Page:Passages from the Life of a Philosopher.djvu/203

Rh Sir H. Davy replied that he did, and then nominated Mr. Children. The President, as president, has no such right; and even if he had possessed it, he had promised Mr. Herschel that I should be his colleague. There were upright and eminent men on that council; yet no one of them had the moral courage to oppose the President's dictation, or afterwards to set it aside on the ground of its irregularity.

A few years after, whilst I was on a visit at Wimbledon Park, Dr. and Mrs. Somerville came down to spend the day. Dr. Somerville mentioned a very pleasant dinner he had had with the late Mr. John Murray of Albemarle Street, and also a conversation relating to my book "On the Decline of Science in England." Mr. Murray felt hurt at a remark I had made on himself (page 107) whilst criticizing a then unexplained job of Sir Humphry Davy's. Dr. Somerville assured Mr. Murray that he knew me intimately, and that if I were convinced that I had done him an injustice, nobody would be more ready to repair it. A few days after, Mr. Murray put into Dr. Somerville's hands papers explaining the whole of the transaction. These papers were now transferred to me. On examining them I found ample proof of what I had always suspected: The observation I had made which pained Mr. Murray fell to the ground as soon as the real facts were known, and I offered to retract it in any suitable manner. One plan I proposed was to print a supplemental page, and have it bound up with all the remaining copies of the "Decline of Science."

Mr. Murray was satisfied with my explanation, but did not wish me to take the course I proposed, at least, not at that time. Various objections may have presented themselves to his mind, but the affair was adjourned with the understanding that at some future time I should explain the real state of