"Davy clings to the belief that will turn out to be a compound substance, and with what pertinacity he importunes it to give up its components. At times he thinks he is on the verge of proof. "I hope on Thursday,” he wrote to his friend Children, "to show you nitrogen as a complete wreck, torn to pieces in different ways." But still nitrogen, with that passive immutability which is characteristic of it, in spite of every form of torture, remained whole and indissoluble. On this point he wrote in the Laboratory Journal under date February 15th:—"Were a description... to be given of all the experiments I have made, of all the difficulties I have encountered, of the doubts that have occurred, and the hypotheses formed ——." But the sentence was not finished. The attack was renewed and continued throughout the whole of the spring and summer, until, fairly baffled, Davy confessed himself beaten, and turned his attention to other matters."