CH. x RESIGNATION OF PROFESSORSHIP 241 



organiser, his widespread reputation, and his high personal 

 qualities it is in great measure due both that the College 

 enjoys so high a rank as a place of education, and that its 

 Chemistry Department in particular has long held a position 

 second to that of no other academic institution in the United 

 Kingdom. 



The Council expresses its cordial wishes for Sir H. E. 

 Roscoe's prosperity and happiness, and assures him that it 

 will regard with pride and warm interest the honourable 

 career on which he is now entering. 



I need hardly say that I left the College, especially 

 the Laboratory, and my colleagues and pupils, with 

 whom and for whom I had worked nearly thirty years, 

 with the greatest regret. I had some hope at one 

 time that an arrangement might have been come to by 

 which I might still have remained in Manchester, 

 taking the full duties of the professorship during the 

 first and busiest term of the year and handing over to 

 some colleague, and I knew I could have secured one, 

 the duties of carrying on the work whilst I was absent 

 in London during the sitting of Parliament. The 

 Council, however, wisely perhaps, thought otherwise, 

 and did not make any overtures to me with this view. 

 But that my work in Manchester was appreciated by 

 those engaged in the chemical and cognate industries 

 in the district may be measured by the fact that a 

 memorial was sent to the Council, signed by upwards 

 of 300 of the chief manufacturing firms in the neigh- 

 bourhood, desiring that my connection with the College 

 should not be altogether broken. The local Press, as 

 well as that in other parts of the country, expressed a 

 similar desire. Thus the editor of the Lancet, notic- 

 ing my resignation, made the following remarks, which 

 I can only accept cum grano salis : 



The Victoria University, Manchester, sustained a great 

 misfortune in the resignation of Sir Henry Roscoe. For 

 many years Sir Henry has been recognised all over the 



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