THE SEMI-CENTENNIAL ANNIVERSARY 79 



truth which will freely cast aside everything that you now be- 

 lieve, if you find it to be untrue, and which will joyously grapple 

 the truth, however much it may be inimical to your own personal 

 desires. 



Gentlemen, I thank you. (Loud and continued applause.) 



Dr. Woodward: Gentlemen, although as the Vice-President 

 has well said there has been recently a marked change in the 

 politics of the United States, there are some of us who can 

 remember that, only a few years ago, there was a very popular 

 administration led by our friend Theodore Roosevelt. (Ap- 

 plause.) During his administration I heard one of our fellow 

 citizens remark, " Next to Roosevelt, there is one man who is 

 the most popular man in the United States." A few years later 

 we had a somewhat less popular administration, under President 

 Taft; and the same person repeated the same remark. He said, 

 " Next to President Taft, who has been very popular, there is 

 one man, t not a citizen of the United States, who is the most 

 popular man in America." 



Now, quite recently, since the incoming of the present adminis- 

 tration, the same remark has been repeated. 



I hardly need tell you to whom I refer. He is the man who 

 has taught Americans to understand themselves better than any 

 other man. He is the man who has won our affectionate regard, 

 and the man whose return to his native land — I will not say we 

 deplore — but whose return we hope will not be for long. I refer, 

 of course, to the British Ambassador, the dean of the diplomatic 

 corps, and Fellow of the Royal Society of London, and I would 

 suggest, with the largest liberties as indicated before, that he may 

 perhaps be kind enough to speak to us of foreign academies and 

 societies. (Applause.) 



