and profound gratification to us all. Without the concurrence of the
National Government, this structure, though primarily of local
relations, as reaching across these navigable waters, could not have
been built. We feel assured that those honorably representing that
Government, who favor its completion with their attendance, and in
whose presence political differences are forgotten, will share with
us in the joyful pride with which we regard it, and in the inspiring
anticipation that the physical apparatus of civilization in the land
is to take fresh impulse, not impediment or hindrance, from that which
here has been effected. The day seems brought distinctly nearer when
the Nation, equipped with the latest implements furnished by science,
shall master and use as never before its rich domain.

Not only the modern spirit is here, even in eminence, which dares
great effort for great advantage; but the chiefest of modern
instruments is here, which is the ancient untractable iron,
transfigured into steel.

It was a sign, and even a measure, of ancient degeneracy, when the age
of Gold was followed if not forgotten by one of Iron. Decadence of
arts, of learning and laws, of society itself, was implied in the
fact. The more intrepid intelligence, the more versatile energy, amid
which we live, have achieved the success of combining the two: so that
while it is true now, as of old, that "no mattock plunges a golden
edge into the ground, and no nail drives a silver point into the
plank," it is also true that, under the stimulus of the larger
expenditure which the added supplies of gold make possible, the duller
metal has taken a fineness, a brightness and hardness, with a tensile
strength, before unfamiliar.

The iron, as of old, quarries the gold, and cuts it out from river-bed
and from rock. But, under the alchemy which gold applies, the iron
takes nobler properties upon it. Converted into steel, in masses that
would lately have staggered men's thoughts, it becomes the kingliest
instrument of peoples for subduing the earth. Things dainty and things
mighty are fashioned from it in equal abundance:--gun-carriage and
cannon, with the solid platforms on which they rest; the largest
castings, and heaviest plates, as well as wheel, axle, and rail, as
well as screw or file or saw. It is shaped into the hulls of ships. It
is built alike into column and truss, balcony, roof, and springing
dome. To the loom and the press, and the bo