At a meeting of the Council held on October 15, 1907, on motion of Mr. SAMUEL S. GREEN it was voted that the proceedings of the Council on the occasion of the death of our late President, Mr. STEPHEN SALISBURY, be incorporated in the next number of our Proceedings with a suitable portrait of Mr. SALISBURY. SALISBURY MEMORIAL. The Hon. STEPHEN SALISBURY, for eighteen years President of the American Antiquarian Society, died at his residence in Worcester after a short illness, on Nov. 16, 1905. A special meeting of the Council was called for 3.30 P. M. on the day of the funeral, Nov. 20. A quorum was present, but as many members of the Council were still in attendance at the interment, the meeting was adjourned without formal action. The Council met again at the Hall of the Society in Worcester on Wednesday, Dec. 13, at 2.30 P. M. Hon. SAMUEL A. GREEN, LL. D., the Second VicePresident, occupied the chair. Dr. GREEN said: It is on rare occasions that special meetings of the Council of this Society are ever called; and then only to pay a passing tribute to the memory of an officer who has been closely identified with its work and its welfare. Not long ago a similar meeting was held in this room to testify our respect for the memory of Senator HOAR; and now we are called together again to show our loving regard for the graceful and modest officer who presided on that occasion. STEPHEN SALISBURY will be greatly missed at the meetings of the Antiquarian Society, on which he spent so much time and thought in order to make them both instructive and attractive. His personality was so pleasant that the members will long bear in mind the impression he made on them not only as the presiding officer of the Society, but as the gracious host of many social gatherings in his family mansion. In this respect he was only following the example set by his father, which in no degree was lessened by the son. I was often a guest under his roof, and less than a month before his death I enjoyed his hospitality; and I find it hard now to realize the fact that he is gone, and forever. Born to great wealth, as his father before him was, he knew the responsibility of riches, and duly appreciated the trust. After leaving college he had many inducements to lead a life of ease and leisure, but he never yielded to the temptation, as he was not built that way. He then passed several years in foreign travel for pleasure and study, and afterward took a full course at the Harvard Law School, where he learned the technical intricacies connected with the management of a large property. A member of many learned societies, a director of many corporations and financial institutions, a manager of many charitable and educational organizations, his civic duties were manifold, but his ability and readiness to work and his willingness to serve the public were great enough to include all these responsibilities in his care and attention. To the Worcester members of the Council, who are so familiar with Mr. Salisbury's activities in this neighborhood, I leave the duty to deal with the more special analysis of his character. The following communication was received from the Rev. EDWARD E. HALE, D. D., first Vice-President: At the annual meeting of the Society in October, no member present seemed in better health or spirits than our President. There was the same thoughtful and cordial welcome for every one, the same real interest in every subject presented, the same intelligence in those private discussions which give the life to our meetings, and the same quiet hospitality in his own house which made every one of us regard him as a personal friend. Personally, I like to say that as I went and came in Worcester, I was greatly touched to see how generally men looked upon his death, each as a personal loss in his first thought, speaking afterwards of the great loss of such a life to the community. The years of his connection with our Society will always be noticed by its friends as prosperous and successful. The administration of his father marked a signal advance in the work of the Society. Our late President himself, entered with spirit into such work when he was quite young, and after his father's death of course he was chosen President, and it became the central pleasure of his life to set forward the work of the Society. His early interest in Central America was increased by his intelligent visits to Yucatan and other provinces, and every year brought to our cabinet and to our library and to our transactions new results of his personal interest in the antiquities of those regions. But he did not by any means confine his antiquarian studies in one direction. From one meeting to another he would occupy himself in the wide range of historical interests which are so well represented in the membership of our society, and he would take care that at each meeting and in each publication a sufficient number of such interests should be represented. The papers prepared and read at his request during his short administration fully justified our founder in taking the large continental name of America for the Antiquarian Society. Mr. Salisbury would not leave it to the hasty special work of a few days to prepare for a semi-annual meeting. On the other hand, whenever he read or whenever he talked, he had us in mind and was asking himself or asking somebody who would prepare a fit paper on such a subject or such a subject in which he thought the Society had a concern. In a review of the work of the Society since he was a member, the simple list of his own suggestions and contributions has a special interest to-day. The munificent gifts which he has made to the Society would of themselves have furnished a fit memorial of his life and service. But there was no need of such a memorial. His administration itself would be always remembered by any who have joined in our work or shared in the interest which it involved. The wide range of Mr. Salisbury's interest in the welfare of all around him is shown in the remarkable list of his benefactions to individuals and to societies. |