between six and nine years, and seven for four—splendid witnesses to the success of masculine housekeeping.

He

Dan Kinder is the waiter of the two inside clubs. knows the order of each member without asking him his wants. The same eulogy, in the realm of nectars, may be pressed on J. N. Taylor, head bartender of the Club for many years. The record is complete with a reference to the popular head hallman, William Lavery, for fifteen years in his present employment.

CHAPTER THE SIXTEENTH

The Anniversary Banquet-A Memorable and Brilliant Affair-President Britt presides and President Wilson outlines an Administrative Programme-Speeches by Judge O'Brien, Mr. Patrick Francis Murphy, and Mr. Frank Lawrence.

PPOINTED by President Philip J. Britt to weigh and discuss all plans and matters in connection with the Fiftieth Anniversary, the Anniversary Committee decided:

First, to publish a history of the Manhattan, which, after all of the foremost American printing-houses had been considered,

was contracted to be issued by The De Vinne Press. Second, and at President Britt's proposal, to erect a bronze tablet in the club-house to bear the following inscription:

IN COMMEMORATION

Of a half century of the continuance of the Manhattan Club of New York, and more especially of the unswerving dedication of its service to the immortal principles of Democracy as conceived by our Forefathers and carried on to us by the Founders of this Club; And in reverent thanksgiving for fifty years of our fortune, progress, and invaluable fellowship, we, the loyal

members of the Manhattan Club of New York, have this day, the ... day of October, in the year of our Lord nineteen hundred and fifteen, erected this tablet to the undying honor of the distinguished and devoted citizens whom our Club has given to the City and State of New York and to our beloved Nation.

Third, to hold a banquet in celebration of the Fiftieth Anniversary.

Every means was invoked by the Committee, after the successful carrying out of the first two clauses, to bring the third to a happy consummation. But many difficulties interposed, chief of them the circumstance that the dining-hall of the Club was inadequate to accommodate all the members who requested seats. Rather than disappoint a single member, rather than decide against what in all justice meant the rights democratically and fraternally of one and all alike, the Committee, against its original will and sentiment, voted to hold the anniversary banquet elsewhere, and, after a careful study of the many and varied hostelries of the city, the Biltmore Hotel was selected. The choice of this hotel proved the wisest possible.

In the meanwhile, President Wilson had been invited to attend the dinner and to deliver an address. The date of the celebration was left to the discretion and convenience of our Chief Executive. The President graciously accepted the invitation, designated the evening of November 4, the date finally announced by the Committee, as the one most convenient to him, and, in view of the fact that he had delivered no public speeches on the subject, selected the long awaited and universally debated topic of National Defense as the theme for his discourse on the occasion.

November 4 was made all the more momentous and worthy of record by the splendid and enthusiastically admired address of the President. Such was the broad and

patriotic character of the speech, such was its dramatic significance, its epoch-making power, its sweeping judgment reaching down as an inspiration into the annals of future American generations, that it is imperative to rehearse, in its proper place, the story in its entirety.

Because of the greater accommodations afforded by the Biltmore Hotel, it was deemed advisable by the committee to extend invitations to the friends of guests and to prominent Democrats from all over the country. The response was immediate. When the great hall of the Biltmore finally seated the last comer, the sight was one to thrill the most jaded old-timer. Surrounded by American flags placed at each table, under the brilliant electric legend, “1865 to 1915,” Democrats of every shade of Democracy sat and chatted and hobnobbed and passed along the word of good cheer and mutual good will. Republicans and Progressives mingled. The menu was pronounced by the most hardened habitués of dinners to be the "finest ever." Quite the most critical expectation of the strongest skeptic would have been satisfied. And the key-note of the whole evening, banquet, speeches, table-talk, repartee, and all, the spirit that played undercurrent to the general march of events, was the allpervading motive of patriotism. Even political partisanship was forgotten, generously merged as it was in the greater factor.

Before the dinner, President Wilson, true to the highest and noblest precepts of Jeffersonian democracy, good-fellowship, and courtesy, mingled with all, shook hands with all. Those who had never met him were introduced and genially welcomed by him.

Among the invited guests who helped to make the occasion one of the most memorable in the history of clubs the world over were: Mayor Mitchel of New York; Secretary of War Lindley M. Garrison; Frank R. Lawrence, president of the Lotos Club; Rev. W. T. Manning, rector of Trinity

Church, who delivered a beautifully appropriate prayer; and Joseph P. Tumulty, secretary to the President, all of whom sat at the President's table along with the President of the Club, and William F. McCombs, Victor J. Dowling, Morgan J. O'Brien, and James A. O'Gorman, Club members.

President Philip J. Britt was the toastmaster of the occasion, and a more capable official could not have been found anywhere. Mr. Britt delivered the opening address, a splendid speech full of allusions that warmed the hearts of the oldest as well as the newest Manhattanites. The trend of each phrase was absolutely in keeping with the lofty aims of the Anniversary.

When, after referring to the many gatherings of the Manhattan Club which had become historic, Mr. Britt said, in concluding his address

"But it was not until to-night that it achieved its greatest distinction in having its only living honorary member, the scholar, historian, and patriot President of the United States, select this celebration as the forum whence to address his fellow-countrymen upon what are probably the most important and vital questions which have presented themselves to the people of this Nation since the beginning of the Republic. [Continued applause.] Mr. President, I can assure you, sir, of the heartfelt appreciation of the members and guests of the Manhattan Club of your presence with us tonight. It has shed additional splendor and glory on this celebration. And we, the members of the Manhattan Club, rejoicing in the goodly heritage of fifty years,-may we not, as we look ahead into the dim and uncertain mazes of the future, mindful of the zeal and patriotism of its founders, mindful of its great traditions and achievements, venture the hope that it will live long and prosper, and that it will continue to be a power for conservative thought and action throughout the Nation, until our country, to which it has