'he €!ommerce, Mayigation 



inisiiElI=LIE]S 



OF- 



STJI^IJ^OUjI^ OOXJISTTY" 



;0N. ^ENRY ^. JEEVES. 



THERE is a French saying, whose age not less than its manifest merit 

 entitles it to respect, that whoever essays to excuse himself thereby 

 becomes his own accuser. I recognize the full force of this truth, yet 

 I am constrained to incur the risk and accept the condemnation it implies. 

 Indeed, I freely confess that no one of this audience, even while the dis- 

 appointment that doubtless awaits them is fresh in mind, can be more swift 

 or less sparing in sentence than is the culprit who stands before them, while 

 I realize the rashness and improvidence of which I was guilty when, at the 

 instance of your committee, I weakly consented to stand in the gap of 

 some better man and to undertake a task of which I then had but a dim and 

 distant appreciation. I yielded to importunity and fell a victim to my own 

 complaisance, mainly because I then supposed that, whatever anticipated 

 obstacles might arise from the lack of suitable preparation, by reason of 

 any adequate previous familiarity with the topics to be treated, and from 

 want of time in the midst of other engrossing cares and duties, to bestow 

 the proper deliberation and thought upon those topics, there would be no 

 serious difficulty in gathering the material of facts and figures out of which 

 to construct a sufficient framework for future elaboration — the foundation 

 stones on which to build, if not a palace to be admired in the daylight, at 

 least a modest dwelling in which to be comfortably housed and entertained 

 for a single evening. But on proceeding to act upon this idea and to 

 search out the necessary data and statistics which I had thought to be 

 readily available, I was, to my great surprise as well as discomfiture, forced 

 to the unwelcome conclusion that they do not exist in any actual or ac- 

 cessible form. Many hours of unfruitful labor have been devoted to this 

 search, many barren inquiries have been made in quarters where inform- 



