o prove the truth or to expose the falsehood of
the old proverb which adorns your menu, and it is commonly the case with
sayings that are supposed to represent the wisdom of the ages, that the
one may as readily be established as the other. It might be suggested by
one of sceptical mind that the saying that "as the twig is bent the
tree's inclined," may not be literally true as applied to this company
and this occasion; on the contrary, might it not be true that if your
early Dutch ancestors could come back and gaze for a moment upon this
sumptuous banquet and these gorgeous surroundings, their first impulse,
in accordance with the frugal simplicity of their lives and their
habits, would be to repudiate it, and repudiate their descendants, with
reprehension and with horror? [Laughter.] And would they not straightway
proceed, had they the power, to enact such sumptuary laws as should
confine you all henceforth and for evermore, to the same simple fare
upon which they and their children throve a couple of centuries ago?

Yet, Mr. President, by whatever strange process of evolution the simple
festivities of the first settlers upon this island may have grown into
an occasion so distinguished as this, I conceive that, after all, the
adage which you quote is well applied and has a serious meaning; for
despite the lapse of time and the introduction of new races of men, New
York is the child of Nieuw Amsterdam--and how the child has outgrown the
parent!

I believe it to be true, sir, that New York to-day bears more traces of
the less than fifty years of Dutch government than of the more than one
hundred years of British rule which followed. New York is, indeed,
erected upon the foundation of Nieuw Amsterdam; yet how impossible to
compare the New York of to-day with the original settlement established
by your forefathers. As well might we compare the great gathering of the
navies of the world which occurred in the Hudson River a year ago with
the first expedition sent hither by their High Mightinesses the
States-General two hundred and fifty years before. New York to-day,
grown up from the Nieuw Amsterdam of a former generation, is a great
emporium and a mighty city. To appreciate the greatness and the
swiftness of its growth, we must recall that since this century began
its population has increased more than twenty-fold. When this city and
its vicinity shall once more have doubled their inhabitants, the result
will be the form