1898.] ANNUAL REUNION. 153 



it all typewritten and he brought here a letter which was type- 

 written instead of his speech. Now if my venerable friend, 

 with that blandness with which he usually tells the truth, can 

 utter such a statement it would justify me in almost anything 

 that I may say. I shall detain you but a few moments. I 

 will not even reach the limit which the toastmaster has set, be- 

 cause I have an appointment with my own family at a time 

 which is somewhat past, and if I delay very much I shall 

 have a worse state of aftairs on my hands than the Spaniards 

 have got on theirs ; and, besides, I know something of what 

 you have got to endure before you get through. That is 

 another reason why I am going to leave early. You have 

 Principal Lewis here, and I have heard him speak, and you 

 have one or two others that I will not name, because if I name 

 many more of them I am afraid you will all leave. 



I was impressed on a visit to the Southwest and through what 

 is called the Badlands of Texas to see the natural resources in 

 reference to the production of the soil as compared with that of 

 old New England, represented in this State by Worcester 

 County, which is rugged and barren compared with the vast fer- 

 tile fields which roll as far as the eye can reach in that vicinity. 

 I suppose there lies in the northern and central parts of Texas 

 perhaps as fertile a plain as the United States contains. I pre- 

 sume that if it were cultivated to the full extent of its resources, 

 the State of Texas alone might produce all that this country 

 would consume so far as feeding its inhabitants is concerned ; 

 but after all as you stand there and gaze over that vast expanse 

 of territory, upon this fertile spot on the surface of the earth 

 that appears to have been made by the hand of Providence for 

 the production of food for man and all those things which come 

 from the earth, and compare its value with all its advantages of 

 nature to the value of the same acreage of land of Massachu- 

 setts or Worcester County, you realize at once that it is not the 

 extent of territory, it is not altogether the fertility of the soil 

 that makes the locality, it is not altogether what nature has 

 done for this particular portion of the earth's surface. And 

 there never was a time when all the peculiar value of the New 



