[RAYMOND] UNIVERSITY OF NEW BRUNSWICK 107 



in his instincts. He was perhaps at his best on the occasion of any 

 pubHc function, and even those students who had Httle love for mathe- 

 matics and stood in awe of the Doctor in the class-room were proud 

 of him when he presided at the Encœnial festival. He was a brilliant 

 mathematician, quick and accurate in his work and exceedingly neat 

 in his diagrams both on paper and at the blackboard. It was always 

 a surprise to the assembled class to see the ease with which the 

 Doctor with graceful freearm movement would draw upon the black- 

 board a perfect ellipse. He had the gift of sarcasm and was not 

 always patient with the dull boys. In the curriculum of those days, 

 unfortunately, there were no options, and there were always certain 

 students with whom the pass-mark in Analytics and Calculus was a 

 veritable nightmare. But to the "mathematicians" in the various 

 classes there was a never to be forgotten charm in the Doctor's manner 

 in the lecture-room. While pre-eminent in mathematics, he was an 

 all-round scholar and of this we have ample proof in his Encœnial 

 addresses. It may be also noted that upon the sudden death of the 

 classical professor, Geo. Montgomery-Campbell, in April, 1871, Dr. 

 Jack himself took the subject of classics with the seniors for tfie balance 

 of the year. 



Previous to a serious attack of congestion of the lungs in the 

 winter of 1869-70, from the effects of which he never entirely recovered, 

 the Doctor did much valuable work in the observatory. This modest 

 little building was built in 1851. Its fine equatorial telescope, by the 

 famous Merz and Son, was for some time the best in British America, 

 and the other accessories were then regarded as quite up to date. 

 The many hundreds of careful observations that the Doctor took 

 show that astronomical work was to him a labour of love. Soon after 

 the observatory was built he made practical use of the lately established 

 lines of electric telegraph, and by exchange of signals with Professor 

 Bond of Harvard University he established the true longitude of 

 Fredericton. He afterwards ascertained the exact longitude of 

 Saint John and of Quebec. Finally in 1856, as discrepancies were 

 found to exist in the longitude of places on the international boundary 

 between Maine and New Brunswick, as taken by the British and 

 United States surveyors, it was deemed important to settle the question 

 by the electric telegraph and Dr. Jack accordingly determined the 

 longitude of Grand Falls and Little Falls on the upper St. John. 



During the decade that followed his appointment as president, 

 Dr. Jack probably did his best work. It was his privilege to see in 

 his lifetime the realization of many of his hopes. Grammar schools 

 and High schools lately established were presided over by graduates 

 of his own University, and to-day his pupils include such men as 



