Faraday As A Discoverer [3]
that I had got hold of an anchor in chemical knowledge, and clung fast to it. Thence my deep veneration for Mrs. Marcet--first as one who had conferred great personal good and pleasure on me; and then as one able to convey the truth and principle of those boundless fields of knowledge which concern natural things to the young, untaught, and inquiring mind. 'You may imagine my delight when I came to know Mrs. Marcet personally; how often I cast my thoughts backward, delighting to connect the past and the present; how often, when sending a paper to her as a thank-offering, I thought of my first instructress, and such like thoughts will remain with me. 'I have some such thoughts even as regards your own father; who was, I may say, the first who personally at Geneva, and afterwards by correspondence, encouraged, and by that sustained me.' Twelve or thirteen years ago Mr. Faraday and myself quitted the Institution one evening together, to pay a visit to our friend Grove in Baker Street. He took my arm at the door, and, pressing it to his side in his warm genial way, said, 'Come, Tyndall, I will now show you something that will interest you.' We walked northwards, passed the house of Mr. Babbage, which drew forth a reference to the famous evening parties once assembled there. We reached Blandford Street, and after a little looking about he paused before a stationer's shop, and then went in. On entering the shop, his usual animation seemed doubled; he looked rapidly at everything it contained. To the left on entering was a door, through which he looked down into a little room, with a window in front facing Blandford Street. Drawing me towards him, he said eagerly, 'Look there, Tyndall, that was my working-place. I bound books in that little nook.' A respectable-looking woman stood behind the counter: his conversation with me was too low to be heard by her, and he now turned to the counter to buy some cards as an excuse for our being there. He asked the woman her name--her predecessor's name-- his predecessor's name. 'That won't do,' he said, with good-humoured impatience; 'who was his predecessor?' 'Mr. Riebau,' she replied, and immediately added, as if suddenly recollecting herself, 'He, sir, was the master of Sir Charles Faraday.' 'Nonsense!' he responded, 'there is no such person.' Great was her delight when I told her the name of her visitor; but she assured me that as soon as she saw him running about the shop, she felt-though she did not know why--that it must be 'Sir Charles Faraday.' Faraday did, as you know, accompany Davy to Rome: he was re-engaged by the managers of the Royal Institution on May 15, 1815. Here he made rapid progress in chemistry, and after a time was entrusted with easy analyses by Davy. In those days the Royal Institution published 'The Quarterly Journal of Science,' the precursor of our own 'Proceedings.' Faraday's first contribution to science appeared in that journal in 1816. It was an analysis of some caustic lime from Tuscany, which had been sent to Davy by the Duchess of Montrose. Between this period and 1818 various notes and short papers were published by Faraday. In 1818 he experimented upon 'Sounding Flames.' Professor Auguste De la Rive had investigated those sounding flames, and had applied to them an explanation which completely accounted for a class of sounds discovered by himself, but did not account for those known to his predecessors. By a few simple and conclusive experiments, Faraday proved the explanation insufficient. It is an epoch in the life of a young man when he finds himself correcting a person of eminence, and in Faraday's case, where its effect was to develop a modest self-trust, such an event could not fail to act profitably. From time to time between 1818 and 1820 Faraday published scientific notes and notices of minor weight. At this time he was acquiring, not producing; working hard for his master and storing and strengthening his own mind. He assisted Mr. Brande in his lectures, and so quietly, skilfully, and modestly was his work done, that Mr. Brande's