The public criticism to which the College was subjected was not altogether without a salutary effect on its policy. It must be remembered that it was the first attempt of the kind to bring the higher training, and something of the spirit of collegiate life, directly within the reach of the middle-class youth of a great business community, and it was necessary to have some regard to the conditions of the district and its special requirements and, it may be added, even its peculiar prejudices. Roscoe’s antecedents, his associations with Lancashire, and his knowledge of and sympathy with what is strongest and best in the Lancashire character, made him quick to realize the factors upon which the ultimate success of the institution depended. It was no use for it to set itself athwart the economical conditions of the community. Young as he was—he was then twenty-four—he was perhaps more alive to the practical necessities of the position than the majority of his colleagues. He quickly revealed himself as the man of the hour. His accession to the College at this crisis was the turning-point in its career. He brought new vigour and a fresh spirit into its policy, and from that time forward its fortunes began steadily to mend. As regards his own department, it was his ambition to establish at Owens College a school of chemistry which should worthily serve the interests of the great manufacturing district of South Lancashire—the largest and most important seat of chemical industry in the kingdom. Associated with him in this effort, he had as assistants Frederick Guthrie, who, on his appointment to the chair of Chemistry at the Royal College in Mauritius, was succeeded by Dittmar, and afterwards by Schorlemmer—all men of originality and admirable teachers. Schorlemmer spent the greater part of his life in Manchester, and died in the service of the College, latterly as Professor of Organic Chemistry—the first to be so designated in the kingdom. His connection with the institution is commemorated by the association of his name with one of the chemical laboratories of the Victoria University. His co-operation with Roscoe in the production of the well-known treatise which bears their joint names will be referred to later.