134 



and others with whom he had himself rambled and pur- 

 sued botanical investigations. 



The President then called upon Hon. ALLEN W. DODGE 

 of Hamilton, to tell the company what he knew about the 

 Rev. Manasseh Cutler. 



Mr. DODGE said that Mr. Cutler was the second minis- 

 ter of the Hamlet Parish, as it was called at the time of 

 his settlement, in 1771, it being a part of old Ipswich, 

 from which it was set of in 1793, and given its present 

 name, in honor of Alexander Hamilton, of whom the 

 doctor was an ardent admirer, his parishioners sharing 

 in his feelings. Of the doctor, personally, Mr. Dodge 

 said his reminiscences were rather dim, but he well recol- 

 lected hearing him preach in his own pulpit, after he was 

 compelled to sit through the sermon, as he did for years, 

 owing to the asthma. He also remembered him at a large 

 social gathering of the Col. Robert Dodge family, to 

 which he (Mr. Dodge) belonged, when the doctor was 

 the life of the party. It was at the same ancestral farm 

 that Witnessed these festivities that, at an earlier period, 

 on the occasion of a barn-raising, the doctor led off a 

 dance on the green with one of his church members, 

 grandmother to the speaker, against which neither tradi- 

 tion nor the church record bears traces of any remon- 

 strance. He was, in truth, always ready to contribute to 

 the innocent recreation of his people, ready to minister 

 to their wants, physical as well as spiritual, and ready to 

 make the common schools of the town preeminently thor- 

 ough in their instruction. To interest the people in the 

 schools, he early instituted the custom of each committee- 

 man giving either a dinner or a supper at every examina- 

 tion day ; and on these occasions the doctor made even the 

 roast turkeys and plum puddings to help on the good cause. 



