There was a party at an English country house, and they had been passing a rather dull English winter afternoon by proposing and guessing at riddles; and finally one of the guests turned to the host and said, “Sir Charles, why don’t you propose a riddle?” He said, “Really, now, I’m not half clever enough to do such a thing as that. I couldn’t really do it, don’t-cher-know.” “Well, you might try; you don’t know what you can do.” Finally Sir Charles said, “Well, it stands on one leg and it has feathers and it barks like a dog.” So they all guessed and guessed, everything in the animal and vegetable kingdom, and they finally gave it up; and Sir Charles said, “Why, really, I had no idea I was so clever; I thought you would easily guess it”; and they said, “It is impossible to guess.” And he said, “Well, that’s easy; it’s a stork.” “Well,” they exclaimed, “but surely, Sir Charles, a stork doesn’t bark.” And Sir Charles replied, “Well, that’s the cleverest part of it; I put that in to make it hard.” And when we come to our Scotch friends we can readily understand how hard it is for a Scotchman to thoroughly comprehend an Irishman. A friend of mine was telling this story in Glasgow to the Board of Trade at its annual dinner: He said an Irishman was coming down the Bowery in New York late one night and met a policeman, and he said to him, “What time is it?” and the policeman replied, “It’s two o’clock.” And the Irishman said, “I’m a bit deaf and I didn’t hear you; would you mind repeating it?” and the policeman yelled at him, “It’s two o’clock.” “Very queer,” says the Irishman, “but really I didn’t hear you. Would you mind saying it again?” and thereupon the policeman (one of my former companions in arms) took his constitution-preserving stick and hit him on one side of the head and said “One,” and then he hit him a clip on the other side of the head and said “Two.” “Did you hear me that time?” “I did, begorra, and I’m glad I didn’t meet you at twelve.” A friend of mine, a Scotchman by descent, told that story to the Glasgow Board of Trade, and there sat those Scotchman in solemn black around the festive board, and there wasn’t a smile in the room. And finally one old Scotchman, by way of defending the storyteller, said, “Weel, now, I dinna blame the policeman so much; it’s very aggravating to be asked the same question so often.” Now this Society was formed, among other things, for the purpose of clearing up the underbrush in American history, or, in other words, “laying” the Scotch-Irish ghost. (Applause.)