SOLON ROBINSON, 1847 83 



seen the progress of the settlement of this county from 

 the first commencement up to the spring of 1847. What 

 a change, what a wonderful change in 12 years — Who can 

 realise it — and yet the change in the next 12 years will 

 be still greater — can you realise that — no-no-no. 



I am aware that much that I have here said to you is 

 now uninteresting, because you say — "Why I knew that 

 before" — but let me assure you that if these leaves could 

 be sealed up for one hundred years, and then opened and 

 read to an audience in this town, that little merit as they 

 possess, they would excite the most profound interest in 

 all who should hear. And it is not improbable but that 

 they might be now read with interest, a thousand miles 

 from here — 



I have only written for a beginning of the history of 

 Lake County, will you all now help to continue the record. 

 Remember that we are all rapidly passing away, and in a 

 few years the place that now knows us will know us no 

 more, and those that come after us will not know these 

 things. We plant trees — we build houses — we make 

 farms for those who are to fill our places — And why not 

 write our early history. I am aware that this sketch is 

 a meager one. But I could not make it more full without 

 fear of tiring your patience — But each one of you can 

 make additions, leave the facts upon record & believe me 

 that the time will come when they will all be more inter- 

 esting, than this, my first effort, has been to you. 



Though from the attention with which you have 

 listened to me, I have reason to hope that I have helped 

 you to pass an evening more pleasantly & more profitably, 

 than those do who spend their days and nights in seeking 

 pleasures by steeping their senses in the ruinous forget- 

 fulness of beastly drunkenness. 



That you may all live to see the day when drunkenness 

 shall be among the things that once were but now are not, 

 is the most ardent wish of your friend and fellow laborer 

 in the good cause in which the Lake County Temperance 

 Society are now engaged in trying to promote. 



