I shall make a bid for your gratitude by being brief. In July weather the song of an electric fan and the small voice of the soda fount were more grateful to the soul than the grandest eloquence that ever burned on a Grady's lips of gold. It is customary, I believe on July 4th, to "make the eagle scream,"--to fight o'er again all the gory battles of the Republic, from Lexington's defeat to the glorious victory of the last election; but I am no Gov. Waite, and blood to horses' bridles delights me not. I would rather at any time talk of love's encounters than of war's alarums --rather bask in the smiles of beauty than mount barbed steeds to fright the souls of fearful adversaries. I have ever had a sneaking respect for Grover Cleveland for sending a substitute to remonstrate with the Southern Confederacy while he played progressive euchre with the pretty girls. His patriotism may not have soared above par, but there were no picnic ants on his judgment. Much as I love my country, I would rather be a living president than a dead hero. I address you as "fellow Americans," for in this land no man of Celtic or of Saxon blood can be an alien. Whether he was born on the banks of the blue Danube or by Killarney's lovely lakes, 'mid Scotia's rugged hills or on the sunny vales of France, he is bound to us with ties of blood; he hath a claim upon our country, countersigned by those brave souls who, in the western wilds, gave to Liberty a habitation and a name--who declared that Columbia should ever be the refuge of the world's oppressed,--that all men, in whatever country born, should be equal before the law wherever falls the shadow of our flag. There has of late arisen a strange new doctrine that we should close our ports against the peoples of other lands, however worthy they may be; but I say unto you that such a policy were to betray a sacred trust confided to us by our fathers,--that every honest man beneath high heaven, every worshipper at Liberty's dear shrine hath an inheritance here, and when, with uplifted hand he pledges his life, his fortune and his sacred honor to the defense of freedom's flag he becomes as much an American as though to the manner born. On occasions such as this we of America are apt to glorify ourselves too much,--to overlook the origin of those elements that made us great. When exulting over our victories in war and our still more glorious triumphs in peace, our progress and our prosperity, we should not forget that had there been no Europe there would be no great American nation; that all the courage that beats in the blood of Columbia's imperial sons, and all the wondrous beauty with which her daughters are dowered; that all the tireless energy of which she proudly boasts, and all the genius that gilds her name with glory were nurtured for a thousand years at white bosoms beyond the ocean's brine.