I have no wish to detail now a thousand circumstances curious enough in a historical point of view connected with my residence in the house of the Royal Institution; suffice it to say that, notwithstanding I became much known and had many friends, yet my chief views being evidently thwarted, and there being no prospect of my situation becoming valuable in a pecuniary way, I thought it was high time to think of my own interest, and I determined on becoming a landscape painter, a profession which then offered considerable prospects in a very agreeable and independent occupation. Count Rumford left England about the same time, certainly neither rewarded nor thanked in proportion to the good he had done. The management of the Institution now fell into other hands, and, from what appeared to me very erroneous reasoning, my mechanics’ stone staircase was pulled down at a considerable expense. All the culinary and other contrivances which the Count and I had taken so much trouble to fit up in the kitchen as an exhibition--and many of them were really good things--were put away. The workmen employed in the house to make models were discharged, there being no one to direct them. The lecture room had been warmed by steam and satisfactorily. When the boiler was worn out (as things will in time) the whole steam apparatus was taken away by the ironmonger then employed, and something of his own was put up, which for years was an annoyance to Mr. Faraday, who did not even know that steam had ever been employed till I informed him. In short, it might seem as if the then managers had resolved that the Institution should _not_ be for the application of science to the common purposes of life. On April 26 Mr. Webster was allowed leave of absence for the benefit of his health until December 1, and he was given 50_l._ on account of his salary. This was his retirement from the Institution. In 1826 he was appointed house secretary of the Geological Society, and Curator of the Museum. He died in 1844, Professor of Geology in the (then) London University. At the meeting of managers and visitors on the same day Count Rumford made a report on the present state of the Institution. This was the last meeting of the managers that he ever attended. He said: ‘I shall briefly state what has been accomplished since my last report on May 25, 1801, and what still remains to be done to complete this great and interesting establishment in all its details.’ He spoke of the new lecture room as holding nine hundred persons; ‘a whisper may be distinctly heard from one extremity to the other, and no echo is ever perceived in it on any occasion.’