BIOGRAPHICAL NOTICE OF ALBERT HENRY SMYTH. 



By JOSEPH G. ROSENGARTEN. 



(Read May 17, 1907.) 



Albert Henry Smyth was elected a member of the American 

 Philosophical Society on May 20, 1887. He has been continuously 

 active and useful in it. At the request of the President this brief 

 statement of Professor Smyth's life and work is presented in ac- 

 cordance with our custom. 



He was born in Philadelphia on June 18, 1863, and was educated 

 at the George G. Meade Public School, graduated in the June '82 

 class of the Philadelphia High School, was the valedictorian, and 

 encouraged by the then President Dr. Riche and Professor Taylor, 

 later President, went to Johns Hopkins University, Baltimore, where 

 he received a Master of Arts degree " causa honoris," in 1886, — it 

 was his thesis for his M.A. degree, " Shakespeare's Pericles and 

 Apollonius of Tyre," that rewritten and with large additions, he 

 read before this Society. It is printed in our Proceedings, and 

 earned praise for its research on a recondite subject. 



His services to this Society were constant and valuable, — he 

 was one of its curators, a member of the Library Committee, repre- 

 sented it at the University of Glasgow on its forty-fifth anniversary, 

 and at the dedication in Paris of the Statue of Franklin, the gift 

 of John H. Harjes, a former resident of this city, — on that occasion 

 too by the appointment of the President of the L^nited States, he 

 was the representative of this country, and his address received the 

 well deserved praise of all his auditors and readers, among them 

 many of the foremost representatives of French eloquence and 

 learning. His addresses at the annual celebration of this Society 

 were always noteworthy, and his last appearance at the general 

 meeting in April of this year, shortly before his untimely death, was 

 warmly welcomed. 



His printed works include a sketch of " American Literature," 



i 



