Mr. Presd.
Nothing can be more embarrassing,
however complimentary it may be, than
to be expected suddenly to reply to a 
toast of a personal character like
that which has been just proposed.
I find it difficult to do so in
appropriate language but I should
be ungrateful if I did not endeavor
to thank my friend who has so
kindly noticed me & to make
my acknowledgements to the
Company for the polite & genuine
manner in which they have
been pleased to accept his
sentiment. [?] Mr. Prst
while I am thus ready to [...]
my obligations I wish it also
to be understood that I am
perfectly sensible of being [ind...]
for the opportunity of doing so to
the courtesy & to the [general] influences
of the occasion rather than to [...]
special deserving of my [...]
[either] in my rare opinion or
on the [structure] of [...]. What
can I say more than this briefly
to [s...] my thanks? If I [...]
a [...] - a Hero - a
statesman identified with some
great public gesture - or were a
great Traveller who had

wanderd thro the world & read the
great Book of [...] Life in
all languages & in all Lands,
I might be permitted to talk in
with about myself, and to [do...]
with complacent unity or perhaps [...] on the
past I had performed or was
performing. But alas, I must
on all candor admit that [...]
[...] will d[...] me - never
having fought the Mexicans or
have had no [...] to become a
[...] - among the [...] in
the office of the Clerks of the

topic. This is the first time I have had
the pleasure to participate in this
Anniversary Banquet of the
[] Society. I do so now
by right of membership accorded
to me within the past year. I 
desire to state here, Mr. President
& Gentlemen that the privilege of
membership is this ancient & honorable
Society thus accorded to me, I gain
as a gratifying evidence of your
[fairly] [] [] & esteem. &
let me add that it is a privi-
ledge upon which I shall
now place a high value.
Since I first resided in Phila
I have recognized the Society
as occupying a foremost position
of [] & []
among the hundred social &
benevolent Societies of the
Country. In point of age-in
point of numbers. Looking in
the past to the general character
of those whose names may
be [] on the lists of mem-
bership-lists []
hundreds of noble hearted, intelli-
gent & patriotic men. Con-
templating its present []
condition-the worth & wealth &
talent to which it can justly
[] [], & above all remembering

those glorious principles of Brotherhood
& charity on which it now rests, &
has [] rested [] [] & in
maintaining that the [Hibeenia]
Society may rank the equal
of any similar philanthropic as-
sociation in the Land. So then
anything nobler than the object:
it desires to serve, & as this
anything purer than []
[] of social good feeling,
fraternal regard & action, [-
...ing] benevolence is the
cause of the unfortunate []
to be cultivated here. The [Hibeenia] Society may be [] among the first of those
many societies founded on similar
principles, spread throughout the
[] & making to a certain
[] the distinction. Races
of [] [] [] []
is [] the vital powers
of whom only [] & []
is charity in its most [carefree]
[] [source]. Such societies
everywhere have my best wishes.
They should be encouraged not
only for the private good they
accomplish, but as []
that [] greatly to the Public
Benefit in a strictly public
sense. In their peculiar Economy
they evoke the best feelings of
those connected with them, equally
as [] as men & as Philanthropists