"Mr. Cyrus W. Field is too earnest and energetic a man, too completely devoted to great projects and great success, to have much of mere egotism left in him. A life so thoroughly absorbed in pursuits which belong to the business and benefit of the whole world can have little time for the indulgence of vanity. But one might well excuse a little self-gratulation and pride on the part of a guest entertained as Mr. Cyrus Field was at Willis's Rooms last night. Not often, certainly, is such a banquet given in England to a man who is neither a politician nor a soldier.... Mr. Field, when he glanced around that splendidly filled banquet-room last night, may have felt but little personal pride in the well-merited honors he received. But he must have felt gratified at the evidence thus practically and brilliantly afforded that the public of civilized nations are at last trying to unlearn the fatal habit which made them so long ungrateful to some of their best benefactors. "We never remember to have read of a public demonstration to any individual in London which had less of a sectarian or sectional character. The Duke of Argyll, one of the most advanced of our Liberal peers, one of the most enlightened of our scientific thinkers, was hardly more prominent in doing honor to Mr. Field than was Sir John Pakington, the steady-going Tory of the old, old school. Lord Stratford de Redcliffe, the great Elchi of Mr. Kinglake's delightful sensation romance, sat side by side with Mr. Bright, who denounced in such powerful and unsparing eloquence so much of Lord Stratford's policy and conduct during the Crimean war. Mr. Layard joined with Sir Stafford Northcote in the compliment to the guest. Two common sentiments animated the whole of the company--a company representing politics, science, literature, arts, and commerce--the sentiment of personal admiration for Mr. Field's labors and character, and that of cordial friendship towards the great people of whose indomitable energy he is so striking an illustration.... Much of the honor, of course, was entirely personal. It was tendered to Mr. Field because he individually had deserved it. Mr. Bright, in a few words, accurately described Mr. Field's position as regards the Atlantic telegraph. Other men may have thought of the project; other men may, for aught we know, have thought of it even before he did; other men may have mentally planned it out, and proposed schemes for its realization.... The idea is not exclusively Mr. Field's; nor is the success exclusively his. But assuredly his was the energy, the prodigious strength of will, the unconquerable perseverance, which forced the scheme upon the intellect, the activity, and the influence of England and America, and never