master from the risk to which a character wrung from a former weak master, by the importunities of an undeserving servant, may expose him. Nor is it a small benefit to be conferred upon the servant, to enable him, by appealing to a long record of former services, to redeem the disqualification which a single fault might bring upon him.

Should we only succeed in inducing the public at large to consider all these points, we shall have the satisfaction of having furthered the interests of a class which we find recorded in the Report of the last Census as the most numerous in the British population.

I shall now call upon the Secretary to lay before you more in detail the points which I have slightly touched upon.

AT THE ENTERTAINMENT GIVEN BY

THE MERCHANT TAILORS' COMPANY.

[JUNE 11TH, 1849.]

I

GENTLEMEN,

THANK

you sincerely for your expressions of kindness and cordiality towards me. Although I have on former occasions met you in this room, it has always been for some charitable purpose, witnessing with delight the readiness with which this, and indeed all the great corporations of London, open the doors of their magnificent Halls at the call of charity. To-day I am here as a Brother Freeman of your Corporation, fulfilling a promise made from the time that you received me into your body. I am ashamed to own how long ago. I beg you not to measure, by the tardiness of my appearance, the value which I attach to the honour which you then conferred upon me, by electing me a Freeman of the Merchant Tailors' Company.

I remember well with what regret, when, shortly after I came of age, the Companies of the

Goldsmiths and of the Fishmongers offered me their freedom, I found myself compelled to decline this honour, being informed that, identified as they were by historical tradition, and still representing two opposite political parties, I could make a choice only of one of them, and, fully sensible that, like the Sovereign to whom I had just been united, and to devote my whole existence to whom it had become my privilege, I could belong only to the nation at large, free from the trammels and above the dissensions of political parties.

I well remember, too, how much pleased I was when the two Companies, waiving some of their statutes, finally agreed both to receive me amongst them; and my satisfaction is heightened when I consider that I owe to that decision the

advantage of finding myself associated with you also.

Anybody may indeed feel proud to be enrolled a member of a Company which can boast of uninterrupted usefulness and beneficence during four centuries, and holds to this day the same honourable position in the estimation of the country which it did in the time of its first formation, although the progress of civilization and wealth has so vastly raised the community

around it, exemplifying the possibility, in this happy country, of combining the general progress of mankind with a due reverence for the institutions, and even forms, which have been bequeathed to us by the piety and wisdom of our forefathers.

Let us join in the hope that this Corporation. may continue in its charitable functions to be equally an object of respect to our children and children's children, and so drink "Prosperity to "the Merchant Tailors' Company."

ON PRESENTING COLOURS TO THE

23RD REGIMENT, ROYAL WELSH FUSILIERS.

[JULY 12TH, 1849.]

SOLDIERS OF THE ROYAL WELSH FUSILIERS, THE ceremony which we are performing this

day is a most important, and, to every soldier, a sacred one. It is the transmission to your care and keeping of the Colours which are henceforth to be borne before you, which will be the symbol of your honour, the rallying point in all moments of danger.

I feel most proud to be the person who is to transmit these Colours to a Regiment so renowned for its valour, fortitude, steadiness, and discipline.

In looking over the records of your services, I could not refrain from extracting a few, which show your deeds to have been intimately connected with all the great periods in our history. The Regiment was raised in 1688. Its existence therefore began with the settlement of the liberties of the country. It fought at the Boyne