Views, and Even Less Did He Attempt Novelty in the Method of Treatment

12 American Antiquarian Society. [April, REPOET OF THE COUNCIL. THERE is little for the Council to mention in the history of the Society during the last six months that is not containe^l in the reports of the Treasurer and the Librarian, which form a part of its report, excepting to present notices of deceased members, and offer the usual historical study. It may be well, however, to call attention to the fact that a new iron stack has been placed in the lower hall of the building of the Society, and to state that that is the rooni which the late Mr. Salisbury thought might sometime be occupied by a public library for the city of Worcester. It is an interesting commentary on the growth of that city, and on the increased importance of this institution, that the libraries of the two corporations have each of them 100,000 volumes, and that while the American Antiquarian Society will soon be pressed for. room in which to store its books and manuscripts, the Free Public Library has none too much room for carrying on its work in the extensivo and commodious pile of buildings put up for its acconnmoda- tion by the municipality which it serves. It is said that death loves a shining mark. Tbe first of our number to die after the last meeting was Hon. Eobert C. Winthrop. In the order of election he was our old- est member and had always been a warm friend of the Society. Most of the gentlemen present to-day recall the touching scene four years ago when Mr. Winthrop attended the semi-annual meeting of the Society in this place and, although suffering, as he said, from ' ' an avalanche of infirmities," reminded us forcibly of his eloquent utterances of earlier years, when he spoke of his pleasant experiences as a young man when he used to sit at the table of his 1895.] Report of the Council. 13 father, our second president, by the side of distinguished members of this Society, now deceased, who were bein"- entertained at dinner by their host on the occasions of the meetings in Boston. We thought 'then that Mr. W^inthrop had probably made his last appearance in public, but only a year ago he again quietly entered this room at our semi- annual meeting and remained here a few minutes to show his interest in our proceedings and his love for the Society. By Mr. Winthrop's death Rev. George E. Ellis, D.D. became our senior member, but he, too, soon passed away, and we miss to-day a member of the Society who was ahiiost always present at our nieetings, and who enlivened and dignified them by his presence. Dr. Ellis, as is well known, was a member of the Council. Somewhat later the Council lost another of its members by the death of Judge P. Emory Aldrich, one of the warm- est friends of the Society, and one of the most constant and useful attendants at its meetings. A pamphlet will soon be issued to record in permanent form the action of the Council on the death of these valued members. We have recently learned of the death of our foreign member, William Noel Sainsbury, of the Public Record Office, London, who sent to us an interesting paper which was read at our meeting two years ago. Mr. Sainsbury's aid in consulting the documents in the Public Record Office was highly appreciated by Sparks and Bancroft, by Deane and Salisbury and other members of this Society now deceased; and his loss is keenly felt by Hale, Winsor, Hoar and other living members who had learned to appre- ciate his readiness to assist in making researches and his fulness and delicate accuracy of knowledge. To the list of the dead must be added the names of another foreign member. Señor Joaquin Gju-cia Icazbalceta, of Mexico, and a domestic member, the highly respected George Olcott, of Charlestown, New Hampshire. 14 American Antiquarian Society. [April, An, obituary notice of Mr. Winthrop, by Charles C. Smith; of Judge Aldrich, by Frank P. Goulding ; of Señor Icazbalceta, and of George Olcott, by President Salisbury, follow this re'port, and also a fitting notice of tlie life and services of Mr.Sainsbury, contributed by Hubeit Hall, F. S. A., of Ijondon, England. ] Robert Charles Winthrop was born in Boston, May 12, 1809, and died in that city, November 16, 1894. He was descended from an honored ancestry, in every generation closely associated with the growth and progress of Massachusetts or Connecticut. The first who bore the name on this side of the Atlantic was John Winthrop, who brought over the colony charter in 1630, and first united in one person the hitherto distinet offices of Governor of the Massachusetts Company and Governor of the. colony estab- lished here. The eldest son of the Massachusetts Gd^- crnor, John Winthrop, Jr., was one of the first settlers iat Ipswich in this State, and for many years Governor ¡of Connecticut, to which colony he rendered services scarcely inferior to those which the father rendered to MassachuseUs. In the next generation, the eldest son of John Winthrop, Jr., Fitz-John Winthrop, a distinguished military ofiicçr, and for nine years Governor of Connecticut, died without male issue ; but the second son. Wait Winthrop, who passed most of his life in Massachusetts, where he was both a major-general and a judge, and held other important offices, left a son, the fourth John Winthrop, commonly known by his designation as a Fellow of the Royal Society. He was a man of ability and great tenacity of purpose, and many yeai's of his life were spent in England in the prose- cution of an appeal to the King in Council, which involved the interpretation of the charter of Connecticut procured by his grandfather.. His eldest surviving son, John Still Winthrop, who died in June, 1-776, at the age of fifty-six, lived some time in England, some time in Connecticut, a.nd 1895.] • Report of the Council. 15 some time in Massachusetts ; but he did not take any prominent part in public afiairs. John Still Winthrop's fifth son was Thomas Lindall Winthrop, Lieutenant-Governor of Massachusetts from 1826 to 1833, President of this Society from 1831 till his death in 1841, and also President of the Massachusetts Historical Society from 1835 to 1841. He married Elizabeth Temple, a granddaughter of James Bowdoin, an eminent statesman of the Revolutionary period and sometime Governor of Massachusetts. Bowdoin's public services were commemorated by his great-grandson, the subject of this notice, in an address at Bowdoin Col- lege, which was named for him. Robert Charles Winthrop was the youngest and for many years the sole surviving son of Thomas L. Winthrop. ° He entered the Boston Latin School, then under the charge of the late Benjamin A. Gould, in 1821. Among the other boys who entered the school in that year, and who best fulfilled their early promise, were Charles Sumner, James Freeman Clarke and William Henry Channing; but it is a noteworthy circumstance that neither of these three was Winthrop's classmate at Cambridge. Of (he two young men who shared with him the highest honors at Harvard College, Charles C. Emerson entered the Latin School in 1817, and George S. Hillard in 1822. Both at the Latin School, where he received.a Franklin modal, and at the University, where he acquired not less distinction, young Winthrop gave the promise which found realization in later years. When he graduated at Cambridge, in 1828, the subject of his oration was "Liberal Principles as affect- ing the Strength of Government." It was pronounced by competent judges the best of the Commencement parts. While in college he showed a marked fondness for music, which he ever afterward retained ; and he was a prominent performer in the college orchestra. In the rivalry for college honors between him and Hillard, Winthrop was more distinguished in the classics, and Hillard in mathematics. 16 " American Antiquarian Society. [April, After graduating, Mr. Winthrop was a law student for three years in the office of Daniel Webster; and in 1831, he was admitted to the bar. But apparently the law had few attractions for him, and at- the age of twenty-six he became a member of the Massachusetts Legislature, as one of the representatives from Boston. Here he soon arid easily won a conspicuous position; and in 1837, he was raised to the Speakership. This office he filled for thrpe years, with a grace and dignity which afterward made his Speakership at Washington one of the most brilliant in the annals of Congress, and which he elsewhere exhibited in later years on many occasions. j In 1840, he was elected as the Representative of Boston in the House of Representatives at Washington, and this position he continued, to hold for five successive ternas. In 1847, he was chosen Speaker;- but in 1849, he failed of a re-election, owing to the existence at that time of three parties in the House. The contest lasted for several weeks ; and it was only after the majority-rule had b^en suspended that the struggle was terminated by the electjon of his principal competitor, Howell Cobb, who had a plurality of two. In the debates in the House of Reijrc- sentatives, Mr. Winthrop took an active part; and in »his collected addresses and speeches are twenty speeches deliv- ered by him while a member of the House. It was while .Speaker that he gave the brilliant address on laying the corner-stone of the Washington Monument in 1848, to which his not less brilliant address on the completion of the monument in 1885, was the fitting complement.

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