PROCEEDINGS FOR 1903 • IX 



of Victoria and Canada. In both countries he emphasized the economic 

 side of the science of geology and did much to encourage those under 

 him to study and solve the complex problems of geological structure 

 ■which presented themselves to him in his official labours. 



In 1877 the council of the Geological Society of London, award- 

 ed him the Murchison medal for his eminent services in the field of 

 geology, and, in 1884, he received the Clarke gold meda,l from the 

 Eoyal Society of New South Wales. In 1886 he was created a Com- 

 panion of the Order of St. Michael and St. George. 



Since Dr. Selwyn's retirement in December, 1894, he resided in 

 British Columbia. 



The name of Dr. Douglas Brymner will ever be associated with 

 the Bureau of Canadian Archives which he organized and, for nearly a 

 third of a century, administered to the satisfaction of the Government 

 and the public. Before he assumed the duties of archi\ist in 1872, he 

 had been an able and successful Journalist. His best work in that 

 capacity was done in collaboration with the late Honourable Edward 

 Goff Penny, senator, in the columns of the Montreal Herald. As edi- 

 tor of the Presbyterian, Dr. Brymner championed, during a critical 

 period of its history, the cause of the Church 'of Scotland in Canada. 

 He was a contributor to various periodicals, not only in prose but in 

 verse; his translation of some of the Odes of Horace into the Lowland 

 Scottish dialect having been conceded a high merit by good judges. Dr. 

 Brymner was for some years a respected member and for a time pre- 

 sident of the Press Gallery at Ottawa. As a journalist he was sincere- 

 ly esteemed a.nd honoured by his confrères. He was conscientious, 

 patient and fair; and, in style, aimed at clearness and strength rather 

 than brilliancy. For no consideration would he swerve in the slightest 

 degree from his honest convictions, and no man was more painstaking 

 in collecting and sifting the data on which his convictions reposed. 

 Both by character and occupation, therefore, he was admirably fitted 

 I'or the position of archivist. 



Only those who have followed his work year by year, from its 

 inception to its close, can form a just estimate of its value or be aware 

 of its profound and far-reaohing significance. In the presidential 

 address (Trans, for 1895), Sir James LeMoine gave an excellent résumé 

 of the contents of the archives reports from 1872 until that year. If 

 we except the special researches of the late Abbé Verreau, of the late 

 Mr. Joseph Marmette and, after Mr. Marmette's death, of Mr. Edouard 

 Eichard, the heaviest labours as well as the supervision of the bureau 

 devolved upon Dr. Brymner. How grave and difficult was the respon- 

 ibility imposed upon him by the conditions of his appointment is 

 known to those who can recall the state of our repositories at that 



