THE FIRST HALF CENTUUY OF THE INSTITUTE. 



43 



tiad ii!?ed l)y Dr. Holyoke in presiding. It was lu'oiiglit 

 to Ipswich in 1634. There was also on the stage a finely 

 inlaid tahle bronght from Japan in 1799, in the ship 

 "Franklin," by Captain Deverenx of Salem, who com- 

 manded her, — the first American vessel tliat traded with 

 Jai)an.^ 



Tlie President then presented the Hon. Stephen Salis- 

 bury of Worcester as the President of a greater society 

 than onrs, pursuing kindred aims, l)ut which had a con- 

 tinent for its field instead of a county. 



President Salisbury of the American Antiquarian Soci- 

 ety spolie as follows : — 



Mr. President : 



I bring cordial greetings and felicitaticms from the 

 American Antiquarian Society to its younger sister. The 

 Society that I represent has its 

 library of 100,000 volumes, its 

 collections of paintings, statuary, 

 manuscripts, coins, relics and In- 

 dian implements, in its Halls at 

 Worcester, and was founded liy 

 Isaiah Thomas in 1812, thirty-six 

 years before your Society, and 

 yet we have every reason to be 

 grateful to Salem, for we possess 

 the mi'.jor part of the Dr. William 

 Bentlcy Library.^ For this we 



are indebted to his friendship for Dr. Thomas, and by his 

 bequest we have become possessed of Di-. Bentley's Ger- 

 man library, pictures, manuscripts and books relating to 



• For au account of the Holyoke Chair see Bulletin, Vol. iv, pp. 25-6 and 133-4. 

 Also Historical Collections, Vol. xxxii, p. 120, and Essex Register for Sept. 22, 

 1828, 1st page, 2nd column. 



9 See Historical Collections, Vol. xxxii, pp. 101-2. 



Bentley: 



