OBITUARY.

Otago Daily Times, Issue 9947, 16 January 1894, Page 2

OBITUARY.

[By Electric Telegraph.—Copyright. (Peb Press association.) * PABIS, January 14. (Received January 15, at 11.10 a.m.) William Henry Waddington, ex-Ambassa' dor to England, is dead. •

William Henry WaddiogtGn, a French statesman and diplomatist, was born in Paris, December 11,1826, His father, a rich Englishman, establiahed cotton works in France, and became naturalised, but the son was partly educated in England. After several years passed at the Lycee St. Louis in Paris, he went to Rugby School in October 1841, and remained there till June 1545, when he went up to Trinity College, Cambridge, with an exhibition from the school. He became scholar of his college, and graduated in 1849 as second in the first; class of the classical tripoj, aDd was bracketed equal a Chancellor's Medallist. At Rugby he was distinguished for his prowess at football, and his contemporaries at Cambridge remember Waddington the sculler, member of the Second Tiinitj Boat Club, and No. 6 in the Cambridge boat in the University race in 1849, when Cambridge won, ,Socn after leaving the university he returned to France, married, and settled in the department of tho Aisne. He became a member of the Society of Antiquaries of France, and in the pursuit of his favourite studies relating to ancient coim and inscriptions he visited Asia Minor, Syria, and Cyprus (in 1850 and 1862), England, and Germany. His valuable contributions towardß the history and archssology of Fr&nceled to his being elected, in 1865, a member of the Academy of Inscriptions acd Belles Lettres. In that year he endeavoured at a by-election to enter the Cor^s Wgislatif, as member for the fourth circonscription of the department of the Aisne, bat his candidature was unsuccessful. However, on February 8, 1871, he was sent as a representative of that department to the National Assembly. From the first he sat in the Left Centre, and allied himself to the Republicans, giving a hearty support to the policy of M. Thiers. Ho was ft member of numerous commissions, and was the reporter of the law relating to the Conseils Gikdriux (August 1871). Appointed Minister ef Public Instruction in tho place of M. Jules Simon, May 19 1873, M. Waddington retired, five days later, with M. Ihiers, and resumed his seat on the benches of the Left Centre. Except on some questions of detail, or rather of procedure, M. Waddipgton voted regularly with tho Republicans. On January 30, 1876, he was elected a Senator for the department of the Aisne, together with M. Henri Martin and M. Saint-Vallier; his term of office espired in 1885, and was renewed for a second period of nine years. He was recalled to the Ministryof Public Instruction in the Cabinet of March 10, 1876, in succession to M. Wallon, and he retained his portfolio under the administration of M. Jules Simon, with whom he resigned office May 17, 1877. On the formation of the Dufaure Cabinet in December 1877, M. Waddiogton became Minister" for Foreign Affairs. He was the first Plenipotentiary of France at tho Congress of Berlin in 1878, After the resignation of Marshal MacSlahou and the retreat of'M. Dufaure, M. Waddington was invited by M. Grevy to remain at the Foreign Office while assuming the Presidency of the Council (February 4, 1879). He had in that capacity to maintain before tho Parliament a policy which was considered too Republican by the Senats, and too moderate by the Chamber of Deputies. On December 27, 1879, ho resigned, and was succeeded as Minister for Foreign Affairs and as President of tho Council by one of his colleagues, M. de Freycintt. At this juncture he refused the offer of the London Embassy, and paid a visit to Italy, where ho was received by the Pope and the King (March 1880). In 1883 he,was sent as Ambassador Extraordinary to represent France at the coronation of tha Czar Alexander 111., at Moscow. He was appointed Ambassador at tho Court of St. James's in succession to M. Tissot, in July 1883, and long retained "the position. He was President .cf tho General Council o£ the department cf the Aisne. He wan a Protestant, and related to the Bunsens, whoso late mother, the wife of the chevalier, was a Waddington. 11. Waddington has published:—"A royage eu Asie Mineure au point de vue numismatique," 1852; a continuation of Lebas's "Voyage Archtiologique on Greoe et.cn Asie Mineure," 1862; and "L'Edit de Diocldtieu," with new fragments and a. commenlary, 1864; and "Fastes dcs Provinces Asiatiques do l'Enipire Roniaiu," 1872. He was elected an honorary Fellow of Trinity College, Cambridge, April 16, 1881.—" Men and Women cf tho Time."