I knew him for many years; to me he was as my own flesh and blood; I could not love a brother more; and his death was merely the final chapter in the grief I experienced when he went from Boston to represent the Republic abroad, in such physical condition that I knew I would never look upon his face again in life; and I know that in voicing my own sorrow I am but expressing the feelings of those who were comrades in the past and lovers of him always. He had reached the zenith of his literary powers before he left the land of his adoption and love forever; and he himself realized that his work was done, and that only the official duties of his consular position remained to preoccupy him until the final call.
Besides a host of friends, he left a wife, a son and a daughter to mourn his passing; and while the idle reader of contemporary literature may time and again derive pleasure and profit from his joyous wit, and gentle philosophy, his intimates and brothers in soul will seldom meet without recalling with a hush and a sigh the friend and comrade who has passed and who awaits them where work and worry, sweat and sorrow, are no more forever.
He was buried in Holyhood Cemetery, Brookline, Mass., within a stone’s throw of the spot where sleep his comrades in the flesh, John Boyle O’Reilly, Thomas J. Gargan and Patrick A. Collins, his grave marked by a handsome granite column adorned with a bronze tablet, erected by a group of friends who loved him in life and mourn him in death. May he sleep in peace; for no gentler, sweeter spirit was ever added to the company of Heaven than James Jeffrey Roche.
The following list of applicants for membership in the Society was read by the secretary-general, and by unanimous vote they were duly elected members:
John J. Kenney, New Brighton, Staten Island, N. Y. (proposed by J. J. Lenehan).
William Gilbert Davies, 32 Nassau Street, New York City (proposed by J. J. Lenehan).
Martin Hughes, Hibbing, Minn, (proposed by Hon. C. D. O’Brien).
Patrick F. McBreen, 404 Munroe Street, Brooklyn, N. Y. (proposed by J. J. Lenehan).
Thomas Murphy, Irvington-on-Hudson, New York (proposed by Francis J. Quinlan, M. D.).
Dr. Thomas E. Dolan, 250 Elizabeth Avenue, Elizabeth, N. J. (proposed by James L. O’Neil).