Part 18

The winter was passed in town, but the state of his health prevented any great exertion, and did not permit his seeing much society; yet the world can scarcely be said to have been the loser; for in his retirement he composed (being now nearly fifty years of age), that delightful book, dear to every angler, 'Salmonia.'[117] Returning spring revived his desire to revisit what he considered the finest scenery in the world, namely, the Alpine valleys of Illyria and Styria; and at the end of March he left England, accompanied by a young medical gentleman (his godson), Mr. Tobin, the son of a much-valued old friend. His pursuits were much as usual, and, living somewhat more generously, he more than once entertained some faint hopes of his ultimate recovery; 'attaching,' as he himself put it, 'a loose fringe, of hope to his tattered garments.' His mind was fully active during this summer, as may be judged from his having now planned his well-known work, 'Consolations of Travel,' which he used to say 'contained the essence of his philosophical opinions;' and from his having sketched out a slight plan for his own memoirs. Stress of weather detained him a short time at Wurzen, and here he occupied the time of his detention by writing his little Irish romance, 'The Last of the O'Donoghues.' He also now sent to press the second edition of his 'Salmonia,' which he thought 'twice as good, as well as twice as big' as the first. At Trieste he resumed his experiments on the electric eel, and at length satisfied himself that under no conditions did the shock affect the magnet. This formed the subject of a paper--the last of a series which continued almost uninterruptedly for a period of twenty-eight years--published by the Royal Society. It was about this time that he made the noble and touching entry in his diary:

'Si moro, spero che ho fatto il mio dovere; e che mia vita non e stato vano ed inutile.'[118]

The curtain rises on the last act, at Rome, where he passed the winter. Here--where he describes himself, in a letter dated 6th February, 1829, to his friend Poole, as 'a ruin among ruins'--he received, a fortnight after that date, his last and fatal shock of paralysis. It was quite unexpected by him, and he was barely able to write one or two hurried letters to his brother, begging him to come quickly. He now quite made up his mind that he was about to die; but his mind continued calm and clear, and he urged Dr. Davy, when he at length arrived, not to give way to any vain regrets, but to regard the matter philosophically. Even in this extremity, the consideration of the strange powers of the torpedo exercised a fascinating influence over him; and he directed experiments and dissections of the fish from the bed upon which he not only believed himself to be dying, but upon which he thought, more than once, that he had actually died. Only with great difficulty was he persuaded by his wife and surrounding friends that he had not as yet passed the dark portals of the grave.

It will hardly be believed that from such a state as this he rallied. Yet such was the case! Lady Davy had brought with her from England an early copy of the second edition of his 'Salmonia;' and he read it with avidity. Indeed reading--or rather being read to--was now almost his only pursuit. Moore's 'Epicurean,' Shakespeare, 'The Arabian Nights,' and 'Humphrey Clinker,' by turns engaged his attention; and at length he not only thought recovery possible, but by April was actually able to take drives about Rome and its neighbourhood, entering fully, with his companions, into all the enjoyment of the charms of a brilliant Italian spring.

At length, leaving Rome, 'by slow and easy stages,' they came to Geneva, which place they reached on the 28th May, by the Mont Cenis route. Here the little party took up their residence at La Couronne hotel, which overlooks the lake; and Davy expressed an earnest desire once more to throw a fly on it. He was very deeply affected on hearing of the death of his old friend Dr. Thomas Young; but dined heartily with the others at five o'clock. After dinner he was heard joking with the waiter as to the cooking of the fish, and desiring that he might be furnished with a specimen of every variety which the lake contained; and, after being read to as usual, he went to bed at nine. In rising, however, from his chair at the dinner table, for this purpose, he gave his elbow a rather violent blow, the sensations resulting from which frightened him very much, and probably accelerated his decease. At half-past two in the morning the servant aroused Dr. Davy with the information that his illustrious brother was much worse. The doctor flew to the chamber, but only in time to see Sir Humphry expire, just as the morning of the 29th of May, 1829, began to dawn.

His will was proved under £30,000, and Lady Davy was appointed sole executrix. Paris says that he left £100 to the Penzance Grammar School, the interest to be devoted to a prize for the best scholar, provided the school kept holiday on the anniversary of his birthday; but I do not find this in the will. I believe that the interest on the money is still paid, but that the holiday is omitted.

A public funeral was decreed him by the authorities and literati of Geneva, including his friends Decandolle and Sismondi, who highly appreciated him; and his mortal remains were deposited in the cemetery at Plain-Palais, close to those of Professor Pictet.[119] It was Davy's wish, as expressed in his will, to be buried wherever he might die: 'Natura curat suas reliquias,' he wrote; and on his monument will be found the reason of this lofty reliance--namely, because he was

'Summus arcanorum Naturæ indigator.'[120]

Thus died, without issue, and within a few months of his great friends Wollaston and Young, Sir Humphry Davy, poet and philosopher, before he had completed his fifty-first year--a man (to use the words of Dr. Paris) 'whose splendid discoveries illumined the age in which he lived, adorned the country which gave him birth, and obtained from foreign and hostile nations the homage of admiration and the meed of gratitude.'

His genius it would be presumptuous in me to endeavour to analyze or describe. I have attempted a biographical sketch rather than an essay on Davy's proper place in the ranks of science;[121] but he was undoubtedly one of the master-spirits of his age; and I gladly select, from among many other similar accounts, the peroration of the _éloge_ pronounced upon him by Baron Cuvier before the Institute of France:

'Ainsi a fini à cinquante ans, sur une terre étrangère, un génie dont le nom brillera avec éclat parmi cette foule s'éclatante de noms dont s'enarguillit la Grande Bretagne. Mais, que dis je, pour un tel homme aucune terre n'est étrangère; Genève surtout ne pouvait pas l'être, où, depuis vingt ans, il comptait des amis intimes, des admirateurs sans cesse occupés de répandre ses decouvertes sur le Continent; aussi, le deuil n'eût pas été plus grand ni les obsèques plus honorables pour un de leur concitoyens les plus respectés.'

The talented and indefatigable editors of the 'Bibliotheca Cornubiensis' have observed that, since the formation of the Royal Society, fifty-eight persons, either born in Cornwall or long resident within its borders, have become, through their eminence in mineralogical and other pursuits, Fellows of that body. A full list of their names is printed in the index to Messrs. Boase and Courtney's work; and in it they rightly say that Cornishmen may be pardoned for believing that no such record of distinction in scientific knowledge could be drawn up from any English county of corresponding size and population. I will only add my opinion that, amongst the foremost in that bright roll of honour, stands forth the name of HUMPHRY DAVY.

FOOTNOTES:

[101] He was one of five children, two of whom were boys and three girls.

[102] The Scilly Isles.

[103] Presented to the Royal Society by Lady Davy, after her husband's decease. This picture had a narrow escape from being lost; it was, however, discovered by Mr. Davies Gilbert in the garret of a man named Newton, who was to have engraved it, and was rescued at the cost of £10, paid to the landlady, who was unable to get her rent from her impecunious lodger. There are other portraits of him by Lonsdale, as P.R.S.; by Howard (when Davy was twenty-three); by Jackson (when he was forty-five); a bust; and the statue erected in December, 1878 (after the portrait by Sir Thomas Lawrence, in front of the Market-house, Penzance, near Davy's old house in Market Jew Street, (now rebuilt,) and about half-way between it and the Star Inn.) He also appears in the print of the Woburn Sheep-shearing, published by Garrard in 1811.

[104] More than enough has been made by Davy's critics of his admiration for the aristocracy; but 'it is not true' (as George Eliot observed) 'that a man's intellectual power is, like the strength of a timber beam, to be measured by its weakest point.'

[105] The house was in the corner which formed the north angle of the square.

[106] Just as another Cornishman--Richard Trevithick--was the first who applied steam to agriculture.

[107] Becker tells us how the ladies so admired his handsome eyes that they vowed they were 'made for something besides poring over crucibles.'

[108] Amongst the former of whom may be mentioned De Quincey, Godwin, and Coleridge, who used frequently to meet at the miserable rooms of the latter, then at the office of the _Courier_ newspaper, in the Strand.

[109] It was on one of these occasions that Davy, when out shooting partridges one day at Rokeby, persuaded Roderick Murchison to come up to town, and '_set to_ at science.'

[110] On 20th October, 1818, he was made a Baronet.

[111] By his will Davy provided that, in certain contingencies, this service should be melted down in order to provide a fund for the reward of original, meritorious discoveries in Science, either 'in Europe or Anglo-America.'

[112] Byron's lines in the first canto of 'Don Juan' will doubtless recur to many of my readers:

'This is the patent age of new inventions For killing bodies and for saving souls, All propagated with the best intentions; Sir Humphry Davy's lantern by which coals Are safely mined for in the mode he mentions.'

Jackson's account of Timbuctoo; the narrative of Robert Adams, a sailor; Dr. Leyden's 'Discoveries in Africa,' and other works, are then hinted at; and the poet goes on, sardonically, to say that _all these_

'Are ways to benefit mankind, as true Perhaps, as shooting them at Waterloo.'

[113] Whilst at Naples he made the acquaintance of one of the guides up Vesuvius, whom Davy commissioned to inform him from time to time of the state of the volcano; the man used occasionally to communicate with him, and the letters reached Sir Humphry, notwithstanding their phonetic address:

'Siromfredevi, 'Londra.'

[114] As a rule he is said to have been careless about his costume; it was with the greatest difficulty that he was persuaded to don a quasi-court dress in order to be presented to the Empress Josephine, and his negligent appearance and manners often surprised his Continental acquaintances. About one thing, however, he was rather particular; and that was to wear a wide-brimmed hat whenever he could.

[115] The Davy medal of the Royal Society was, in 1882, presented, in duplicate, to D. Mendelejeff and Lothar Meyer for their discovery of the periodic relations of the atomic weights.

[116] He would often go two or three hundred miles for a day's fishing, and has more than once patiently fished all day long without a rise; he was, however, generally a successful as well as an enthusiastic fisherman, but seems to have been thought somewhat clumsy in his manipulation.

[117] The first edition was genially reviewed by Sir Walter Scott in the _Quarterly Review_, xxxviii. 503. Sir Walter used to say of Davy, in allusion to his well-known preference for his _old_ associates and acquaintances, that 'he never forgot a friend.'

[118] It should, perhaps, be remarked here that Davy was an excellent linguist.

[119] The centenary of his birth was celebrated at Penzance in February, 1879.

[120] There is also a tablet to his memory in the north transept of Westminster Abbey.

[121] Dr. Paris, F.R.S., has appended to his 'Life of Davy' an historical sketch of the revolutions in chemical science produced by his discoveries, and also a list of his chief works, which may conveniently be consulted by those who desire more detailed information as to Davy's scientific triumphs.

_ADMIRAL VISCOUNT EXMOUTH._

_ADMIRAL VISCOUNT EXMOUTH._

'Hearts of oak! our captain cried-- When each gun From its adamantine lips Spread a death-shade round the ships, Like the hurricane eclipse Of the sun.'

CAMPBELL.

The life of this gallant sailor and good man was told so admirably in 1835, by my late valued friend, Edward Osler, F.L.S.--for many years editor of the _Royal Cornwall Gazette_, and himself one of our Cornish Athenæ--that his memoir must necessarily form the backbone of any account of Lord Exmouth's career. To Mr. Osier's well-known work I would therefore refer those who desire a more detailed account than space allows me to give to the subject of this chapter. I should, however, add that I have been fortunate enough to gather some facts to which even Mr. Osier does not refer in his elaborate memoir.

Lord Exmouth's career was both eventful and distinguished; but, notwithstanding its brilliancy, his chief glory was his unswerving devotion to his country, irrespective of all party feeling (and he was a strong Tory)--his generosity in recognising to the fullest extent the merits of his subordinates--his combined strictness and kindness to his men--and his constant recognition of the Divine Hand in all his victories. No vessel under the orders of Pellew was ever taken by the enemy.

Like many another Cornish worthy, Edward Pellew was a man of comparatively small beginnings. Originally, it is said, of Norman extraction, the Pellews were an old-established West Cornwall family, whose tombs may still be found at Breage. Humphry Pellew, his grandfather, an American merchant, the builder of part of the little town of Flushing in Falmouth harbour, took for his wife, in 1692, Judith Sparnon of Sparnon and Pengelly in Breage, by whom he had six children; but the children of Samuel, the youngest son (who was only eight years old when his father died in 1721), were at length the only male survivors of the family. This Samuel Pellew, Lord Exmouth's father, a man of determined character, commanded a post-office packet on the Dover station. He married in 1752 Constance, daughter of Edward Langford, Esq., of a Herefordshire family, settled at or near Penzance--a woman, Mr. Osier says, 'of extraordinary spirit,' and fitted, as indeed her husband also was, to be a parent of heroes.

In 1765 Samuel Pellew died, leaving a widow and six children; of whom Edward, the second, was born at Dover, 19th April, 1757. In 1765 he removed with his mother to Penzance; and here, when quite a child, gave an early instance of his love of the 'pomp and circumstance of glorious war,' by walking all the way from Penzance to Helston, in order to follow a troop of soldiers; and of his indomitable courage, when somewhat older, by removing from a burning house a quantity of gunpowder which had been stored there. He frequently played truant from school in order to get into a boat at the quay; and was a great favourite with the loafers there, who taught him to box. Bottrell says that Mrs. Pellew and her family lived in a thatched cottage 'near the Alverton entrance to Fox's gardens;' the house still stands, on the left-hand side of the road as the traveller leaves Penzance for the Land's End.

The Truro Grammar School, where the Rev. R. Polwhele was one of his schoolfellows, as appears from his 'Reminiscences,'[122] was the next scene of his combative energy; and here he thrashed so many of his schoolfellows, that, in order to escape a still severer thrashing with which the head-master (then Mr. Conon) threatened him, he ran away, and--against his grandfather's consent, but luckily for English glory, and for his own fame--went to sea. Whilst at Truro, hastening through the courtyard of the Red Lion Hotel to assist in putting out a fire, Pellew found the high back gate shut; but he sprang over it, and I remember the spot being pointed out to me in evidence of his strength and agility. His freaks on the water in after-life were of the most daring kind, and he often set the example on board ship, when no sailor could be found bold and active enough to perform some dangerous act of seamanship.

In the year 1770, being then about thirteen or fourteen years of age, Edward Pellew entered the Navy in the _Juno_, and went his first voyage to the Falkland Islands. Thence, under the same captain (Stott), he sailed in the _Alarm_ to the Mediterranean, where, at Marseilles--a place which he was destined afterwards to save from destruction by its own inhabitants--he left the ship, in consequence of a gross and uncalled-for insult inflicted by the Captain on one of Pellew's brother midshipmen, named Cole.

He next joined the _Blonde_, under Captain Pownoll--who had been trained in the school of another Cornish naval hero, Admiral Boscawen--and with whom he soon became a prime favourite. It was on board the _Blonde_ that he so alarmed and amused General Burgoyne, by standing on his head on the yard-arm when the General came on board to make his ill-starred expedition to America; and from the fore-yard of the same ship Pellew sprang to rescue a man who had fallen overboard. His magnificent physique and perfect courage enabled him to perform similar services on more than one occasion.

A smart engagement with a superior American force on Lake Champlain was his next exploit, in which, though unsuccessful, he found another opportunity of showing his coolness and bravery; and his services on this occasion gained him his lieutenant's commission. Shortly afterwards he very nearly captured, single-handed, the American Commander-in-Chief Arnold. The stock and buckle, which General Arnold left behind him in his flight, were long (and perhaps still are) preserved by the Pellew family.

Joining Burgoyne's unlucky army, and sharing in all the dangers and hardships which it underwent, Pellew, though only twenty years old, was summoned to the council of war at Saratoga, at which (against his own advice) it was resolved, in October, 1777, to capitulate to an American force of double the strength of the English. On his way home to England, in a transport, he fought an American privateer, and beat her off with his usual pluck and skill.

On receiving his commission to a guard-ship, he threatened to throw it up rather than remain at so inactive a post; and it was not until he declared his intention to command a privateer that he obtained his appointment to the _Licorne_, in which he sailed for Newfoundland in the spring of 1779. He returned, however, to England in the following winter, and joined the _Apollo_, under his old friend--his 'only one on earth,' as he said--Captain Pownoll, taking part in an engagement with the French frigate _Stanislaus_, on which occasion the Captain left to Pellew the honour of completing her capture.

The old sloop _Hazard_, of which he was promoted to be commander, was his next ship, and the East Coast of Scotland his station in the summer of 1780. Then followed the _Pelican_, a French prize, whilst commanding which he drove ashore some French privateers near the Isle of Bass, an exploit for which he was made a post-captain on board the _Suffolk_:--thus obtaining every step in his profession as a reward for some successful action. When it is added that, whilst in temporary command of the _Artois_, he captured on 1st July, 1782, the French frigate _Prince of Robego_, we may conclude this part of his career by observing that this was his last service before the Peace, which left him without any employment in His Majesty's service for four years.

The year 1783 saw him a denizen of Truro,[123] and married to Susan, daughter of J. Frowde, Esq., of Knowle, in Wiltshire. Doubtless, in his wooing, he told her--

'Of all the wonders of the mighty deep, Tales that would make a maiden love to weep, Of perils manifold and strange, and storms, Battle, and wreck, and thousand feller forms, Which Death, careering on the terrible sea, Puts on to prove the true knight's constancy.'

It was probably about this time, also, that he became, according to Polwhele, a member of the Truro Corporation. He soon, however, removed to Flushing, near Falmouth, a curious little village, which had for Pellew, as we have seen, family associations, and where his elder brother, Samuel Humphry, formerly a surgeon of Marines, was collector of the Customs.

In 1786 we find him on board the _Winchelsea_, and once more on the Newfoundland station, into every harbour of which he squeezed his ship with the utmost intrepidity, often exhibiting remarkable feats of personal strength and activity.

The _Winchelsea_ was paid off in 1789, and till 1791 Captain Pellew served in the _Salisbury_, of 50 guns, again on the Newfoundland station; and this time with his younger brother, Israel, as first lieutenant. He afterwards became Admiral Sir Israel Pellew, K.C.B.--an officer whose distinguished career was scarcely less illustrious than that of his more celebrated brother. He was born at Flushing in 1761, and died at Plymouth in 1832. His ship, the _Amphion_, of 32 guns, blew up in the Hamoaze, Plymouth, on 22nd September, 1796, and only her commander and a few others escaped with their lives.

Once again the distasteful 'piping times of peace' came round; and Pellew, for want of something to do, turned farmer. His experiments in this capacity were made on the little family estate of Treverry, near Falmouth; but they were a failure; and the declaration of war against France, in February, 1793, promised him a most agreeable relief after his enforced idleness. He was appointed to the _Nymphe_ (formerly a French frigate) of 36 guns; and, to Cornishmen at least, his connexion with this ship--manned as she was for the most part by Cornish miners, eighty of whom joined her at Spithead--is one of the most interesting parts of his career. On the evening of 19th June, 1793, the _Nymphe_ came up with the French frigate _Cleopatra_,[124] of 40 guns, and after a furious cannonade of three-quarters of an hour, the Cornish crew, most of whom had certainly smelt powder before (underground), though none had ever before heard a cannon fired, had the proud delight of seeing the enemy's pennant hauled down, and of capturing the first frigate in the war,--thus illustrating Drayton's lines in his 'Barons' Warres':

'For courage no whit second to the best, The Cornishmen, most active, bold, and light.'