PROCEEDINGS FOR 1900 XLIX 



elapsed between the decease of our late lionorary eeeretary and that of un 

 able, industrious, and higlily esteemed member of Section II, the Kev. 

 I)r. W. H. AYithrow, M.A. The late Dr. Withrow, whose death took place 

 at Toronto on the 13th of November, ^vas senior in the Society by one 

 rear to Dr. Fletcher, having been elected in 1884. The Council are in- 

 debted to the Eev. Chancellor Burwash, also a member of Section II, for 

 the following interesting and sympathetic sketch of our late colleague's 

 career : — 



" In the death of W. H. Withrow, M.A., D.D., the Eoyal Society has 

 lost one of its oldest and most industrious members. Elected in 1884, 

 ho held his place for twenty-four years as an active contributor to our 

 literature, especially in the fields of journalism, history and fiction. 



Of United Empire Loyalist descent, Dr. Withrow was a Canadian 

 of the Canadians. He was born in Toronto, August 6th, 1839, and dur- 

 ing the greater pai-t of his life resided in that city, his father being one of 

 its pioneer citizens. He received his elementary education in the Toronto 

 A ademy and entered Victoria College on the 19th of February, 1857. 

 In the following academic year he w^as admitted to full status as an un- 

 dergraduate in arts, and in the years 1857-8 and 1858-9 completed the 

 work of the first two years. After two years were spent in the study of 

 architecture he recognized a call to give himself to the work of the Chris- 

 tion ministry, and in the year 1861 w^as received on trial in the New Con- 

 nexion Wesleyan Methodist Conference. The next two years were spent 

 in the University of Toronto, completing his course in arts. He was ad- 

 nntted to the degree of B.A. iv 1863. x\mong liia classmates were such 

 eminent men as Chief Justice Sir ^^'illiam Mulock and His Honour 

 IJeut.-Governor Gibson. After eleven years of pastoral work he was 

 chosen by the first General Conference of the then (1874) uniting Metho- 

 dist churches, editor of the Magazine and Sunday-school periodicals, a 

 ])osition which he held by unanimous re-election at nine succeeding Gen- 

 eral Conferences, covering a period of thirty-four years. Already in his 

 student days, Dr. Withrow liad evinced unusual literary taste and ability. 

 In addition to the Latin and Greek then required of all students in arts, 

 he had in his undergraduate course mastered the three most important 

 modern languages, through which lie obtained access to all the most im- 

 portant literature of Europe. He liad also imbibed from the scholarly 

 Di. McCaul, President of Toronto University, a taste for research in the 

 field of Christian antiquities, and his first important work was the " Cat- 

 acombs of Rome and their testmiony to primitive Christianity," issued 

 from the press in 1874, and pronounced by the Edinburgh Review at the 

 time to be " the best English work on the subject extant." This work at 

 once established his reputation in Europe as well as on this continent, 



