Governor LONG, for the Committee to nominate Officers for the ensuing year made a report, upon which a ballot was taken. The officers are as follows:

President.

CHARLES FRANCIS ADAMS.

Vice-Presidents.

SAMUEL ABBOTT GREEN.

JAMES FORD RHODES.

Recording Secretary.

EDWARD STANWOOD.

Corresponding Secretary.

HENRY WILLIAMSON HAYNES.

Treasurer.

ARTHUR LORD.

Librarian.

SAMUEL ABBOTT GREEN.

Cabinet-Keeper.

GRENVILLE HOWLAND NORCROSS.

Editor.

WORTHINGTON CHAUNCEY FORD.

Members-at-Large of the Council.

WALDO LINCOLN.

WILLIAM R. LIVERMORE.

FREDERIC WINTHROP.

MOORFIELD STOREY.

ROBERT S. RANTOUL.

The PRESIDENT then called upon Mr. STOREY, who read the following:

By the death of Francis Cabot Lowell, Massachusetts has lost a citizen of unusual distinction. Sprung from a family which has long been conspicuous for eminent public service rendered in many fields and has been distinguished alike in the pulpit, on the bench, in the army, in education, in literature, in politics and in business, he felt the inspiration of its traditions, and in his turn did his full duty to the State. He was active in such varied ways that his death leaves not one but many vacancies, each hard to fill, and in the record of his life there is no page which we would wish to erase.

He was born on January 7, 1855, and died on March 6, 1911, in the fifty-seventh year of his age. Educated in private schools, he went to Harvard College, entering the Sophomore class in 1873. He carried with him a natural refinement, increased by his education, which gave him a place of his own among his classmates. He had no sympathy with the rougher side of college life, no appreciation of what men found delightful in its coarser amusements, but his frank and straightforward manliness were thoroughly appreciated, and he commanded universal respect and warm regard.

He graduated in 1876 with honors in history and after a year spent in European travel entered the Law School, where he remained two years. After a year in an office he became the private secretary of Horace Gray, then the Chief Justice of Massachusetts, and this experience gave him a glimpse of judicial life which may well have fostered in him an ambition for the bench. When he resigned this place he began the practice of the law in partnership with his cousin, now the President of Harvard College, and his classmate Frederic J. Stimson.

As a member of this firm he was employed in very important matters, but not such as attracted public attention, and while he showed himself a sound lawyer and was held in high esteem by his clients, he did not during his years of practice acquire a conspicuous position at the Bar. He presented a question of law to the Court clearly and well, and was a wise adviser, but he had no taste for the work of a jury lawyer, though had he been

drawn into this branch of professional labor he would undoubtedly have won the respect and confidence of jurymen, as he did of all men with whom he was brought in contact.

He took a strong interest in politics, and in 1889 was elected a member of the City Council. Six years later he was chosen to the Massachusetts House of Representatives, where he served for three years and won the position of a leader. Had he continued to follow this career he would unquestionably have been called to high office, but his appointment to the bench of the United States District Court terminated his political activity. In the Council and in the Legislature he enjoyed an ascendancy derived from his character, his transparent honesty, his public spirit and his singleness of purpose. He respected his colleagues, and in return they respected him, and if in some cases his confidence in the rectitude of his associates was greater than they deserved, the reason is to be found in the remark of one that no man would have dared to approach Lowell with any dishonest suggestion. He radiated an atmosphere which protected him against baseness. Men showed him their best side, and he lived therefore in a purer air than most of us breathe, so largely does every man create his own world.

He early entered the service of Harvard College, as an Overseer from 1886 to 1895, and as a Fellow of the Corporation from 1895 until his death. He was an active member of both boards, and did his Alma Mater good service in both. As an Overseer he joined in a report which, if adopted, would have done much to end the abuses of college athletics, and perhaps might have helped to rekindle the love of learning in breasts where it is now almost extinct. As a Fellow he was ever useful in the councils of the Board and always an influence for good. It seemed to his friends as his strength waned that he gave too much to other than his judicial labors, but his devotion to the college forbade him to spare himself and he was untiring to the end.

He was interested in historical research, and his monograph on Joan of Arc was a careful and a novel discussion of her career and her condemnation. In the year 1896 he delivered an oration before the Historical Society of Beverly and he wrote various articles for magazines. As a member of this Society he prepared the memoir of Francis A. Walker and paid a tribute to

Governor Wolcott, but his duties as a judge left him little time to indulge his taste for literary labor.

He was appointed United States District Judge for the District of Massachusetts by President McKinley in 1898, and was made Circuit Judge for the First Circuit in 1905, an office which he held until his death. It was on the bench that he won his greatest distinction. He brought to the discharge of its duties a high moral sense, a love of justice, an adequate knowledge of law, a courtesy which never failed, a great capacity for work and untiring devotion to duty. He was the New England conscience in its highest embodiment without the manner which like the burr of the chestnut sometimes needlessly wounds him who encounters it.

He was not a great lawyer, and perhaps had no controlling native aptitude for the profession which he chose, but he was a model judge. He presided at a trial with courtesy and firmness in due proportion, and was able to prevent the constant bickering between counsel which too often wastes time, tries tempers and interferes with the administration of justice. Every man's rights were scrupulously protected by him, and his presence on the bench, as elsewhere, purified the atmosphere of the court room. His promotion to the Circuit Bench in 1905 was well deserved, and every succeeding year made him a more valuable magistrate. His published opinions number more than three hundred, and with four or five exceptions his judgments were sustained by the Court of Appeals. He dealt with questions of great variety and his contributions to the law were important and enduring. His untimely death at the maturity of his powers is a calamity deplored alike by his associates on the Bench, by all members of the Bar who ever practised before him and by the community which trusted and leaned upon him.

A gentleman in the best sense of the word, brave, frank, pure and courteous, an able judge, a public-spirited and most useful citizen, a supporter of all that is good in our State and a foe of all that is evil, his great power lay in his character, which every man recognized and could not help respecting. He drew out what was good in men and repressed what was bad wherever he was, and no man in our time has proved more completely the truth of Charles Sumner's words "Remember, young man, that character is everything."

Mr. WEEDEN read a paper upon

WILLIAM CODDINGTON.

William Coddington was one of the remarkable men of New England in the mid-seventeenth century. Born in Boston, England, he landed at Salem in 1630, being one of the original Assistants or Magistrates under the charter of Massachusetts Bay. Before the settlement of Boston was named, he built the first brick dwelling-house there, and afterward was elected treasurer of the corporation. He might have become a powerful citizen under Winthrop, had he not been involved in the Hutchinson controversy, as we shall perceive.

December 14, 1634, a committee was sent out across Neponset to "assign lands for William Coddington and Edmund Quincy to have for their particular farms there." A portion of these lands in Quincy or Braintree was afterward known as the "Coddington School Lands." The tradition ran that the tract was a gift from Coddington. In a careful study published in the Quincy Patriot, September 12, 1891, Mr. Charles Francis Adams exploded this legend, showing that the title was obtained by purchase.

In 1636 Pastor Wilson in the words of Winthrop delivered a "very sad speech" arraigning Mrs. Hutchinson and arousing public opinion against her heresies, as he considered them. Vane and Cotton opposed him, and Coddington was of their party. Boston was at first in favor of Anne's doctrines, and chose for representatives from the freemen to the General Court, in 1637, Vane and Hough with Coddington. The Court attempted to reject them on a technical pretence, but the freemen insisted at a new election and compelled the Court to receive them. Points of etiquette as well as of doctrine convulsed the sensitive community. Vane was wont to occupy a seat of honor with the magistrates at service on the Sabbath, but he now went with Coddington to sit with the deacons, much to Winthrop's annoyance.

Coddington, Aspinwall and Coggeshall were sent from Boston to the new Court, which had a meeting November 2. Coddington was an honored official, classed in the public estimation with Winthrop and Endecott as one of the founders of