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718 DAVIS STRAIT formation of the " Young Ireland " party, to which the "Nation" was devoted, induced him to make his first attempts at poetical com- position in the columns of that paper; and during the rest of his life he continued to write for it, under the pseudonyme of "A Celt," a variety of lyrical and ballad pieces, which be- came widely popular. An edition of them appeared in New York in 1860. DAVIS STRAIT, an arm of the North Atlan- tic ocean, communicating with Baffin bay, and separating Greenland on the east from Cum- berland island on the west. It stretches north from Cape Farewell, about lat. 60 N., to Disco island, near lat. 70 N. Its narrowest part, where it is cut by the arctic circle, is 220 m. wide ; its greatest breadth is about 700 m. Its coasts are high, rocky, and broken by numer- ous bays and inlets, the largest of which are Northumberland inlet and Hudson strait ; they are almost barren, and scantily peopled by Esquimaux. Notwithstanding its dangerous currents and vast icebergs, it is a favorite re- sort for whalers and sealers. DAVOS, a valley of Switzerland, in the canton of Grisons, situated in the Rhaetian Alps, and stretching about 20 m. N. E. and S. W. be- tween wooded mountains, from the small lake of Davos to the valley of the Albula; pop. in 1870, 1,726. The chief place is Davos am Platz, which in the 15th century was the capi- tal of the confederation of the ten courts, and has of late become famous as a watering place for those afflicted with diseases of the chest. DAVOUST, or Daiont, Louis Nicolas, a French marshal, born at Annoux, in Burgundy, May 10, 1770, died in Paris, June 1, 1823. At 15 he was appointed second lieutenant of caval- ry. In 1792-'3 he served in the army com- manded by Dumouriez, and from 1794 to 1796 was a brigadier general in the armies on the Moselle and the Rhine, where Moreau intrusted him with important commands. He accom- panied Bonaparte to Egypt, and greatly con- tributed to the victory of Aboukir. After his return to France he was appointed general of division in 1800, chief commander of the con- sular guard in 1801, and marshal of the em- pire in 1804. He took a distinguished part in the victories of Ulm and Austerlitz; and on the same day that Napoleon defeated the Prus- sians at Jena (Oct. 14, 1806), he won over them the victory of Auerstadt, and was re- warded with the title of duke of Auerstadt. In 1809 he was made prince of Eckmtihl for his part in the battle of that name. After Wagram he was appointed military commander in Poland, which country he ruled with an iron hand. In the Russian campaign he de- feated Bagration at Mohilev, and was wound- ed at Borodino. After the disastrous retreat from Russia, he took up his headquarters at Hamburg, where he was soon besieged by the allied armies. He boldly opposed them, at the same time treating the inhabitants of the city with merciless rigor; and it was only in DAVY April, 1814, that he consented to deliver the place into the hands of Gen. Gerard, a com- missioner of Louis XVIII. Napoleon on his return from Elba appointed him minister of war. After the defeat at Waterloo he was placed in command of all the troops in and around the capital, -and was ready for the con- test when he received positive orders from the provisional government to negotiate with the allies ; and on July 3, 1815, he signed at St. Cloud the capitulation of Paris. A few days later he retired from active life. On the trial of Marshal Ney, he boldly declared that he would not have signed the capitulation of Paris if it had not, in his opinion, guaranteed the safety of all the military men then in that city. His firmness was not palatable to the Bourbons, and he was not fully reinstated in his position till 1818. His biography, by Che- nier, appeared in 1866. DAVY. I. Sir Humphry, an English chemist, born at Penzance, Cornwall, Dec. 17, 1778, died in Geneva, Switzerland, May 29, 1829. He was a healthy, active, and forward child, fond of sports and stories, of retentive memory, and of a remarkably affectionate disposition. Among his boyish tastes was that for fishing, which he never lost. After a somewhat des- ultory education, in which he acquired a good knowledge of Latin and Greek, and appears al- ways to have stood at the head of his class, he commenced the study of medicine in February, 1795, tinder Mr. Borlase, a surgeon and apothe- cary of Penzance. His attention was naturally turned to chemistry, which he took up with ardor toward the end of 1797, though only as accessory to his medical education. The read- ing of Lavoisier's "Elements of Chemistry' 7 first led him to the experimental study of the science. His apparatus was of the rudest kind, his materials such as are most commonly used in medicine, and his first experiments were very simple ; yet so rapid was his progress that in four months he had sent to Dr. Beddoes a new theory of heat and light, to which the lat- ter became a convert ; this was his first pub- lication, which appeared in 1799, in a vol- ume of essays by Dr. Beddoes. Mr. Gregory Watt, a son of the famous James Watt, came to reside at Penzance in the winter of 1797; and in his society, conversation, and sympathy Davy found the stimulus he needed for the de- velopment of his intellectual powers. He also became acquainted with Mr. Davies Gilbert, afterward his successor as president of the royal society of London. The mineralogical and geological structure of the surrounding country, abounding in tin and copper mines, the lithological character of the cliffs and head- lands, and the ever-changing air and sea of that tempestuous climate, invited him to in- vestigate the operation of natural causes ; and the undeveloped condition of chemical science was favorable to his rapid advance. His very first original experiments, at the age of 18, were to determine the kind of air which filled