I must offer as an apology the fact, that though myself a cultivator
of the soil, my mind has for several years been given so much to
political subjects, that in speaking without having previously
arranged what to say, the thought inadvertently runs from the matter I
wished to present, into collateral questions of governmental concern.
Before turning back, however, into the original channel, permit me to
say that the diversity of which I have been speaking, formed no small
inducement to the union of the States, and that it has been through
that union that we have attained to our present position, and stand
to-day, all things considered, the happiest, and among the greatest in
the family of nations.

In looking around upon the evidences you have brought of mechanical
and agricultural improvement, I have viewed it not with the curiosity
of a stranger, but with the interest of one who felt that he had a
part in it, as an exhibition of the prosperity of his country. The
whole confederacy is my country, and to the innermost fibres of my
heart I love it all, and every part. I could not if I would, and would
not if I could, dwarf myself to mere sectionality. My first allegiance
is to the State of which I am a citizen, and to which by affection and
association I am personally bound; but this does not obstruct the
perception of your greatness, or admiration for much which I have
found admirable among you.

Yankee is a word once applied to you as a term of reproach, but you
have made it honorable and renowned. You have borne the flag of your
country from the time when it was ridiculed as a piece of striped
bunting, until it has come to be known and respected wherever the ray
of civilization has reached; and your canvass-winged birds of commerce
have borne civilization into regions, where it is not boasting to say,