Assisted by the Grand Master of the Masonic Lodges, in the presence of many Members of Congress, of officers of the Executive and Judiciary departments, National, State and Districts, of officers of the Army and Navy, the Corporate authorities of this and neighboring cities, many associations, civil and military and Masonic, officers of the Smithsonian Institution, and National Institute, professors of colleges and teachers of schools of the Districts, with their students and pupils, and a vast concourse of people from places near and remote including a few surviving gentlemen who witnessed the laying of the corner-stone of the Capitol by President Washington, on the 18th day of September, 1793. If, therefore, it shall hereafter be the will of God that this structure shall fall from its base, that its foundation be upturned, and this deposit brought to the eyes of men; be it then known that on this day the Union of the United States of America stands firm, that their constitution still exists unimpaired, and with all its original usefulness and glory growing every day stronger and stronger in the affections of the great body of the American people, and attracting more and more the admiration of the world. And all here assembled, whether belonging to public life or to private life, with hearts devoutly thankful to Almighty God for the preservation of the liberty and happiness of the country, unite in sincere and fervent prayer, that this deposit, and the walls and arches, the domes and towers, the columns and entablatures, now to be erected over it may endure forever. “God Save the United States of America. DANIEL WEBSTER, _Secretary of State of the United States_.” In the speech made by Mr. Webster on this occasion he uttered the following words:— “Fellow citizens, what contemplations are awakened in our minds as we assemble to re-enact a scene like that performed by Washington! Methinks I see his venerable form now before me as presented in the glorious statue by Houdon, now in the Capitol of Virginia.... We perceive that mighty thoughts mingled with fears as well as with hopes, are struggling with him. He heads a short procession over these then naked fields; he crosses yonder stream on a fallen tree; he ascends on the top of this eminence, whose original oaks of the forest stand as thick around him as if the spot had been devoted to Druidical worship and here he performs the appointed duty of the day.” Fifty-eight years stretched between this scene and the last and already the mutterings of civil revolution stirred in the air. Could Webster have foreseen that the marble walls of the Capitol whose corner-stone he then laid would rise amid the thunder of cannon aimed to destroy it and the great Union of States which it crowned, to what anguish of eloquence would his words have risen!