President's Address. 11 



have given a succinct account of some of the sources to which 

 our family traces its origin. Of course, there are other sources 

 if we cared to deal with our English or Scotch lines of descent ; 

 but enough has perhaps been said to show what variety of blood 

 has from time to time entered into our national life. In our own 

 case, Flanders, France, German Switzerland, as well as England 

 and Scotland, have been contributors ; whilst the one bond which 

 has bound all together has been the bond of the Reformed Faith. 

 In one product of your Scottish industry much stress is often laid 

 upon the importance of a judicious blend ripened by age. We 

 need not, I think, be ashamed of the blend which I have been 

 describing. Whether it has been ripened by age I will not say, it 

 certainly has stood the test of years ; and we, the descendants, 

 may well be content to walk in the faith and follow the example 

 of those who have gone before us. In tracing up the story of 

 our family life one fact stands out in view, viz., that in a sense 

 we owe much as a family to the tyrannical monarchs of France 

 and Spain. Indeed, but for the persecution waged against the 

 Huguenots our family would have had no existence, certainly not 

 in its present form. But for Philip and the Inquisition, the de 

 Bailleuls, rooted for centuries in ths soil of Flanders, would 

 certainly not have sold their ancestral possessions and crossed 

 the border into France ; and again, but for the persecuting spirit 

 of the French king they would not have again struck their 

 tents, and, crossing the seas, sought refuge in England. 



Again, if it had not been for Louis XIV. the Calais merchant 

 would not have crossed the channel to Dover. He was carrying 

 on a thriving business in France ; he evidently clung fondly to his 

 native land ; but bonds and imprisonment compelled him to act 

 upon our Lord's maxim, " When they persecute you in this city, 

 flee ye into another ; " and thus a second Huguenot family, driven 

 from its own land by the wicked policy of a short-sighted intoler- 

 ance, found a home in England. Whilst again, if the banking 

 house had not been established by the refugees in Dover, the son of 

 the Mulhausen manufacturer would never have been sent to make 

 his fortune there ; for the house, to the headship of which he rose, 

 would have had no existence. And, to carry the sequence one 

 step further, but for the modest but fructifying fortune which he 

 left Maswelton would have been sold to pay the ruinous calls of 

 £2600 per share, on the failure of what Burns called " that villain- 



