The Sun.
London, England, 1867-10-04 00:00:00

The Lord-Lieutenant of Ireland in Belfast.

BELFAST, Thursday.

To-day his Excellency the Lord-Lieutenant of
Ireland visited several places of interest in this town.
In the afternoon he was entertained by the Mayor
of the borough (Mr. David Tayler, J. 1).) at a
splendid dejeuner in the Music Hail, to which the
principal persons connected with the district were
invited to meet his Excellency. The Mayor
occupied the chair. Oa his right were his Excel-
lency, Lord Downshire, the Earl of Longford, Lord
Dufferin, Sir F. Ilcygate, the Moderator of the
General Assembly of the Presbyterian Church
Ireland, and Mr. Lanyon, M.P. Oa the Mayor's
left were Earl Vane, Lord de Pros, Sir T. Bateson,
the Lord Bishop of Down and Connor and Dro -
more, Admiral Seymour, M.P., and the High Sheriff
of the county, Sir E. Cosy. The Lord Mayor of
Dublin was also present.
The Marou proposed The of the Lai. I-
Lieutenant, which was most enthusiastically received,
and praised the conduct of the Lerd-Lieutenant,
whose ad!ninistration he described as firm and im-
partial.
His EXCELLENCY, on rising to respond, was re-
ceived with loud applause, which having subsided he
said—Mr. Mayor, my Lords, and Gentlemen,—lf
anything could add to the pleasure and satisfaction
of my visit to Belfast, during which the cot dial and
hospitable welcome which I have received has been
impressed most strongly upon my grateful recollec-
lection, it would be the very cordial manner in
which you have received my name to-night, and the
very flattering way in which it has been proposed by
the Mayor. I thank the Mayor for the kind terms
of approval he has expressed in regard to the man-
ner in which the government of this country has
been carried on. (Applause.) But I feel I have
really only one advantage to claim in rising to ad-
dress you—namely, that, although this is my first
official visit here, I am not altogether a stranger to
your great and flourishing town—(applause)—not
altogether personally unacquainted with the progress
which each succeeding year has wrought in it. (Re-
newed applause.) It is also to me a source of addi-
tional pleasure to find among names which add
lustre to Belfast and this locality there are many
with whom I have had the happiness and advantage
of living on terms of continued private acquaintance
and friendship. (Hear, hear.) It is therefore with
no ordinary or merely official feelings of gratifica-
tion that I receive the kind and cordial welcome
which, as the representative of our beloved Queen,
. I have met with at the hands of the people of this
great town. (Great cheering.) While adverting
to the satisfaction I have received in this respect I
must not omit a reference to that even higher and
even more enlarged gratification which as one deeply
interested in the welfare of Ireland and intrusted
with its government I have felt in viewing and ex-
amining the points which your flourishing commu-
nity exhibits. (Hear, and applause.) I will not
weary you by detailing the magnificence of your
enterprise and the extending ramifications of your
commerce nor even those magnificent undertakings
which we were yesterday called upon to inaugurate.
(Applause.) But I will say that conjunctive and
coincident with these outward signs of the wealth
we see various proofs that subjects of a deeper and
even more intrinsic importance have not been
neglected. I mean those influences which relate to
the wellbeing, the comfort, and the social and intel-
lectual status of the producers of this wealth. (Hear,
hear, and applause)—of those workers in the hives of
industry, the toilers from whom these riches ema-
nate. (Renewed applause.) I confess that striking
and imposing as may bo the intellectual impression
produced by your magnificent factories and vast
fleets of merchandise, yet that the sight of that in-
telligent and well-to-do population bearing about
them the external proofs of being the denizens of
homes and abodes of plenty and comfort confers
a larger and more suggestive enjoyment than even
the evidence of the riches that have produced
these results. (Hear, hear, and applause.) I can-
not doubt but that the fresh atmosphere and
free breezes of your hills and mountains, and
the cheerful fertility which surrounds your
streets and suburbs, cannot but have as eleva-
ting and refining effect even upon the hardy
and wearied sons of toil—(applause)—au effect
which the gloomy atmosphere of the environs of a
Manchester or a Birmingham would fail to produce.
(Hear, hear.) 'We have heard that a distinguished
statesman lately observed that " King Iron and
King Cotton rule the manufacturing districts." The
sway is no doubt one of infinite prosperity and
wealth, but it is subject to these exactions of atmos-
phere and nature. Even the clear skies of heaven
are swallowed up and defaced in their dusky and
grimy grasp. Belfast has reason to consider itself
fortunate that it has no drawbacks of this nature,
and that it is able to show such intelligent, cheerful,
and contented faces as those which we have seen
among your working population assembled by thou-
sands during the last two days in your streets and
at your quays. (Great applause.) But, gentlemen,
it would be a great injustice, an injustice both to
the intelligence and social influence of Belfast, to
limit its aspirations and its functions to the mere
common place and ordinary arts of production,. or
of commercial progress. Your borough has long
ably sustained a higher and more aesthetic claim of
being a more reverend and still more successful
Alma Mater to the rising youth of the country, and
of being the dispenser of that intellectual knowledge
and culture which, if it cannot supersede King Iron
and King Cotton, at least tends to elevate them on
their dusky thrones, pointing them the way to the
loftier powers of human and Divine sympathy.
Gentlemen, I may now add that, fresh as many of
you are from the learned and philosophical assembly
which has lately honoured Belfast by its presence, I
may speak of one cheering and significant fact con-
nected with it. I mean that two at least of the
names among those most distinguished by eloquence
and ability in that distinguished assembly were
gentlemen connected by locality of birth with your
town and district. (Applause.) I man my noble
friend its president—(prolonged applause, inter-
miagled with several hisses) —to whom, even
in his presence, I may allude as a worthy
descendant of a family illustrious by its genius, and
also my hon. friend Justice Ollagan, whom Belfast
tho honour to call a native. (Great applause.)
Mr. Mayor, I cannot find words adequate to express,
before I sit down, my grateful sense of the welcome
and hospitality I have received from you and the
people of Belfast on this occasion, or the satisfac-
tion which the varied objects of instruction and
interest which I have seen here enabled me to enjoy.
I thank you not only for the privilege of being pre-
sent at this great assembly, but for the continuous
welcome and hospitality which I have received dur-
ing my present visit here, a visit which will at all
times recall Belfast and its loyal and hospitable
inhabitants in bright and grateful colours to my
memory. (Protracted cheering.) Gentlemen, lam
sure I am only speaking the sentiments of all here
when I ask you, who are so well acquainted with
the able and efficient manner in which the Mayor
has performed the important ditties of his station,
to join me in drinking " Prosperity, Health, and
Success to our able and talented Chairman, the
Mayor of Belfast." (Loud cheers.)
The toast was honoured in the most enthusiastic

manner.

Immediately on the left of the Mayor was reserved
the seat for Earl Russell, who is at present the guest
of Lord Dufferin, but the noble Earl had caught a
cold at the rifle shooting at Claudeboye, and was
unable to be present.

Lord lluderin conveyed his apology for non-
attendance to the Mayor.

To-night Sir Thomas Bateson, M.P., gave a grand
ball at his residence, Belioir-park, where the Lord-
Lieutenant is staying, in honour of his Excellency.
His Excellency and a large number of the nobility
were present.

RAINFALL IN CORNWALL.—The rainfall of the
harvest months of the present year—August and, Sep-
tember—presents a striking contrast to that of the same
months last year. The rainfall, as measured by the
Callington gauge in August and September last year was
6.40 inches in the former month, and 12.16 in the latter.
This year the rainfall, as measured by the same gauge, has
only been 1.53 inches in August, and 2.60 in September;
or 14.73 inches less titan the rainfall of the corresponding
period of last year.