Gentlemen, it is no wonder that the rising generation of people who have learned to think and to feel in our language, should eagerly desire to see face to face the man to whose genius, from their very childhood, they have turned for warmth and for light as instinctively as young plants turn to the sun. But I must not forget that it is not I whom you have come to hear; and all I might say, if I had to vindicate the fame of our guest from disparagement or cavil, would seem but tedious and commonplace when addressed to those who know that his career has passed beyond the ordeal of contemporaneous criticism, and that in the applause of foreign nations it has found a foretaste of the judgment of posterity. I feel as if every word that I have already said had too long delayed the toast which I now propose: "A prosperous voyage, health and long life, to our illustrious guest and countryman, Charles Dickens." HAMILTON WRIGHT MABIE SPIRIT OF NEW ENGLAND LITERATURE [Speech of Hamilton W. Mabie at the ninety-first annual dinner of the New England Society in the City of New York, December 22, 1896. Henry E. Howland, vice-President of the Society, presided and introduced the speaker as follows: "There is no person better qualified to speak upon any literary subject than the editor of a great paper. He scans the whole horizon of literature, and his motto is: 'Where the bee sups there sup I.' As a gentleman eminently fitted to speak upon the literature of New England or any kindred subject, I have the pleasure of introducing to you Mr. Hamilton W. Mabie, of 'The Outlook.'"]