The rooms given to him were 25 and 26, the two furthest on the attic floor. The sister of the librarian, Mr. Harris, occupied the smallest of these (26), and there were difficulties about any other arrangement, so that a few weeks afterwards the librarian asked permission to reside out of the house. In 1816 the managers decided that, in consideration of the additional labour caused to Michael Faraday by the lectures of Mr. Brande in the laboratory, his salary should be raised to 100_l._ per annum. The pecuniary difficulties of the Institution were increasing, and Sir Humphry Davy, Mr. Auriol, and Mr. Solly were appointed as a sub-committee to examine the expenditure. In 1817 the debts increased. In 1818 the bill for coals in 1816 was paid. Mr. Fuller, who ultimately founded the Fullerian Professorships, allowed one thousand pounds, which he had invested for the benefit of the Institution, to be used for the payment of debts. In the autumn Sir Thomas Bernard died. In 1819 Mr. Brande applied to the board, on the part of Mr. Faraday, for permission to occupy the two southernmost front rooms on the second floor. In 1820 an anniversary dinner was held on May 8 at Willis’s Rooms. The following year Mr. Faraday was given the use of two more rooms on the second floor, and appointed Superintendent of the House and Laboratory in the absence of Mr. Brande. In 1822 the treasurer had to advance 1,000_l._ to pay the bills, and in 1823 a loan of 4,000_l._ without interest was raised amongst the members. In 1824 Faraday first lectured at the Royal Institution, and was elected a Fellow of the Royal Society for his discoveries made in the laboratory. From 1815 the life of Faraday and the history of the Royal Institution became inseparable, and from 1824 it was kept alive by his unselfish devotion to its welfare. CHAPTER VI. LIFE OF DAVY. 1778 to 1829. The history of thirteen years of the life of Davy, like that of fifty of the life of Faraday, is closely interwoven with the history of the Royal Institution. Their lives were the life of the place; and hence, to complete the history of the Institution to the time of Faraday, a sketch of Davy and his scientific life must be given here. Humphry Davy was born on December 17, 1778, at Penzance. He was the son of a wood carver and was apprenticed to a surgeon. Mr. Davies Gilbert heard that the boy was fond of making chemical experiments. He encouraged him and spoke of him to Dr. Beddoes, Professor of Geology and Chemistry at Oxford, who happened to be at work upon the ‘Geology of Cornwall.’ Afterwards Dr. Beddoes established the Pneumatic Institution at Clifton, and he required an assistant to prepare the gases and superintend the Pneumatic Hospital, and Mr. Gilbert proposed Davy. He went on October 2, 1798, ‘to superintend experiments on the medical powers of factitious airs or gases.’ Davy thus wrote to Mr. Davies Gilbert: November 12, 1798.