You know that if I can be counted upon for any one thing it is candor, and if I hurt the feelings of any of these individuals whom I introduce to-night, I want them distinctly to understand that it is not because I love them less, but that I love truth more.

With this--ah--blanket apology, as it were, to cover all possible emergencies that may arise during the evening, I will begin.

The first speaker on the programme, I regret to observe, is my friend Goldsmith.
Affairs of this kind ought to begin with a snap, and while Oliver is a most excellent writer, as a speaker he is a pebbleless Demosthenes.

If I had had the arrangement of the programme I should have had Goldsmith tell his story while the rest of us were down-stairs at supper.

However, we must abide by our programme, which is unconscionably long, for otherwise we will never get through it.