Brooklyn celebrated the first landing; New York the second landing. So I say Hail! Hail! to both celebrations, for one day, anyhow, could not do justice to such a subject; and I only wish I could have kissed the blarney stone of America, which is Plymouth Rock, so that I might have done justice to this subject. [Laughter and applause.] Ah, gentlemen, that Mayflower was the ark that floated the deluge of oppression, and Plymouth Rock was the Ararat on which it landed. But let me say that these Forefathers were of no more importance than the Foremothers. [Applause.] As I understand it, there were eight of them--that is, four fathers and four mothers--from whom all these illustrious New Englanders descended. Now I was not born in New England, though far back my ancestors lived in Connecticut, and then crossed over to Long Island and there joined the Dutch, and that mixture of Yankee and Dutch makes royal blood. [Applause.] Neither is perfect without the other, the Yankee in a man's nature saying "Go ahead!" the Dutch in his blood saying, "Be prudent while you do go ahead!" Some people do not understand why Long Island was stretched along parallel with all of the Connecticut coast. I have no doubt that it was so placed that the Dutch might watch the Yankees. [Laughter.] But though not born in New England, in my boyhood I had a New England schoolmaster, whom I shall never forget. He taught us our A, B, C's. "What is that?" "I don't know, sir." "That's A" [with a slap]. "What is that?" "I don't know, sir." [With a slap]--"That is B." [Laughter.] I tell you, a boy that learned his letters in that way never forgot them; and if the boy was particularly dull, then this New England schoolmaster would take him over the knee, and then the boy got his information from both directions. [Renewed laughter.]