Page:Dictionary of National Biography, Second Supplement, volume 2.djvu/435

 Scotland (Aberdeen Eccesiol. Soc. Trans.). There he instituted daily service, mostly taken by himself, and, in the church, services every day in Holy Week, and at Christmas.

At the same time he was prominent in the general assembly, where he became convener of its committee on correspondence with the foreign reformed churches. In that capacity he attended the assembly of the Moravian church at Klobuck in Hungary, and of the Danish church at Copenhagen. In 1887 he went to Australia to take the services in the Scots church, Melbourne, for four months, returning by way of San Francisco, Buffalo, and New York. He was made convenor in 1890 of the Assembly's commission to 'inquire into the religious condition of the people of Scotland.' The work occupied six years, and meant a personal visitation of almost all the parishes of Scotland. Lang's annual speech, as he gave in his reports, was the great event of successive general assemblies. In 1893 he was moderator of the general assembly.

Anxious to heal division in the church he actively promoted the Pan-Presbyterian Alliance; he attended and spoke at all its quadrennial conferences, from the first at Edinburgh in 1876 to that of which he was president at Washington in 1899. For the Philadelphia Conference (1 881) he wrote a 'Letter of Greeting,' which was translated into many languages. He joined in the conferences for Christian unity in Scotland initiated by Bishop George Wilkinson [q. v. Suppl. II] and in his company he addressed the general assembly of the United Free church.

In 1898, on the death of Sir William Geddes [q. v.], principal of Aberdeen University, Lang offered himself for the vacant office and was chosen by the Crown. He rapidly vindicated the appointment by tact and business capacity. The chief events of his principalship took place in Sept. 1906, when the (belated) quater-centenary of the university was celebrated, and King Edward VII and Queen Alexandra open^ the new buildings which his energy largely he]})ed to complete, at Marischal College. Lang was made C.V.O. in celebration of the occasion. He had received from Glasgow the degree of D.D. after his appointment to the Barony, and that of LL.D. in 1901. He was also an honorary member of the Imperial University of St. Petersburg, of the Imperial Academy of St. Petersburg, and of the Egyptian Institute (1906). He was Baird lecturer at Glasgow in 1901.

In Dec. 1908 his health began to fail. He died at Aberdeen on 2 May 1009. He was buried beside Bishop Patrick Forbes [q. v.] within the ruined transcript of Aberdeen Cathedral.

Lang married at Fyvie in 1859 Hannah Agnes, daughter of P. Hay Keith, D.D., minister of Hamilton. By her he had seven sons and a daughter. His third son, Cosmo Gordon Lang (b. 1864, and named after Lang's patron at Fyvie) became Archbishop of York in 1909.

Lang was author of several devotional volumes, including : 1. 'Heaven and Home, a Book for the Fireside,' 1880. 2. 'The Last Supper of Our Lord,' Edinburgh, 1881. 3. 'Ancient Religions of Central America,' Edinburgh, 1882. 4. 'Life: is it worth living ?' London, 1883. 5. 'The Anglican Church,' Edinburgh, 1884. 6. 'Homiletics on St. Luke's Gospel,' 1889. 7. 'Gideon, a Study Practical and Historical,' 1890. 8. 'The Expansion of the Christian Life ' (Duff Lectures), Edinburgh, 1897. 9. 'The Church and its Social Mission' (Baird Lectures), Edinburgh, 1902. A portrait by his friend and elder, Mr. E. R. Caltenis, hangs in the session-house of the Barony church. A bronze memorial medallion was unveiled on 9 Dec. 1911 in the same church.

 LANGEVIN, HECTOR LOUIS (1826–1906), Canadian statesman, born at Quebec on 25 August 1826, was son of Lieut.-colonel Jean Langevin, a Quebec merchant, of Anjou stock, who had served as assistant and secretary to Lord Gosfoid, governor-general of Canada, and had been for a time corresponding clerk of crown lands. His mother was Sophie Scholastique, daughter of Major La Force, who had distinguished himself in the defence of Canada in 1812-14. Langevin received his education at the Seminary of Quebec (1836–46) and studied law at Montreal. Entering the office there of (Sir) George Etienne Cartier [q. v.], he identified himself with Cartier's conservative political principles and was very intimately associated with him in public life. He found time for journalism in the early course of his legal career and edited successively at Montreal 'Mélanges Religieux' (from 1847) and the 'Journal of Agriculture.' Langevin 