hours of this evening upon any thing relating to myself, I
could say much more than I do to thank you for your great kindness.

But, gentlemen, we are met here on public business. You have heard what
we are asked to do. We are asked to petition the city government, and
send a committee of force to the city government (not as if the
government were at all reluctant, but that they may know the feeling of
the people of Boston), and ask the city government to go to work at
once, and see that Boston has, as soon as possible, these necessities
for her honor, her health, and her beauty. [Applause.]

In thinking of this subject, Mr. President and gentlemen, it occurred to
me that it was a very singular fact, and not altogether to the credit of
human nature, that great numbers of persons cannot live together without
extreme inconvenience. Now, Robinson Crusoe, when he lived on the Island
of Juan Fernandez alone, was not troubled with any question of public
parks, or drainage, or health. Things took care of themselves. But when
you get two or three or four hundred thousand Robinson Crusoes in a few
square miles, you find the whole state of things is reversed, that you
require all the patience, all the science, a large part of the money,
and a large part of the industry, of the population, that you may live
at all, and on any terms. The lower parts of our nature, the animal
parts, tend to produce certain results which the intellectual parts are
expected to meet and control. If they do not that, men become savages;
if they do, they are enlightened.

Now, in this great and enlightened city of Boston, the pride of us all,
the "Athens of America," as we all know we are [laughter], and, as our
friend Dr. HOLMES there has told us, the "Hub of the Universe"
[laughter], it would hardly be respectful to say that one of the
questions before us was, Which of those two roads we were going to
take,--whether we were going to let the intellectual and moral parts
have the upper hand, or whether we were going to sink beneath the
material part. And yet, gentlemen, that is a good deal the question that
is before us to-night.

Why, look at the progress which is inevitably made where you get great
numbers of human beings together. You must have drainage, you must look
to the health of the population, and then you must look to their
recreation and their amusements (for they will have them); and, if they
are not good and creditable and honorable, th