The Bennington banner. [volume] (Bennington, Vt.) 1858-1894, 1892-01-22
SONS OF VERMONT
NEW YORK AND BROOKLYN.

again on Tuesday at Chicago, ILL.,, the
Sons of Vermont have held festivities,
that will become marked events in the
history of the year 1892 The former
was the occasion of the celebration of
Vermonts advent into the union 10l
years ago, and the latter was the tif-
teenth annual banquet of the. Chicago SO
ciety. Both of these events were noted
by us last week and reports of both have
been received. The Brooklyn affair was
attended by several from Vermont,
among whom was Gen. Mccullough of
this town. Over 200 guests sat down to
four tables. The pOst-prandal exercises
were presided over by President Robert
D. Benedict, brother of Col. Benedict
of the Free Press of Burlington. Space
does not permit this week of a full re-
port of the occasion, which we find fully
reported in the Brooklyn Sunday Citizen,
but we give a resume of the address of
our respected tOwnsman. Gen, j. G.Mc-
Cullough said, among other things, the
following:
Mr.. President Whatever the senti-
ment given tonight, | suppose, in fact
was told a little while ago that at this
festival and in this presence, Vermont
and her story was the legitimate and por
blhtllI IL uOU lllO OlllN lOdl "
mont at home or Vermont abroad.
And yet why sing her virtues and her
giories to an audience like this-an
audience that literally knows them by
heart-that began to learn them at the
same knee they heard recited - TEX and
Jill' and the other Mother Goose melo-
dies in the nursery, and the repetition of
which is but Teviving to the children OF
an elder growth the memories of their
boyhood. 1t is asked why? The story
is threadbare; so is that of William Tell
and Switzerland, And yet in the one
case as in the other, though old 1t Is eyer
young, though trite it is ever fresh, to
the true sons of each, and ever insuuc-
tive to each.
THIS is our night, this is the anniyer-
sary of the day when our ancestors de-
clared themselves independent-inde-
pendent of all earthly potentates and
powers. This is our privilege, our occa-
sion, and ours only. At the other dim
nors other societies may fitly sing their
own praises. At one, the proud
descendants of that power of which Mr..
Webster so grandly said, ''whose morn
ing drum-beat, following the sun, and
keeping company with the hours, circles
the earth with one continuous and un-
broken strain of the martial airs of Eng
land" may worship at the shrine of st.
George. AT another dinner the canny
Scotchman may eat his haggis Ito the
utter ruin of his gastric julce), and re-
fresh his recUllectiuns of Bruce and Wal
lace, and sing again in song and story of
those twin wizards OF The North, Barns
and Scott, and offer his devOtiOns at the
shrine of St. Andrew. At still third,
the devotees of st. Nicholas, smoking
their long pipes, in the midst of their
curling clouds. may retell the grand
story Of the heroic struggle chat is per-
sonilied in the life and deeds of VILLAIN
of 0ltt6gs tENiHie about the festal board
of fourth the rollicking and enthus-
iastic sons of st. Patrick may gather to
hear yet once again the fearful threnody
of the Emerald Isle, to the earsiof whose
sons, apparently, "there is nothing half
SO sweet in liIe'' as the repetition of the
sad story Of lreland's wrongs.
But here and tonight, st. George, ST.
Andrew, st. Nicholas and st. Pa rick
and all the other saints of the calendar
must stand aside and give room for
| Nermonts saint Or-Sinner, Ethan Allen.
| Not him alone Qor Vermont is not much
| given to hero Worship, not him alone,
| but her hundred other saints and heroes,
named and unnamed, known and I'M
| known, who were the founders and
| builders and defenders of that little
mountain commonwealth up among the
SHOWS of New England, whose proudest
| boast was ever that willie she tolerated
no slave within her borders, neither did
she acknowledge any master These
| heroes went into the wilderness, builded
! L, IN {
paid honestly once and only once for
| their titles, and when unjustly assailed
maintained their rights against all
corners, and stood for their own as firm
as rock-ribbed Mansfield itself.
For twenty-five years and more they
| kept up the unequal contest These
rough and ready, sturdy and stalwart
| patriots met, and met successfully every
demandupon their resources. In Council
| Chamber, though unpublished, they
| solved the weightest problems of state.
craft; in the field, though unversed in
| the science OF war, they faced without
fear and triumphed eventually over every
! foe from whatever quarter. While New
| York was laying claim, in her modest
way, to their whole territory, while
Massachusetts,, with her accustomed am
| bitiOn, was encroachlng on their south
ern border, while New Hampshire Qike
! the stepmOther), was asserting her right
to reclaim the grants, your Spartan an
| cestry were not only holding them all at
bay, but were anxiouswith brave heartand
swift foot to assist them all in repeling
the encroachments Of the common enemy
beyond the sea; and the news of Lexing-
ton aud Concord Dong before EmersOn's
shot was "heard round the worldly had
no sooner crossed the Green Mountains
than Crown Point and Ticonderoga fell.
They were at Bennington, TOO, and Bemis
Heights and wherever and whenever a
blow was to be struck for the general
cause, there were to be found the Green
Mountain boys.
Then why, ask again, have you, their
descendants, not right to brag little
1t is said yOu were small in territory
little in numbers. Sparta was small
too, and there were but 800 at Their
mOpylR. Yet the fame of Thermopyla
has Tung down the centuries.
But more, while these men of grit and
pluck, of biawn and brain were lighting
the very elements often for the right oi
themselves and their families to subsist
and were fighting their cOvetous neigh
bOrs to the east and west and south OI
them for their titles and fresides and
homes, and were fighting the British to
the north of them and wherever they
could find them, for their liberties, they
were at the same time conserving anC
maturing, through those twin nurserie,
of freedom, the Town Meeting and the