another are cast away in an open boat and only one of them can live, it will not be Antony who is eaten." MacDonnell was sworn of the Privy Council of the United Kingdom on 11 August 1902, following an announcement of the King's intention to make this appointment in the 1902 Coronation Honours list published in June that year. He was also appointed a member of the Council of India in October October 1902. It was expected that he would be appointed Governor of Bombay in that year, but instead he opted to accept an offer from George Wyndham, Chief Secretary for Ireland, to become Permanent Under-Secretary of State for Ireland, the administrative head of the Irish Government. The MacDonnell Hostel, Aftab Hall, Aligarh Muslim University In the year 1895, Antony Patrick MacDonnell was appointed as Lieutenant Governor of North West Province and Oudh. He served in this position till the year 1901. Honouring a request for funds towards construction of a hostel at Aligarh Muslim University, Mac Donnell sanctioned Rs. 20,000 from the provincial budget in 1900 for the construction of a hostel. The hostel was to be constructed for solving the lodging problems of the students at the M.A.O. College. The construction work began in the same year and it was completed in March 1904 and the hostel was named after him as the MacDonnell Hostel. Under-Secretary for Ireland MacDonnell was known to be sympathetic to the cause of Irish Home Rule, and his return to London elicited an offer to join his brother, Dr Mark Anthony MacDonnell, in the House of Commons as an independent nationalist. Competing for his attention, however, was a recommendation by Lord Lansdowne, his former superior as Viceroy of India, to the Chief Secretary for Ireland that MacDonnell be offered the position of Permanent Under-Secretary for Ireland, the administrative head of the Irish government. MacDonnell entered into lengthy negotiations with Lansdowne and the Chief Secretary, George Wyndham, regarding the terms under which he would accept the position; he was not content to occupy the traditional role of an administrative civil servant, with little input into the formulation of policy. He eventually accepted the office of Under-Secretary, on the explicit understanding that he would be given "adequate opportunities of influencing the policy and acts of the administration". MacDonnell's choice to return to head the Irish administration was surprising for several reasons. The position