SCIENCE AND CELEBRITY HUMPHRY DAVY'S RISING STAR

摘要

The Juns air was stifling. But in The Royal Society's steeply raked amphitheater London's fashionable men and women, scientists and laymen, crowded the benches and gallery to watch Humphry Davy, the celebrity chemist, present his latest scientific findings. The previous year at the Royal Society's prestigious Bakerian Prize lecture, Davy had tossea a nugget of metallic potassium into o flask of water, where the lump skittered oround the surface of the water be-' fore exploding in lavender flames. Expectations for the June lecture were high. The crowd leaned in, anticipating another colorful, if not explosive, performance, With his lively demonstration of electrolysis using a sizable voltaic pile, Davy did not disappoini.