But while not forgetting the posterity, it is not forbidden at these dinners to make an occasional and casual allusion to the Pilgrim Fathers.  Thackeray tells us of an ardent young lady who had a devotion of the same sort to “Nicholas Nickleby.”  When she wanted instruction, she read “Nicholas Nickleby.”  When she wanted amusement, she read “Nicholas Nickleby.”  When she had leisure, she read “Nicholas Nickleby.”  When she was busy, she read “Nicholas Nickleby.”  When she was sick, she read “Nicholas Nickleby,” and when she got well, she read “Nicholas Nickleby” over again. [Laughter.] We return with the same infrequent, inconstant and uncertain fidelity to the memory of the Pilgrim Fathers.  If we seek the light persiflage and airy humor of the after-dinner spirit, we find an inexhaustible fountain in the quaint customs and odd conceits of the Pilgrim Fathers.  If we seek the enkindling fire and the moral elevation of high principle and profound conviction and resolute courage, we find a never-ceasing inspiration in the unfaltering earnestness and imperishable deeds of the Pilgrim Fathers. [Applause.] After praying for all the rest of mankind, the good colored preacher closed up with the invocation “And, finally, O Lord! bless the people of the uninhabited portions of the globe.” [Laughter.] We are sometimes as comprehensive in our good-will as the colored brother; but to-night we fix our thoughts upon that more limited portion of mankind which belongs in nativity or ancestry to that more restricted part of the globe known as New England.

We are here to sing the praises of these sturdy people.  They, too, sang—­and sang with a fervor that was celebrated in the memorable inscription on one of the pews of old Salem Church:—­

  “Could poor King David but for once
    To Salem Church repair,
  And hear his Psalms thus warbled out,
    Good Lord! how he would swear.”

And it was not in Salem Church, either, that the Psalms were sung with the peculiar variations of which we have record.  An enterprising establishment proposed to furnish all the hymn-books to a congregation not abundantly blessed with this world’s goods, provided it might insert a little advertisement.  The thrifty congregation in turn thought there would be no harm in binding up any proper announcement with Watt and Doddridge; but when they assembled on Christmas morning, they started back aghast as they found themselves singing—­

  “Hark!  The herald angels sing,
    Beecham’s Pills are just the thing;
  Peace on earth and mercy mild,
    Two for man and one for child.”

But if the Pilgrim Fathers were not the sweetest warblers, they at least never wobbled.  They always went direct to their mark.  As Emerson said of Napoleon, they would shorten a straight line to get at a point.  They faced the terrors of the New England northeast blast and starved in the wilderness in order that we might live in freedom.  We have literally turned the tables on them and patiently endure the trying hardships of this festive board in order that their memories may not die in forgetfulness.