The night of the "comic oration" is come, and the speaker is
arranging his back hair in the star dressing-room of the theatre.
The orchestra is playing selections from the Gentile opera of "Un
Ballo in Maschera," and the house is full. Mr. John F. Caine, the
excellent stage manager, has given me an elegant drawing-room scene
in which to speak my little piece.

[In Iowa, I once lectured in a theatre, and the heartless manager
gave me a dungeon scene.]

The curtain goes up, and I stand before a Salt Lake of upturned
faces.

I can only say that I was never listened to more attentively and
kindly in my life than I was by this audience of Mormons.

Among my receipts at the box-office this night were--

20 bushels of wheat.
5 bushels of corn.
4 bushels of potatoes.
2 bushels of oats.
4 bushels of salt.
2 hams.
1 live pig (Dr. Hingston chained him in the box-office.)
1 wolf-skin.
5 pounds of honey in the comb.
16 strings of sausages--2 pounds to the string.
1 cat-skin.
1 churn (two families went in on this; it is an ingenious churn,