“There is an impression that Irish immigration is a matter of only half a century. From this hasty sketch we have seen that it is a matter of gradual growth, the earlier citizens being successful merchants, adding to their capital, the later being the industrious, if humble, whom necessity had driven abroad from a land which no other force could have induced them to leave. Let us hope that the inspiration of this Society may lead some one to undertake this seemingly hopeless task of wresting from the past the record of those who, today unknown, did the work whose fruits we are all enjoying. All honor to the early exiles, whose very names are forgotten, and yet who, hungry, exhausted from toil, hated and despised, with their very heartstrings throbbing with the grief of a sensitive race justly proud of its glorious traditions, then scorned and derided,—yet in silence and resignation built deep and solid the foundations of the free institutions of our country. Without these pioneers the history of Irish genius and its accomplishments would have been the less glorious, but without them there would have been as well a different tale to write of this latest experiment in human freedom. New York owes that race a particular debt of gratitude, which gave to the State its first Governor, George Clinton, the son of a County Longford emigrant, and his kinsman, DeWitt Clinton, the father of the Erie Canal; which gave to the city its first mayor, James Duane, an Irishman’s son; and which gave to the city fame as the scene of the first successful attempt to conquer a way over the waters by the use of steam, when the son of a Kilkenny man, Robert Fulton, saw the fruition of his dreams as the _Clermont_ sailed the Hudson, August 11, 1807. “Irishmen and their sons have always been fond of the city which to them symbolized the freedom and opportunity of the West. New York has been the haven of their hopes. Here their eyes, still dim with tears at the thought of Erin, first saw the glimmerings of hope and confidence. She has honored and enriched their sons, and they have not been ungrateful nor unworthy. From tens of thousands of Irish hearts, when the hour for the closing of their earthly pilgrimage was near at hand, has gone up an aspiration for her continued prosperity who had not forgotten the stranger within her gates. Many an Irishman has voiced the wish which Diedrich Knickerbocker was represented as uttering as the expression of the Dutchman’s love: ‘Haply this frail compound of dust, which while alive may have given birth to nothing but unprofitable weeds, may form a humble sod of the valley, whence may spring many a sweet wild flower to adorn my beloved island of Mannahata!’” Judge Dowling’s address met with hearty applause and he received many compliments upon the masterly manner with which he handled the difficult subject assigned him.