At the last meeting of the Massachusetts Historical Society, Mr. Robert C. Winthrop, Jr., spoke of the inscription on the base of John Harvard's statue, reading "John Harvard, founder, 1638," which gives the impression that this denotes the year in which our college was founded. As considerable comment has been caused by the date on the inscription, Mr. Wintrop's remarks will be of general interest.

The official catalogues of the university, he said, declare that its natal year was 1636, and this date has been recognized as the true one by successive historians of the college and of New England; and in 1836 the two hundredth anniversary of the founding of this institution was commemorated. It was during the governorship of Sir Henry Vane, and during his auspices, that the college was instituted by the Massachusetts Assembly, which it has been said, was the first body by which the people through their representatives, ever gave their own money to found a place of education. John Harvard himself, the gentleman continued, would regret that the inscription on his statue should imply the slightest want of recognition of the fact that, long before he had ever set foot upon these shores, the magistrates of the colony had taken formal steps to establish a seat of learning, to which they subsequently assigned his name.