rick to cram the pithy line
That cracks so crisply over bubbling wine;
And since success your various gifts attends,
We--that is, I and all your numerous friends--
Expect from you--your single self a host--
A speech, a song, excuse me, and a toast;
Nay, not to haggle on so small a claim,
A few of each, or several of the same.
(Signed), Yours, most truly, ________"

No! my sight must fail,--
If that ain't Judas on the largest scale!
Well, this is modest;--nothing else than that?
My coat? my boots? my pantaloons? my hat?
My stick? my gloves? as well as all my wits,
Learning and linen,--everything that fits!

Jack, said my lady, is it grog you'll try,
Or punch, or toddy, if perhaps you're dry?
Ah, said the sailor, though I can't refuse,
You know, my lady, 't ain't for me to choose;
I'll take the grog to finish off my lunch,
And drink the toddy while you mix the punch.

. . . . . . . .

THE SPEECH. (The speaker, rising to be seen,
Looks very red, because so very green.)
I rise--I rise--with unaffected fear,
(Louder!--speak louder!--who the deuce can hear?)
I rise--I said--with undisguised dismay
--Such are my feelings as I rise, I say
Quite unprepared to face this learned throng,
Already gorged with eloquence and song;
Around my view are ranged on either hand
The genius, wisdom, virtue of the land;
"Hands that the rod of empire might have swayed"
Close at my elbow stir their lemonade;
Would you like Homer learn to write and speak,
That bench is groaning with its weight of Greek;
Behold the naturalist who in his teens
Found six new species in a dish of greens;
And lo, the master in a statelier walk,
Whose annual ciphering takes a ton of chalk;
And there the linguist, who by common roots
Thro' all their nurseries tracks old Noah's shoots,--
How Shem's proud children reared the Assyrian piles,
While Ham's were scattered through the Sandwich Isles!

--Fired at the thought of all the present shows,
My kindling fancy down the future flows:
I see the glory of the coming days
O'er Time's horizon shoot its streaming rays;
Near and more near the radiant morning draws
In living lustre (rapturous applause);
From east to west the blazing heralds run,
Loosed from the chariot of the ascending sun,
Through the long vista of uncounted years
In cloudless splendor (three tremendous cheers).
My eye prophetic, as the depths unfold,
Sees a new advent of the age of gold;
While o'er the scene new