. 3rd. As to the number of works without any author’s name or title whatever, or with so vague a title as to be of no use for the purpose of cataloguing the work.” He continues:— “Much time is spent in searching for names or for authors, and in glancing over tracts to see what is their subject, to catalogue them properly, after a most tedious search proves useless with respect to the first point, and no evidence remains of the trouble and loss of time which it causes. I cannot catalogue more than forty tracts each day.” As it is a matter of importance that Panizzi’s stormy connection with the Royal Society should be fairly and impartially added to these memoirs, and as we have now arrived at the period when, for the proper elucidation of the facts thereto belonging, the whole circumstances of the case should be thoroughly weighed and dwelt upon, it will be necessary to devote a few pages to a clear account of the proposal made by that Society, of the obstacles that were placed in Panizzi’s path, in his conscientious endeavours to fulfil the obligations imposed on him, and of the untiring zeal and patience he displayed in doing his duty in the matter, and in opposing the force with which it was attempted to crush the evidence of his superior talent, and to trample under foot even the Society’s own verbal agreements upon which, as coming from a body of men beyond suspicion, Panizzi relied. The whole of that opposition was successfully surmounted by his undoubted genius.