In this year, having improved, he went through France, Italy, and Switzerland, hunting and fishing as in his boyhood, and writing "Salmonia, or Days of Fly Fishing," giving descriptions of his journey and his observations on natural history.
In the spring of 1828, he made another journey, to Southern Austria, spending the winter in Italy, and writing his "Consolation in Travel," which Cuvier called the work of a dying Plato. "I was desirous," he says, "of again passing some time in these scenes, in the hope of reëstablishing a broken constitution; and though this hope was a feeble one, yet, at least, I expected to spend a few of the last days of life more tranquilly and more agreeably than in the metropolis of my own country. Nature never deceives us. The rocks, the mountains, the streams, always speak the same language. A shower of snow may hide the verdant woods in spring; a thunder storm may render the blue limpid streams foul and turbulent: but these effects are rare and transient; in a few hours, or at least days, all the sources of beauty are renovated; and Nature affords no continued trains of misfortunes and miseries, such as depend upon the constitution of humanity,—no hopes forever blighted in the bud,—no beings full of life, beauty, and promise, taken from us in the prime of youth. Her fruits are all balmy, bright, and sweet; she affords none of those blighted ones so common in the life of man, and so like the fabled apples of the Dead Sea,—fresh and beautiful to the sight, but, when tasted, full of bitterness and ashes."
From Rome he writes to a friend, a year later, in the spring of 1829: "I am here wearing away the winter,—a ruin amongst ruins!... I fight against sickness and fate, believing I have still duties to perform, and that even my illness is connected in some way with my being made useful to my fellow-creatures. I have this conviction full on my mind, that intellectual beings spring from the same breath of infinite intelligence, and return to it again, but by different courses. Like rivers born amidst the clouds of heaven, and lost in the deep and eternal ocean,—some in youth, rapid and short-lived torrents; some in manhood, powerful and copious rivers; and some in age, by a winding and slow course, half lost in their career, and making their exit by many sandy and shallow mouths."
Davy was destined to go back to the Infinite Intelligence in manhood, "a powerful and copious river," however much he "fought against sickness and fate."
On February 23, 1829, he dictated a letter to his brother John: "I am dying from a severe attack of palsy, which has seized the whole body, with the exception of the intellectual organ." He added in his own hand, just legible, "Come as quickly as possible."
When the brother arrived, and was overcome with grief, Sir Humphrey received him with a cheerful smile, and bade him not to grieve, but consider the event like a philosopher. He talked more earnestly than ever, and his mind seemed all aglow as with the brilliancy of a setting sun.
At one time he was so near death, that he said "he had gone through the whole process of dying, and that when he awoke he had difficulty in convincing himself that he was in his earthly existence." Reviving somewhat, they journeyed from Italy to Geneva, by slow and easy travel, arriving May 28, 1829. In the night, at half-past two, Sir Humphrey was taken very ill, and died almost immediately.
He was buried June 1, in the cemetery outside the walls of the city, having requested to be interred where he died, without any display. The grave is marked by a simple monument erected by his wife. She also founded a prize in his honor, to be given every two years, for the most original and important discovery in chemical science. Only fifty, and his work finished,—no not finished,—for his books and his discoveries, his character, with its earnest perseverance, its tenderness, its sympathy, its noble aspirations, and its helpfulness to mankind, will live forever!