ADDRESS, 



BY JOHN S. ELDRIDGE, ESQ., OF CANTON. 



Mr. President, Ladies and Gentlemen : 



To-day this peaceful fraternity of Farmers, from all parts of 

 this our ancient shire of Norfolk, holds its autumnal anniversary. 



It is doubtless a wise provision of our nature, which prompts us 

 occasionally to lay aside the cares and duties of every day life, 

 to indulge in the pleasures of some time-honored festival, to pay 

 our Christian devotion to some godlike deed, to lay by public 

 declaration on the altars of our hearts, some token of our regard 

 for those events and principles which have changed the fate of 

 nations. 



This is a sentiment coeval with the race. Its origin and devel- 

 opment may be traced in that oriental history of mankind, that 

 Jewish race, who were commanded to observe " the first fruits of 

 the weeks," and the " first fruits of the wheat harvest," and the 

 feast of the ingathering at the year's end. 



It manifests itself in those eleven centuries of Grecian splen- 

 dor, when her noblest sons thronged to the Olympic festivals, to 

 bear away on crowned temples the fruits and flowers Avhich were 

 the Hellenic " type and meed of victory." It is exemplified in 

 the feasts and fasts of the church, as well as in the public cere- 

 monials of the State. 



It is alike significant of the ideal principle, whether it illustrates 

 itself in the " grand carnival" of Venice, or in the celebration 

 of the simple landing of the Pilgrims on the rock of Plymouth. 

 The people of England and France are rejoicing over the inter- 

 change of hospitalities between their respective sovereigns ; the 

 serfs of Russia hold a gala day as the chains of slavery fall from 



