42 ROYAL ROCK BEAGLE HUNT. 



expressing my deep sense of your kindness. But, gentlemen, be assured of this, 

 that though unable adequately to convey to you my gratitude, the feeling is 

 there, and so long as this heart is allowed to beat, so long will the remembrance 

 of this day be indelibly stamped upon it. Gentlemen, I must candidly and 

 openly confess (and it is no mock humility which induces me to say so), that I 

 feel a sort of shame in receiving the high and distinguished honour you now 

 confer upon me. I have done so little to merit it at your hands, that it seems as 

 if I were appropriating a compliment which ought never to belong to me. I 

 cannot boast of any great or public acts to win your approbation. Beyond the 

 immediate circle of my friends my name even is unknown, and I can but feel 

 that this great and undeserved compliment is owing, not to my own merit, but 

 to the warmth of your own hearts. You must have known and felt how 

 gratifying so public a demonstration of your kindly feelings would be ; what a 

 lasting subject of delightful and proud recollection it would ever afford ; and 

 without weighing the merits of the receiver, your kind hearts dictated the 

 compliment. This idea, gentlemen, only renders it more gratifying, for I read 

 in the events of this evening, and above all in the right hearty greeting with 

 which you received my health, I read it, I say, with pride and pleasure, that 

 though I cannot boast of public services, I have so conducted myself in private 

 life as to win your good opinion and esteem, an esteem which though I have 

 done little to merit, at least I have done nothing to forfeit. Gentlemen, it is 

 now hardly eight years since I came to Liverpool, unknown to all, and without 

 one friend in this great Metropolis of the North. Could I dream that I should 

 so soon be able to boast of seeing myself surrounded by so many warm and 

 valued ones as I behold on this occasion ? Gentlemen, be assured that no time, 

 no distance, and no circumstances, prosperous or adverse, can efface the re- 

 membrance of your kindness this evening. There is not one present of whom 

 I shall not have some agreeable moments to remind me. With some I have 

 engaged in public, with others in the whirl of private business. With many I 

 have shared the healthful sports of the field, or the still more pleasing delight 

 of social intimacy ; and I say to all, that the distinguished honour you have 

 conferred upon me will but make me more anxious so to conduct myself in 

 future years, as never to give you cause for being ashamed of having this 

 evening given me so public a mark of your regard and esteem. It needed not 

 this compliment to ensure the remembrance of such friends, and deeply do I 

 regret being obliged to leave those I esteem so highly. Gentlemen, most warmly 

 and heartily I thank you. May every blessing, this and a future world can give, 

 be yours ; and believe, that one of my greatest pleasures will be to hear and 

 know that you, my kind and valued friends, are happy. May God bless you all. 



After the toasts of the Chairman and the Ladies, the Landlords of Wirral 

 was the next toast, given by the Vice-Chairman, Mr. Thomas Littledale, and 

 responded to by John R. Shaw, Esq., of Arrowe Hall, who concluded by pro- 

 posing, " Continued success to the Royal Rock Beagles," and assured the 

 members of the Hunt whom he saw around him that he, as one of the land- 

 owners of Wirral, would always feel great pleasure to see them cross his land. 

 This toast having been received with great cheering, was replied to by Mr. 

 Alfred Waltord, on behalf of the members of the Hunt. 



Robert Christie, Jun., then rose and presented Mr. Rawson with a splendid 

 picture in testimony of the high opinion entertained of that gentleman by his 

 friends. In the course of the discharge of that duty he said. My dear Rawson, 

 the pleasing duty has been most kindly assigned me of presenting to you on 

 this occasion, in the name of those assembled, and of many other friends unable 

 to be with us this evening, a testimonial of regard at parting. I am not suffi- 



