Connecticut western news., 1910-12-08
MALE PILGRIMS FAT
ENJOYABLE FEATURES AT
 BROTHERHOOD DINNER
Chicken Feast With all the Trimmings and Toasts-0psonic Indexes, Little Red School Houses and Little Old Towns Shown Up.


 Towns Shown Up.
 The second annual Pilgrim Brother hood dinner, given in the dining rooms of Pilgrim church, Tuesday evening, was notable success, and insures the per manency of this feature of Pilgrim church usefulness and activity. About fifty men were present, mostly members of the church. but some of whom were outsiders" having no home church af' fliations in Canaan.
 The banquet was a chicken supper, abundantly provided and efficiently served by pious male help" and it was attacked with relish that indicated a long season of fasting on the part of more than one among those present A copious supply of ginger ale figured among the trimmings of the feast, and by special dispens ltion the guests were allowed to smoke if they had anything to smoke a.-
 The feast was followed by after. dinner toasts. The Rev. MT. Gillette officiated as toastmaster, and he did it up brown, punctuating his introductions with wit and anecdote that. brought the sacred house down and kept the festive brother hood in the best of humor. The first speaker called on was Professor Vogel, superintendent of schools. who responded to the toast, "The Little Red School house" and while giving due credit to the important part the little red school house has played in developing the minds and moulding the characters of some of the nations exalted, he stood for the progressive in educati onaI methods and invironment, aud for something better for this and succeeding generations than the little red school-house and the curri- cnlnm and birch-rod rule that were its assets
 Principal Eldridge, of Canaan High School, spoke on "The Boys" and his handling of tine subject indicated not only that he knows and understands boys, but that he is competent to win their sympathies, their confidence, and their affections, and understands the se- cret,of handling them ill a way to enlist their interest ill their own work and bring out the best that IS in them.
 A. V. A. Felten, who was introduced as member of John Moneymaker mercantile establishment, was scheduled to talk on "The Trolley" Felten started by saying he could think of noGhing to say, and wound up by making tip-top speech on his subject, in which he naiu- tained that despite the croaking of the croakers, the coming of the trolley would be benefit to the town, business-wise and every otherwise.
 Dr. Adam was confronted by the tosstmaster with the subject, ''Our Opsonic Index" but it never feazed him. He tackled it with strangle-hold and showed himself its master from the strike of the gong, and before he had been wrestling with it two minutes it was plain to the Brotherhood that it was 8 one- sided contest. He called it names in Latin, he swatted it in the jaw with Greek, he upper-cut it in Turkish-Mo- rocco, then he wiped the floor with it in plain Pilgrim English. He told what it was and what it wasn't, revealing it in it's true coIors so clearly that every man present now thoroughly understands that in a general way, the opsonic index is the thing you get well with W ,an you re sick if it's in good shape, and the thing you get sick with when you re well if there's hole in it. He used the opsonic index as 8 symbol in referring to the indications of moral health in a community, ,and his address was through. out not only intensely interesting but instructive.
 s The star feature of the event was the response by the Rev. J. O. Goddard of Salisbury, to the toast, "The Little Country Town" It was an intellectual treat, deserving a verbatim report which unfortunately is out of the question here. The talk was interspersed with that rare and spontaneous wit and humor for which the speaker is famous, aud it must have inspired in every iis- tener higher appreciation of the dig nifty, the importance and the true worth of the little towns of Connecticut, re- gardless of census increase or decrease.
 MT. Gillette has every reason to feel gratified at the success of the affair and no less so the committees to whose cooperation the credit is largely due. The supper. committee was composed of E. B. Rowe, Samuel Reel, Allyn Fuller and Harry Holt. Dining room com- mittee, Robert D. Peirce, Heerman Lansing and Lester Adams. Reception committee George Mather and Harry Lyles. Rev. MT. Gillette, as program committee, had laid out the general plan of campaign and furnished advice. aid and comfort to the other committees.
 The committee elected after the speak ing, to arrange for the next function of the brotherhood, was composed of Messrs George R. Fuller, Heerman Lansing and A. P. Freeman.