70 The late Professor Algernon Freire-Marreco. 



many for men competent to manage our large cliemical works. 

 Every year young men left his laboratories fully equipped for 

 real work, and witK nothing to fear from foreign competition ; 

 and in the world of industrial chemistry his well-weighed recom- 

 mendations became time after time passports to positions of 

 commercial and scientific eminence. Indeed one of Professor 

 Marreco's chief characteristics was his love for his students. All 

 old students of his will bear us out when we say, that in the late 

 Professor of Chemistry at the Newcastle College, they found not 

 only a teacher of singular patience, energy, and ability, but also 

 a friend whose interest in their welfare went with them far be- 

 yond the College walls. 



But it was not only as a teacher, or as a thoughtful friend in 

 after life that Professor Marreco will be remembered. No one 

 could keep order in a lecture room more effectively than he, but 

 no one, at the same time could sympathize more thoroughly with 

 the vagaries of students. Students, we all know, are apt to get into 

 scrapes — no one was more ready to help them out of them than the 

 Chemical Professor. Students cannot be always working. 

 Though no longer school-boys they still require a little play, and 

 the play of *'men" is apt to be more costly than the play of 

 boys. Hence subscriptions for cricket and football clubs, soii-ees, 

 athletic sports, etc. In all these things the late Professor was 

 ever foremost with purse and experience. His enthusiasm in all 

 connected with the success of ''his men," in examination or in 

 races, in the cricket field or in the hard battle of life, was indeed 

 something to see and remember. 



In furthering the local interests of his own branches of science 

 he was always active. He may be said to have founded the New- 

 castle Chemical Society, of which, after having steered it through 

 the dangers of its early years as Secretary, he became President 

 in 1876. He was likewise one of the founders of the Northern 

 Photographic Association. For many years he was Secretary of 

 the Natural History Society of Northumberland and Durham. 

 He was a member of the first Council of the Chemical Institute 

 of Great Britain, and had much to do with its formation ; he was 

 a Fellow of the Chemical Society of Great Britain and of that of 

 Berlin, and an Honorary Member of the North of England Insti- 

 tute of Mining Engineers, to whose Transactions he contributed 

 some of his more important papers. He was an honorary Mas- 

 ter of Arts of Durham. But honours were of small account to 



