"America--North America--is the noblest country ever given by God to his children--a country saved through all the progressive ages of the world for a new experiment in human government, and here some British adventurers opened a branch office. That they might 'worship God according to the dictates of their own conscience,' they hurled themselves in their frail barques, turned their prows--the ships' prows--to three thousand miles of boisterous waves, and landed on Plymouth's rock-bound shores. Here, defying titanic difficulties, they scaled the mountains, levelled the forests, tamed the soil, and, from the jaws of many defeats, they snatched a glorious victory. Here, they erected new altars, blazed out a new destiny, and, rocked in the cradle of Liberty by the untrammelled winds of heaven, they built a temple at whose shrines the unborn generations could freely worship." Here, the notes record that a young man in the audience smiled, while poetess Vauline seemed good-naturedly surprised; noticing which, Amoora Oseba faltered, and said:-- "Well, my children, those remarks would be very tame in America, and a man who could not soar higher on a 'fitting occasion' would certainly not be returned at the head of the poll." But in material prosperity, the orator said that during the first century of America's national life, she achieved not only unparalleled, but unapproached success, and during the last half of that period she accumulated more wealth than was ever possessed by any other nation. With nearly half of the railways of the globe, she furnished half the food and raiment products, and manufactured more goods than any other four nations--aside from Britain--and by the brightest inventive genius the world ever knew, she had furnished more of the cunning devices that ease the care and toil of man, than all the world besides. [Illustration: _Queenstown, The Remarkables in the distance._] In moral progress, she has been equally successful, for she had about two-fifths of all the newspapers of the world; 72,000 post offices, 180,000 churches, 450,000 school teachers, and more libraries and more readers than any other country; while more than half of the institutions of higher learning on the globe were hers, and counting only the real Americans, more enterprising, ingenious, intelligent and educated people, than any other nation. "Verily," said Oseba, "America was Britain's greatest contribution to the world's progress. These two kindred countries flourished through reciprocal interests; by their industrial methods they have lifted the world from medieval barbarism, and they are destined to give their language, their civilisation and their notions of liberty to the whole human race." Here the poetess Vauline inquired why America, with all her great wealth and opportunities, would not be a desirable country to which to send a colony of the Shadowas? "A cloud was on his brow."