Editing Humphry Davy (section)

==== Education ====
At the age of six, Davy was sent to the [[grammar school]] at Penzance. Three years later, his family moved to [[Varfell]], near [[Ludgvan]], and subsequently, in term-time, Davy boarded with John Tonkin, his godfather and later his guardian.<ref name="ODNB"/> Upon Davy's leaving grammar school in 1793, Tonkin paid for him to attend [[Truro Grammar School]] to finish his education under the Rev Dr Cardew, who, in a letter to the engineer and [[Fellow of the Royal Society]] [[Davies Giddy]] (from 1817 called [[Davies Gilbert]]), said dryly, "I could not discern the faculties by which he was afterwards so much distinguished." Davy entertained his school friends by writing poetry, composing Valentines, and telling stories from ''[[One Thousand and One Nights]]''. Reflecting on his school days in a letter to his mother, Davy wrote, "Learning naturally is a true pleasure; how unfortunate then it is that in most schools it is made a pain."<ref>{{cite book |last = Knight |first = David |author-link = David M. Knight |title = Humphry Davy: Science and Power |location = Cambridge |publisher = Cambridge University Press |year = 1992 |isbn = 978-0-631-16816-4 |url = https://archive.org/details/isbn_9780631168164 }}</ref> "I consider it fortunate", he continued, "I was left much to myself as a child, and put upon no particular plan of study ... What I am I made myself."<ref name=DNB>{{cite DNB |last=Hunt |first=Robert |author-link=Robert Hunt (scientist) |wstitle=Davy, Humphry |year=1888}}</ref> His brother said Davy possessed a "native vigour" and "the genuine quality of genius, or of that power of intellect which exalts its possessor above the crowd."<ref name="Davy 1836"/>