Here I come naturally to answer the questions that may be put by some that have not followed the history and the work of the Royal Society of Canada,--What measure of success has it won? has it been of value to the Canadian people in whose interests it was established, and with whose money it is mainly supported? Twelve years have nearly passed away since a few gentlemen, engaged in literary, scientific and educational pursuits, assembled at McGill College on the invitation of the Marquess of Lorne, then governor-general of Canada, to consider the practicability of establishing a society which would bring together both the French and English Canadian elements of our population for purposes of common study and the discussion of such subjects as might be profitable to the Dominion, and at the same time develop the literature of learning and science as far as practicable.[56] This society was to have a Dominion character--to form a union of leading representatives of all those engaged in literature and science in the several provinces, with the principle of federation observed in so far as it asked every society of note in every section to send delegates to make reports on the work of the year within its particular sphere. Of the gentlemen who assembled at this interesting meeting beneath the roof of the learned principal of Montreal's well-known university, the majority still continue active friends of the society they aided Lord Lome to found; but I must also add with deep regret that, within a little more than a year, two of the most distinguished promoters of the society, Dr. Thomas Sterry Hunt and Sir Daniel Wilson, have been called from their active and successful labours in education, science and letters. As I know perhaps better than any one else, on account of an official connection with the society from the very hour it was suggested by Lord Lorne, no two members ever comprehended more thoroughly the useful purpose which it could serve amid the all-surrounding materialism of this country, or laboured more conscientiously until the very hour of their death by their writings and their influence to make the society a Canadian institution, broad in its scope, liberal in its culture, and elevated in its aspirations. Without dwelling on the qualifications of two men[57] whose names are imperishably connected with the work of their lifetime--archæology, education and chemistry--I may go on to say that the result of the Montreal meeting was the establishment of a society which met for the first time at Ottawa in the May of 1882, with a membership of eighty Fellows under the presidency of Dr. (afterwards Sir) William Dawson, and the vice-presidency of the Honourable P. J. O. Chauveau, a distinguished French Canadian who had won a high name, not only in literature, but also in the political world where he was for years a conspicuous figure; noted for his eloquence, his culture and his courtesy of manner. The society was established in no