The Stourbridge Observer, Cradley Heath, Halesowen & District Chronicle.
Stourbridge, West Midlands, England, 1872-11-02 00:00:00

BANQUET, M NEW YORK TO

M. FitOIJDV.

The American Correspondent of The 'I ieee, writing from
Philadelphia, under date the 16th ult., has sent the following,
which will Interest both Celt and Saxon :
Lastieyening, Dalgoogico`a, New York, a banquet
+ram given by th; Messes. SeViLner to Mr. James
Anthony Fronde, which was attended by a lare
number of our leading literary men, publishers, and
journalists. The Scribners have been Mr. Fronde's
American publishers, end among those present at the
banquet were Ralph Waldo Emerson. George William
Curtis, H. Ward Beecher. W. Cullen Bryant, Professor
Wolney, the Ret. Dr, Chapin. Professor Andrew 1).
White, Dr. ii. W. Bellows E. 1,. Godkin, George
W. Childs, J. W. Harper, 'W. It Appleton, George
Jones, R Hoe, Robert Eonner,Dr. S. J. Prititie,
14, 0. Irongliton, nail. R. H. Stoddart. George
William Curtis presided, and made aii address of
welcome to Mr. F.roude, who replied, and addresses
were also made by Ralph Waldo Emerson, William
Cullen Bryant, Henry Ward Beecher, Judge Charles
P. Daly, the Rev. R. H. Chapin, Professor White,
the Rev. Dr. Bellows, Colonel T. Wentworth Higgin-
son, and others, while a number of letters of regret
were read from Professor M'Cosh, Professor Longs
fellow, John G. Whittier, James R. Osgood, and
Oth4e, Mi I'voode4e gddress rill be of interest in
England. in resPonse to Mr. Ctirtie'd cordial oreeting
he mid:—

, ,
" When, a few years since, an English squadron was en.
gaged with the
mho, one of our ships ran on a
tory. _
bank, and was tottering severely front Chineaa dee:
American frigate which was in the river catne to her help,
the cOMMender saying briefly that blood Wee thinker than
Water.' That blood,Which was thicker than Water sent Dr.
line Into the Arctie pirOe In searsh of Sir John Franklin,
That blood which wee thicker than water ir,dnCed tkfe Chival-
rous editor of the Sea Tork Herald to despatch
into the heart of Africa to seek and find David Livingstone.
The same feeling but createkin the Engllth nation a more
genuine fiellght in.the sucegsa of a Private enterprise of an
Ja.leficati tat Len Foan ll tielvetost ffett been dispvered
and brought home by the agents of our oake ele,,Astfes.
flie-inson, whose acquaintance I had
the honour of making ine't summer in London, told a e that
what most streak him in England was, that he found himself
among his own countrymen. The longer he stayed among
os, the ?flora he felt that he was among the same people
whom he had left behind him in New York and Boston. I,
myself, gentlemen, when lauded last week, had not a single
resenal acquaintance in this city and I find myself not only
among thy on penny% but among werm and generous
friends. . When I see else!! hers serrandvd by the
most brilliant representatives of .inerietin literatrtre—by
men whose names have been household words when the
English language is spoken—l am sure you are forming ex-
pectations of me which I shall inevitably disappoint. We
are all of us so c.JustituteA be nature that we can swallow a
large measure of flattery, but the digestive power even here
has its limits. i know too well the tr.essure of my own caps-
bilities. You make me feel like Falstaff before the battle of
Shrewshury—' would lwere avoid, g, Ilal, and all were well.'
Would it were a fortnight hence, when you have hear I what
I have to say to you, and your good opinion of me had re-
melted unchanged.
" But, gentlemen, It Is not only for this that f owe to you
my a.hnowledgn]ents I have to thank you also for giving
nie an anpertuntar waplidniag tail' PIT" ("f
my preseEt viait to this country. lo one sense. ha East A
fonts no explanation. It has been the dream 01 my life to
conic to America, and lam only delighted that I have found
an opportunity of realizing it. occupied, however, as I am
at home in many ways, I do not know whether I should have
succeeded in accomplishing my wish had I not combined
with It another purpose—a purpose which presented itself
tt' ala at lest in the shape of an obligation. What that pug.

pose Is can hest Mae
form it. Some IS months ,
It wet mentioned that on
leaders wee making $ tot
upon Inglieh tyranny and
the text lan pregnant one,
the commentary. Irish r
bring against England wt. . be.,
cannot An if Ir. . nave a long
memory There are, however:, features in t.., long tragical
story which, if they do not palliate, et least explains and
make intelligible much that see could wish undone—fea-
tures which, naturally enough. the Irish overlook, yet which
should be borne in mind it an impartial judgment is to be
formed an the controversy. LAN aware how ass{ an M.
tlicence America possesiles In hand. The jaidgment
ni
America has more weight in Ireland than tensity batteries of
English woolen, and that judgment ouebt n.,. in be pro-
.noi,dinhomued ailyt.er,lhtehaircinkgiowily,,t,,heovc:runsiadeloto.r
stohmiie pummlaintileit; on
other chic ' I spike without serious intention ; but the
idea haying inc,e presented itself to me gathered form and
eltr,
. „
"tam ilotan
itzmrschumact' Ido not care to own ~c -crc qf an 4
ways It nit self specially maira t-'seehis. thorn V, hen at
College I used to antid Illy VaCtitiolla Otsi Irish
mountains. I have lived in peasants' cabins for ruoutut t"-
gether. I was once laid un with severe illness in the wilds of
Sher, slld tee ppor creatures treated nie with a tenderness
wniefi I shell mi.,. forees, Their nielere attracted me. Their
comistion personally interested We. :timer rrehrelberprthe
famine, I know it in the famine. I was in lreian,
wards, lu 1345, In the emith 0 Mien insurrection. Since that
!limes!, evib: been an ebtane
been,
.t
rifle eodu,
ti
of
.andlcwanmsywryatiunuiewiribitilliii
wanted to live le his own house and .atteud to his della
aBI u rnr gy
allll 11.1.:mhyety say.
country.l
holding,apml
to go.
if
ether place in the came county hit ,7ipt .le is snail,
"When (was writing my Iliatory of Englanu. Si.! led foi
~,,tehtiiirotuil
look closely into the conduct of the English Gavernmen"
towards , 'rebind in earlier times. When that book was off
mY hands I lAgaii t 5 beatrine ftiui4 the.action of the cele-
brated penal Jaws of the hurt
.century. I ne'va read what very
few persons haver readrthe secret correspondence ielttWeen
the Euttlish Red Irish Adenntstrationa daring all that period.
I felt, in short, that I had something of importance to say,'
and I wished to say it. 1 would noted. las sueb matter with-
out advice. I consulted My friends, and their anewecie 44ere
'generally istifavciOtable. One sa p
id I should be mobbed hye
Irish. Another that he "Opposed I should tell the truth—
there was nothing so unpalatable an trilt • I had better let it
lone Others urged more gravely that it was teibeeoming
anti improper .to discues questions of our own donliall"
politics in a Jordan °gentry. 3 here were some, however,
and hoSe site tress ',rented best, who said to me, 'Oo
and my own instinct said, • tio; ..t.s to the pleb, I have
always been on good terms with them, and I hetet' S always
*Mil he. I hope to spend w large part of the rest am,
ille amoog them, and if they have anything to say to me
they will have an opportunity at home. As to truth,
may lie unpalatable, hut there is a prejudice that a little of
it is not unwholesome. For the mete grave objection, if I
were in Parliament, If I belonged to ahy pollts•-al party,
even a I were an Irish landlord, I admit that it wotad be".
weight.
"It might be supposed that Swan indirectly %Winning ilOnie
party objs Ct. lint as far el t bare any public character it is
almnly asd welter oi books. addreea rived' Penally to all
English speaking people -.;:lers,n, thcy are and there can
he no possible reason why I may not aditit•ser them" se Wolf
with my tougue as my pen. Once for all, however, / ireffst
that England and America do not stand to one auothez
as foreign eatlone—foreign in the sense that France or
Piissia is fore/gu to Us bath. Politically separate we may
but we cannot shake off otr relationship. Sprung
from a "yeomen ytock, with it nonillion histofy, oommon
language, comniim lasts; charged as we both are fit Petal-
donee with the carrying 04.; et that grand princiPle of
ordered liberty, on which, as we belie-:/t, Ore amelioration
of mankind depends, we may be rivals, hut :Vale milt
as to which of us shall represent these principle:
moat !dimly and most effectively. We may quarrel,
and when we ildarrel st will he with the peculiar bitterness
which distinguishee family disp "tee bnt the very acrimony
is itself an evidence of the closeness of the On which finds
good
will For twhhei
csht ri s eost f
wir o mootipeemsviiii piipwo ehdatbesae nc o
eight
e f
tts 41101,1
for from the other. Be our political position to each other
what it may—.aud for myself 1 hope and believe no angry
word need ever more be:exchanged between ue—it is inevit-
able that we must retain an ardent iMereet In each other's
future, and must remain connected by links oi teeing such
as cannot exist between either of as and any other Power's.
" And on this peculiar subject of Ireland, America has a
special Interest and a special right to express an opinion,
owing to the peculiar relations which hare Sprang up between
Ireland and herself. Those relations are not the growth of
yesterday. Daring the present century several rail:lmre of
Irish Catholic peasantry have found a home and a shelter
here, and the Irish people left In the old country have re-
sponded to your hospitality with a passienate and groundless
gratitude. America is the land of premisie, the land flowing
with milk and honey in the imagination of every Irish
Catholic child In the tut century, and in the century before.
when the Irish Catholics remained fixed at home, there was
, so,, less important Protestant emigration to this country.
Every season for ioor6 th,m a hundred years they came over in
shiploads{ the Very pith mid naatrow of the col mists who
had been planted in Ireland by the Puritans—the sons and
grandsons of the Cromwelliau settlers, the Oster Presby-
terians' the Calvinist immierants, English, liatch, and
French, who went thither after the last conquest, and were
driven out by the intolerance of the Episcopalian laws
They came here like the pilgrim Fathers, in search of liberty
which was denied them at home. In the war of independ-
ence they made England me the madness which banishe
them, and in that same noir of independence their Mends
In Ireland, the Proteetants who rem:shed there, were the
staunChest Mends which America possessed Yon are thus
els-meted ereally with both the parties whose presence in
Ireland constitatee the Irish difiiculty. You Can wish 00 111
te either ; you are peculinly acted to mediate between
them, while you arose circumstanced that the jed.onent of
America, expressed threugh the press, threugh public
speeches, in the thousand ways In which national senti-
ment can make null felt, will carry a weight which Is
almost incalculable. Gentleman, it is now 360 years since
an Englialyinan *as sent over from London to examine and
report upon the causes at Ms!? discontent. It was a time
when, if ever, the Irish had the Maliegement of their own
affairs. The result warn universal misery, and the conclusion
was that the cause was hopeless. ' Our fathers,' tiffs welter
said, 'could firri no remedy ; they had more wit and wisdom
than we ; how, then, can we find It? Wise men say that • the
herb that will heal the wound did never grow.' Nearly
400 years have passed away; we are still seeking for that
haiku, Pend ^mina find it. I know not if It grows anywhere,
but I ye; bele, that titingh no growth of the old hemi-
sphere, it miy be discovered lb: tlin new. It is that plant
of which I have come in search—l bellee iS t, Ice American
opinion. Ourselves at our wit's.end, if America tilt ceemsel
England what to do which she has left undone, what wrung she
can yit resit eas of which Ireland mayjustly complain, Euglane,
I sin artant, .till listen respecif ally, cordially, gratefully.
If, on tho hrnd, g time is ever to come when political
agit..tion late one ll'ehied—when Celt and S.Oll, Protes-
tant and Catholic are to tire W. tly eide la peace and quiet-
ness—it will he when America talk the Irish Preethew have
no longer a grievance which legislation cau redress, We that
they must depend for their future presperity on their Met
ludwitry."

- _ -
NI by telling you ho hll came to
ago, at a Loudon blitnlat Odds,
ono a tho most prombehat Nation
toxiclo the V ulted states, dilating
id **Wrongs of Ireland. ICO doubt
-, and It probably did sot sutler In
. pmfghltism has many a charge to
whisk don be but too toll subston.
odOillloin If !Titbits:lobo-

MEW