expect to enjoy in a New England Society even when Mr. Choate addresses you—­the privilege of never being able to understand a word that is said by the speakers after dinner.  But we had to hurry home.  We were Republicans, and there was going to be an election in November.  We didn’t suppose that our votes would be necessary at all; still it would look well, you know, to come home and swell the Republican majority. [Laughter.] Now when you get on that ship to come back, you begin for the first time to appreciate the advantage of the steam lanes that are laid down by the steamship company, by which a vessel goes to Europe one season over one route and comes back another season over another route, so that a man who goes to Europe one season and comes back another is treated to another change of scenery along the entire route. [Laughter.]

As I said, we thought it was the thing for Republicans to come home to vote.  At the polls we found it was rather the thing for them to stay away.  But we acted upon that impulse which often seizes upon the human breast—­the desire to come home to die.  I never for one moment realized the overwhelming defeat that we were going to suffer until one day Mr. Choate confided to me his determination to speak for the Citizens’ candidate. [Loud laughter.] And this left us the day after that election and left the other members of our party standing around the highways and byways with that one supplication upon each one’s lips:  “Lord, be merciful unto me a Republican and a sinner.” [Loud applause and laughter.]

* * * * *

WOMAN

[Speech of Horace Porter at the seventy-eighth annual dinner of the New England Society in the City of New York, December 22, 1883.  The President, Marvelle W. Cooper, in introducing the speaker, arose, mentioned the single word “Woman”—­and said:  “This toast will be responded to by one whom you know well, General Horace Porter.”]

MR. PRESIDENT AND GENTLEMEN:—­When this toast was proposed to me, I insisted that it ought to be responded to by a bachelor, by some one who is known as a ladies’ man; but in these days of female proprietorship it is supposed that a married person is more essentially a ladies’ man than anybody else, and it was thought that only one who had had the courage to address a lady could have the courage, under these circumstances, to address the New England Society. [Laughter.]

The toast, I see, is not in its usual order to-night.  At public dinners this toast is habitually placed last on the list.  It seems to be a benevolent provision of the Committee on Toasts in order to give man in replying to Woman one chance at least in life of having the last word. [Laughter.] At the New England dinners, unfortunately the most fruitful subject of remark regarding woman is not so much her appearance as her disappearance.  I know that this was remedied