‘Soon after my designs were made they were taken away by one of the managers (whose name I shall not mention at present) and put into the hands of Mr. Spiller, an architect, in order that he might make another set of designs, thereby giving him the advantage of my ideas. This was accordingly done. His lecture room was upon the second story and mine was upon the first. His was covered by a lofty dome highly enriched; my ceiling was flat. His estimate was 10,000_l._; mine was 5,000_l._ His would take two years to execute; mine was to be finished in six months. I shall pass over the unpleasant circumstances to which this affair gave rise, my resigning my situation in the Institution, being requested by the managers to retain it, &c., and shall only say both the sets of designs were submitted to the members of the Institution at their annual meeting, and _mine were_ adopted, and it was resolved that they should be executed under my superintendence. Mr. Spiller claimed and got, I believe, 150_l._ I received nothing as an architect, because I was an officer of the Institution at a very small salary, and Count Rumford had in the beginning caused a strange regulation to be made and _printed_ “that no one should ever be _rewarded_ by the Institution for any services which he might perform.”’ In another note he says: ‘In designing the lecture room of an institution so peculiar (unique indeed at that time) my object was to adapt it for different ranks in society, for any attempt to destroy all distinctions must be absurd. I constructed a gallery intended for those who either wished to be less observed, or who, for obvious reasons, would not like to sit down by their employers. It was also to receive such ingenious mechanics as had gained a title to be there. To this gallery a _separate stone staircase led from the street_. The whole of this _was built_.’[15] On January 15 Count Rumford wrote to Sir Joseph Banks from Broadlands: I certainly am in much better health than I was when I came here, which I attribute as much to my having left off taking medicines as to the salubrious air of the country. I think that I shall stay here about a fortnight longer, and shall then return to Brompton, and shall be at the disposal of the managers of the Institution for the remainder of the winter. I am very glad indeed that you like Webster. I am much deceived if he does not turn out to be a very useful acquisition. I hope Dr. Garnett will do well, but I must own that I am not as prepossessed in his favour as I am in favour of Webster.