d
station, and everything that makes life pleasant, you are not the same
persons physically, though you profess the same principles, yet as
prudent men, you employ more policemen in New York--a larger proportion
to the inhabitants of your city than the whole army of the United States
bears to the people of the United States. You have no Indians here,
though you have "scalpers." [Applause and laughter.] You have no
"road-agents" here, and yet you keep your police; and so does our
Government keep a police force where there are real Indians and real
road-agents, and you, gentlemen, who sit here at this table to-night who
have contributed of your means whereby railroads have been built across
the continent, know well that this little army, which I represent here
to-night, is at this moment guarding these great roadways against
incursions of desperate men who would stop the cars and interfere with
the mails and travel, which would paralyze the trade and commerce of the
whole civilized world, that now passes safely over the great Pacific
road, leading to San Francisco. Others are building roads north and
south, over which we soldiers pass almost yearly, and there also you
will find the blue-coats to-day, guarding the road, not for their
advantage, or their safety, but for your safety, for the safety of your
capital.

So long as there is such a thing as money, there will be people trying
to get that money; they will struggle for it, and they will die for it
sometimes. We are a good-enough people, a better people it may be than
those of England, or France, though some doubt it. Still we believe
ourselves a higher race of people than have ever been produced by any
concatenation of events before. [Laughter.] We claim to be, and whether
it be due to the ministers of New England, or to the higher type of
manhood, of which Mr. Beecher speaks--which latter doctrine I prefer to
submit to--I don't care which, there is in human nature a spark of
mischief, a spark of danger, which in the aggregate will make force as
necessary for the government of mankind as the Almighty finds the
electric fluid necessary to clear the atmosphere. [Applause.]

You speak in your toast of "honored names"; you are more familiar with
the history of your country than I am, and know that the brightest pages
have been written on the battle-field. Is there a New Englander here who
would wipe "Bunker Hill" from his list for any price in Wall Street? Not
one of y