[124] Sir Humphry Davy has told us an anecdote which well illustrates this observation, while it affords a gratifying testimony of the kind feeling he entertained towards a kindred philosopher.--"There was--alas! that I must say _there was!_--an illustrious philosopher, who was nearly of the age of fifty before he made angling a pursuit, yet he became a distinguished fly-fisher, and the amusement occupied many of his leisure hours, during the last twelve years of his life. He indeed applied his preeminent acuteness, his science, and his philosophy, to aid the resources and exalt the pleasures of this amusement. I remember to have seen Dr. Wollaston, a few days after he had become a fly-fisher, carrying at his button-hole a piece of Indian rubber, when by passing his silkworm link through a fissure in the middle, he rendered it straight, and fit for immediate use. Many other anglers will remember other ingenious devices of my admirable and ever-to-be-lamented friend."--_Salmonia. Additional Note_, Edit. 2. he alike relied for success upon his subtile discrimination of minute circumstances. By comparing the writings as well as the discoveries of these two great philosophers, we shall readily perceive the intellectual distinctions I have endeavoured to establish. "From their fruits shall ye know them." The discoveries of Davy were the results of extensive views and new analogies; those of Wollaston were derived from a more exact examination of minute and, to ordinary observers, scarcely appreciable differences. This is happily illustrated by a comparison of the means by which each discovered new metals. The alkaline bases were the products of a comprehensive investigation, which had developed a new order of principles; the detection of palladium and rhodium among the ores of platinum, was the reward of delicate manipulation, and microscopic scrutiny. As chemical operators, I have already pointed out their striking peculiarities, and they will be found to be in strict keeping with the other features of their respective characters. I might extend the parallel farther; but Dr. Henry, in the eleventh edition of his "System of Chemistry," has delineated the intellectual portraits of these two philosophers with so masterly a hand, that by quoting the passage, all farther observation will be rendered unnecessary.