Litchfield enquirer., 1829-07-02
EDWARD EVERETT.

s. . m SEDLEY.
 es EDWARD EVERETT.
 Al the public dinner given to this gentleman Nashville, Ten. (lIon. George Washington Campbe presiding( the following toast was given:
 Our Gaest, tte Hon. Edsvard Ese,yse, a distinguish ed representative of the learning, taste beraliy an refinement of the eastern section of our country.
 The drinking of the toast followed by long an, continued cheering. Mir. Everett then addressed tn, company as follows: @@
 Mr. President and Gentlemen: The sentiment which has just been announced, and the kind attention, of which I find my- self, on this occasion, the object, demand my particular acknowledgements. Com ing among you from a remote district of the country; personally acquainted on my arrival with but single individual, besides your distinguished representative in Con- gress; possessing none of those public and political claims on your notice, which are usually acknowledged by courtesies of this kind,I find myself the honoured guest of this day; cordially greeted by so large company, where could have expected only to form few acquaintances, and made to feel myself at home in heland ofstran- gers, should feel that sense of oppression, which unmerited honor ought always to produce, did look within myself for the reason of this fattering distinction. It is not there, gentlemen, that look for it, I know that ii flows from higher sOurC0 from your ready hospitality; iron, your liberal feeling, whichis able to take in those parts ofthe Republic which are the most remote from you; and which disposes you, even toward the person of an individual stranger, to strengthen the bonds of good will between all the brethren of the great American family. It is in this view of the subject alone, that could reconcile my accepting this kind offer of your public at- tentions, with the inofensive privacy which it is my study to preserve in my present journey; for the sake of which 1 have been led, on more than one occasion since ! left home, to express wish to be excu- sed from similar attentions on the part of politica! friends; attentions which would have implied public standing which do not possess; and would have caused my ex- cursion to be ascribed to another than its real motive.
 That motive, gentlemen, is the long cher- ished wish to behold, with my own eyes, this western world, not of promise merely, but ofmost astonishing and glorious fal6i- ment. The wonders, as they may justly be called, of the West the prodigious extent of the territory; the magnitude of the streams, that unite into one great sys. tenn the remotest parts of this boundless region; the fertility of its soil, of which the accounts, till they are verified by actu- al observation, seem rather like the fables of romance than sober narrative, were a. mong the earliest objects that attracted my youthful curiosity. While visiting some of the most ancient abodes of civilization in the elder world. | had frequently secession to observe (and1 have no doubt, NJ. Pres ideut, that your observation confirmed the fact) that the curiosity of the intelligent men of Europe was more awake on ths subject of this, than of any other portion of our country. Of the Atlantic coas they have some general knowledge, arising from the length time since it was settled and the e,pOlitical events of which 1t has beer the theatre; but the valley of the Missis' sippi seemed to have presented itself, as | were, suddenly to their imaginations as { mosk peculiar, important, and hitherto comparatively unknown region. But from the time that have been led more partic. ularly to reflect on the Western country in it's social relations to the rest of'the Un' iops I have felt an irresistible desire to un. derstand, from personal observation. thu stnpendous work of human advancement which is here going on, and of which ths history ofmankind certainly affords nc other example. cannot but think it the most interFestingbubject of contemplation whichthe world at present affords. Apart from fhe grand natural features of the scene thenspect of popnlous towns springing like an exhalatiop from the soil--ofa vacant oI savage wilderness transmitted. in one gen. eralieD, into ashickly inhabited territory