Page:Men of the Time, eleventh edition.djvu/960

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ROSS.
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Lord Dalmeny by Lady Catharine Lucy Wilhelmina, only daughter of the fourth Earl Stanhope, was born in London in 1847, and received his education at Eton, and at Christ Church, Oxford. He succeeded to the title on the death of his grandfather, the fourth Earl of Rosebery in 1868. The first time he ever spoke in public was in 1871, when, at the opening of Parliament, he was selected by the Prime Minister, Mr. Gladstone, to second the address in reply to the speech from the throne. He soon took a decided position on the question of national education, and when the Government Education Bill for Scotland was before the House of Peers, he moved an amendment to it by which he aimed at the exclusion of catechisms from public schools. He also spoke in the same session on Lord Russell's motion regarding the Alabama Treaty; and he was appointed Commissioner to inquire into Endowments in Scotland. In the session of 1873 Lord Rosebery was much engaged in an endeavour to obtain a Committee of Inquiry on the supply of horses in this country. He moved for, and obtained the Committee, and was made the chairman of the same. It may be said that to the labours of that Committee the remission of the taxes on horses is fairly due. During the session of 1874 Lord Rosebery moved for, and was made the chairman of, a Committee on the Scotch and Irish Representative Peerages. He was President of the Social Science Congress which met at Glasgow Oct. 1, 1874. On Nov. 16, 1878, he was elected Lord Rector of the University of Aberdeen in succession to Mr. W. E. Forster. In Nov., 1880, he was elected Lord Rector of the University of Edinburgh, but he did not deliver his inaugural address till Nov. 4, 1882. He was appointed Under-Secretary of State for the Home Department in Aug., 1881, in succession to Mr. Leonard Courtney, who was transferred to the Colonial Office. His lordship resigned the Under-Secretaryship in June, 1883. He married, March 20, 1878, Hannah, daughter of Baron Meyer de Rothschild.


ROSS, Alexander Milton, M.D., was born at Belleville, Ontario, Canada, Dec. 13, 1832. He was educated at Belleville, became a member of the College of Physicians and Surgeons of Ontario, and was appointed Surgeon, and served temporarily in the American army during the civil war. During the past twenty-five years he has been engaged in collecting and classifying the Flora and Fauna of British North America, of which he has many specimens. His chief publications are:—"Birds of Canada," 1872; "Butterflies and Moths of Canada," 1873; "Flora of Canada," 1874; "Forest Trees of Canada," 1874; monographs on "Architecture of Canadian Birds' Nests," "Food of Canadian Birds," "Migrations of Canadian Birds," "Remains of the Elephas americanus and Mastodon giganteus" found in Canada, 1875; and "Mammals and Fresh-Water Fish of Canada," 1878.


ROSS, John Wilson, was born in 1818 at Belmont, St. Vincent, of which island his father, the late Hon. J. P. Ross, was Solicitor-General and Speaker of the. House of Assembly. After being educated at King's College, London, he proceeded to the West Indies, and was secretary to the Vendue Master of Berbice, but finding himself unadapted to business, he left British Guiana, and returned to England, where he has since remained, devoting himself entirely to literary pursuits. He has been a large contributor to periodicals, including the Monthly Magazine, the Monthly Review, Bentley's Miscellany, and Douglas Jerrold's Shilling Magazine. His most remarkable periodical contribution was "The Doctrine of the Chorizontes" in the Edinburgh Review (April, 1871), in which he