the gas, repeated in various ways, his earnest and impressive manner exciting in the minds of his auditors the liveliest interest both in the inventor and his invention. [Illustration: LITERARY AND PHILOSOPHICAL INSTITUTE, NEWCASTLE.] Shortly after, Sir H. Davy's model lamp was received and exhibited to the coal-miners at Newcastle, on which occasion the observation was made by several gentlemen, "Why, it is the same as Stephenson's!" Notwithstanding Stephenson's claim to be regarded as the first inventor of the Tube Safety-lamp, his merits do not seem to have been generally recognized. Sir Humphry Davy carried off the larger share of the _éclat_ which attached to the discovery. What chance had the unknown workman of Killingworth with so distinguished a competitor? The one was as yet but a colliery engine-wright, scarce raised above the manual-labor class, without chemical knowledge or literary culture, pursuing his experiments in obscurity, with a view only to usefulness; the other was the scientific prodigy of his day, the pet of the Royal Society, the favorite of princes, the most brilliant of lecturers, and the most popular of philosophers. No small indignation was expressed by the friends of Sir Humphry Davy at Stephenson's "presumption" in laying claim to the invention of the Safety-lamp. The scientific class united to ignore him entirely in the matter. In 1831, Dr. Paris, in his "Life of Sir Humphry Davy," thus wrote: "It will hereafter be scarcely believed that an invention so eminently scientific, and which could never have been derived but from the sterling treasury of science, should have been claimed on behalf of an engine-wright of Killingworth, of the name of Stephenson--a person not even possessing a knowledge of the elements of chemistry." But Stephenson was really far above claiming for himself an invention not his own. He had already accomplished a far greater thing even than the making of a safety-lamp: he had constructed a successful locomotive, which was to be seen in daily work on the Killingworth Railway. By the improvements he had made in the engine, he might almost be said to have _invented_ it; yet no one--not even the philosophers--detected as yet the significance of that wonderful machine. It excited no scientific interest, called forth no leading articles in the newspapers or the reviews, and formed the subject of no eloquent lectures at the Royal Society; for railways were as yet comparatively unknown, and the might which slumbered in the locomotive was scarcely, as yet, even dreamed of. What railways were to become rested in a great measure with that "engine-wright of Killingworth, of the name of Stephenson," though he was scarcely known as yet beyond the bounds of his own district.