therefore regarded as half a countrywoman. We talked a good deal
together, and I confided to her my annoyance at the prospect of being
called up to answer a toast; but she did not pity me at all, though she
felt, much alarm about her husband, Captain ------, who was in the same
predicament. Seriously, it is the most awful part of my official duty,--
this necessity of making dinner-speeches at the Mayor's, and other public
or semi-public tables. However, my neighborhood to Mrs. ------ was good
for me, inasmuch as by laughing over the matter with her came to regard
it in a light and ludicrous way; and so, when the time actually came, I
stood up with a careless dare-devil feeling. The chairman toasted the
president immediately after the Queen, and did me the honor to speak of
myself in a most flattering manner, something like this: "Great by his
position under the Republic,--greater still, I am bold to say, in the
Republic of letters!" I made no reply at all to this; in truth, I forgot
all about it when I began to speak, and merely thanked the company in
behalf of the President, and my countrymen, and made a few remarks with
no very decided point to them. However, they cheered and applauded, and
I took advantage of the applause to sit down, and Mrs. ------ informed me
that I had succeeded admirably. It was no success at all, to be sure;
neither was it a failure, for I had aimed at nothing, and I had exactly
hit it. But after sitting down, I was conscious of an enjoyment in
speaking to a public assembly, and felt as if I should like to rise
again. It is something like being under fire,--a sort of excitement, not
exactly pleasure, but more piquant than most pleasures. I have felt this
before, in the same circumstances; but, while on my legs, my impulse is
to get through with my remarks and sit down again as quickly as possible.
The next speech, I think, was by Rev. Dr. ------, the celebrated Arctic
gentleman, in reply to a toast complimentary to the clergy. He turned
aside from the matter in hand, to express his kind feelings towards
America, where he said he had been most hospitably received, especially