I shall here weave into my narrative some extracts from several letters, with which Mr. Purkis, one of the earliest friends of Davy, has lately favoured me. "On his first appointment at the Royal Institution, I was specially introduced to him by a common friend, Thomas Poole, Esq. of Nether Stowey in Somersetshire; and I continued in habits of friendship with him during a great portion of his life, though somewhat less intimately during the last few years. I loved him living--I lament his early death: I shall ever honour his memory. "The sensation created by his first course of Lectures at the Institution, and the enthusiastic admiration which they obtained, is at this period scarcely to be imagined. Men of the first rank and talent,--the literary and the scientific, the practical and the theoretical, blue-stockings, and women of fashion, the old and the young, all crowded--eagerly crowded the lecture-room. His youth, his simplicity, his natural eloquence, his chemical knowledge, his happy illustrations and well-conducted experiments, excited universal attention and unbounded applause. Compliments, invitations, and presents, were showered upon him in abundance from all quarters; his society was courted by all, and all appeared proud of his acquaintance. "One instance of attention is particularly recalled to my memory. A talented lady, since well known in the literary world, addressed him anonymously in a poem of considerable length, replete with delicate panegyric and genuine feeling. It displayed much originality, learning, and taste: the language was elegant, the versification harmonious, the sentiments just, and the imagery highly poetical. It was accompanied with a handsome ornamental appendage for the watch, which he was requested to wear when he delivered his next lecture, as a token of having received the poem, and pardoned the freedom of the writer. It was long before the fair authoress was known to him, but they afterwards became well acquainted with each other."