"Done at the National Institute, Messidor 11, year 10.
"(Signed) Laplace, Halle, Coulomb,
Hauy. Biot, Reporter."
It was not until twelve months after the publication of his first Bakerian Lecture, that Davy received the intelligence that the prize of three thousand francs had been awarded him by the Institute of France, for his discoveries announced in the Philosophical Transactions for the year 1807.
Mr. Poole, in a late communication, informs me that he was in London soon after the letter communicating this gratifying intelligence had been received from France; and that Davy, upon showing it to him, observed, "Some people say I ought not to accept this prize; and there have been foolish paragraphs in the papers to that effect; but if the two countries or governments are at war, the men of science are not. That would, indeed, be a civil war of the worst description: we should rather, through the instrumentality of men of science, soften the asperities of national hostility."
After Davy had been elected Secretary to the Royal Society, he appears to have been confined to town during the autumn of 1807, when he wrote the following letter.
TO THOMAS POOLE, ESQ.
August 28th, 1807.
MY DEAR POOLE,
I am obliged to be in the neighbourhood of town during the greater part of the summer, for the purpose of correcting the press for the Philosophical Transactions.
I made a rapid journey into Cornwall for the sake of seeing my family; and it was not in my power, had I received your letter at Lyme, to have accepted your kind invitation.