ens," and on "Chimney Fireplaces." The Rumford medal was now presented to the Royal Society "for discoveries tending to improve the theories of fire, of heat, of light, and of colors, and to new inventions and contrivances by which the generation, and preservation, and management of heat and of light may be preserved." The endowment of the medal consisted of £1,000 stock, and was, I may add, presented on the first award, in 1802, to its founder. Meanwhile Rumford went to Ireland and fitted up laundries and model kitchens, cottage fireplaces, and model lime-kilns; served in Bavaria, preserving by his firmness and skill the neutrality of that country; and finally determined to return to America, but was deterred from carrying out this project by his anxiety to launch the Royal Institution. In the mind of Rumford the dominant idea was originally that of bettering the condition and increasing the comforts of the poor. A society was formed for this, purpose, and out of it sprang, from a proposal of Count Rumford, a scheme for forming a new "Establishment in London for diffusing the Knowledge of Useful Mechanical Improvements." The two great objects of the institution were declared to be, the diffusion of the knowledge aforesaid and the teaching of the application of scientific discoveries to the improvement of arts and manufactures in this country. To fulfill the first object were to be exhibited full-sized working models of fireplaces, kitchens, stoves, grates, boilers, coppers, etc., and smaller models of houses, bridges, spinning-wheels, and of all "such other machinery and useful instruments as the managers of the institution shall deem worthy of the public notice."
In order to carry into effect the second object of this institution—namely, "teaching the application of science to the useful purposes oil life"—a lecture-room was to be fitted up "for philosophical lectures and experiments, and a complete laboratory and philosophical apparatus, with the necessary instruments, will be provided for making chemical and other philosophical experiments." On the 7th of March, 1779, a meeting was held at the house of Sir Joseph Banks, at which the list of original fifty-four proprietors and subscribers of fifty guineas was read. In addition to the names of Rumford and Banks are found on this list those of Angerstein, Joseph Grote, the Duke of Devonshire, Earl Spencer, Earl Holland, Lord Palmerston, the Earl of Winchelsea, and William Wilberforce. By the end of June, 1801, the Royal Institution had received upward of £20,000 in subscriptions. The site of four houses had been purchased in Albemarle Street, professors of chemistry, physics, and mechanics, had been engaged, daily lectures were delivered, a spacious chemical laboratory had been erected, workshops for making models had been built, and skilled workmen engaged for making apparatus and models of various kinds. Early in this year Count Rumford wrote to his daughter that the Royal Institution was "not only the fashion but the rage," and mentions incidentally that "we have found a nice, able man for this place
