direction, is not to be compared with the experience of the
perpetual president of a society like this. Having on previous
occasions said everything about it that he could possibly find to
say, he is again produced, with the same awful formalities, to say
everything about it that he cannot possibly find to say. It struck
me, when Dr. F. Jones was referring just now to Easter Monday, that
the case of such an ill-starred president is very like that of the
stag at Epping Forest on Easter Monday. That unfortunate animal
when he is uncarted at the spot where the meet takes place,
generally makes a point, I am told, of making away at a cool trot,
venturesomely followed by the whole field, to the yard where he
lives, and there subsides into a quiet and inoffensive existence,
until he is again brought out to be again followed by exactly the
same field, under exactly the same circumstances, next Easter
Monday.

The difficulties of the situation--and here I mean the president
and not the stag--are greatly increased in such an instance as this
by the peculiar nature of the institution. In its unpretending
solidity, reality, and usefulness, believe me--for I have carefully
considered the point--it presents no opening whatever of an
oratorical nature. If it were one of those costly charities, so
called, whose yield of wool bears no sort of proportion to their
cry for cash, I very likely might have a word or two to say on the
subject. If its funds were lavished in patronage and show, instead
of being honestly expended in providing small annuities for hard-
working people who have themselves contributed to its funds--if its
management were intrusted to people who could by no possibility
know anything about it, instead of being invested in plain,
business, practical hands--if it hoarded when it ought to spend--if