friends, for I can, I assure you, fully appreciate your undertaking, and honestly congratulate you on your success.

It must have cost you some hesitation and regret to separate yourselves from a hall in which your forefathers had feasted the first Kings of the House of Stuart, and in which they, as well as yourselves, habitually met for business and recreation. But the marks of man, like the organic bodies in nature, to be preserved require to be continually renewed, and thus alone resist the destructive tendency of time; and you determined (as we see to-day) to follow Nature also in the law of increase, and to show that you have grown and expanded within these two hundred years. Your desire to see me amongst you upon this occasion, which I must attribute to your loyalty to the Queen, and my pleasure in responding to your call, proves, at the same time, that those feelings of mutual regard and affection which subsisted two hundred years ago between these great and wealthy companies, these little independent republics of the City of London, and the Crown, have withstood the effects of time, are living, ay-and I trust are even grown in intensity and warmth. In such feelings we gladly recognize one of the essential conditions

of the political and social life of a free and prosperous nation.

May these blessings be preserved to this favoured land from generation to generation! and may this Corporation, of which I feel proud to have by your kindness been admitted to-day as a member, live and prosper on, as one of the important links which connect succeeding generations with those which have long passed away!

Let me drink to the health of our Master and Wardens, and Prosperity to the "Clothworkers' Company!"

66

AT THE

BANQUETING-ROOM, ST. JAMES'S PALACE,

ON THE OCCASION OF THE

200TH ANNIVERSARY OF THE FORMATION OF THE GRENADIER GUARDS.

[JUNE 16TH, 1860.]

GENTLEMEN,

1.

"THE QUEEN."

2.

I

AM much obliged to Colonel Lewis for the kind terms in which he has proposed to you to drink my health, and much gratified at the feelings which you have evinced by the manner in which you have responded to his proposal.

Gentlemen!—I was justly proud of the distinguished honour conferred upon me when I was appointed, eight years ago, to succeed the

immortal Duke of Wellington in the command of this regiment, and of having since held this honourable post, which connects me with you, not only officially, but on terms of intimate and I hope cordial personal relations; but it is on an occasion like the present that the consideration must rise to my mind in its full force,-what honour and distinction is involved in the title of Colonel of the Grenadier Guards.

We are assembled to celebrate the 200th Anniversary of the formation of the Regiment as at present constituted 200 years, which embrace the most glorious period of the history of our country—and in the most glorious events of this history the Regiment has borne an important and distinguished part. It has fought at sea and on land, in most parts of Europe, in Africa and America; and, whether fighting the French, Dutch, Spaniards, Moors, Turks, or Russians, it has stood to its colours, upheld the honour of the British name, and powerfully contributed to those successes which have, under God's blessing, made that name stand proudly forth amongst the nations of the earth.

I need not recall to your recollection its deeds, which must be all present to your minds, but I cannot forego on such an occasion pointing at

R

least to some of the most important of the long and uninterrupted list of victories with which the Grenadier Guards have been associated. I must point to the celebrated siege and capture of Namur, the first defence of Gibraltar, the capture of Barcelona and Valencia, the battles of Blenheim, Ramillies, Oudenarde, and Malplaquet, the battle of Dettingen, ay! and of Fontenoy, where, though the victory did not ultimately remain with the Allies, it was fairly won, as far as the English were concerned, and that by the conspicuous prowess of the Grenadier Guards! the capture of Cherbourg, which, just a century ago, looked grimly across at our shores; the battles in Germany under the Marquis of Granby; the battle of Lincelles; those of Corunna, Barrosa, and the Pyrenees; the capture of St. Sebastian; battles of Nive and Nivelle, and of Waterloo, in which last great struggle with Napoleon the Regiment acquired the title of Grenadier Guards, from having defeated, in fair fight, those noble and devoted grenadiers of his Imperial Guard, who, till met by the British bayonet, had been considered invincible; and more lately the battles of the Alma and of Inkerman, and the longprotracted siege of Sevastopol.