University of Virginia Library

[Description: 564EAF. Page 073. In-line image of man in soldiers uniform looking through a telescope. In the sky above are generals stars.]

6. CHAPTER VI.
THE MILES O'REILLY BANQUET.

IN contrast with the magnificent banquet given to
Private Miles O'Reilly, Forty-seventh regiment
New York Volunteers, last evening, at Delmonico's,
all previous festive entertainments of a public character
given in our city must pale their ineffectual

fires. The arrangements were of the most faultless
kind, and the company embraced many of the very
foremost representative men of Manhattan Island.
The Japanese ball will hereafter be remembered as
a poor affair; the Prince of Wales break-down at
the Academy of Music will pass into oblivion; and
even the recent civic dinner to the Muscovite Admiral
and his officers, at the Astor House, will be dismissed
with a contemptuous shrug when contrasted
with the superb and gorgeous banquet given at
Delmonico's, over which the most cultivated taste
presided, and at which the ablest and most brilliant
minds of the day poured out their views and aspirations
with a frankness never before equalled.

THE BANQUET HALL AND BANQUET.

Delmonico, as was said of the famous bayonet
charge which General Hancock did not make at
Williamsburg—Delmonico “outdid himself.” The
tables, sparkling with massive gold and glittering
silver, bore aloft, in vases of crystal and in the
hands of sculptured nymphs and graces, all the most
luscious fruits of the tropic and temperate zones, all

the flowers of richest hue and odor. Everything
that taste and liberality combined could achieve
towards making the banquet worthy of those who
gave it was accomplished. The dining hall was of
itself a picture, so well had the artistic effects of
colors in glasses, gold and silver ware, dazzling
exotics, quivering jelly palaces, and crusted battlements
of charlotte russe—been studied. Where the
walls were not flashing mirrors, they were covered
with banners of every nationality and hue—great
interest being excited by the shot and shell torn
banner of the Sixty-ninth New York Volunteers,
which Colonel Robert Nugent, who was present,
kindly volunteered for the occasion. In the window
recesses were placed fanciful bowers of evergreens,
liberally sprinkled with flowers, and made cool by
little sparkling fountains, which sprang out of crystal
basins, in which innumerable gold and silver fish
were “playing at backgammon.” The ornamental
confectionery showed many beautiful designs, those
most prominent being an exact model of Fort
Sumter as it appeared before making the acquaintance
of General Gillmore's rifled guns; and an Irish
harper, with an Irish wolfhound at his feet and an
Irish harp in his hand—for the archæological correctness
of which Judge Charles P. Daly offered to give
his erudite and incontrovertible certificate. The bill
of fare we omit in deference to the feelings of those
who were not present. Suffice it to say that Delmonico
“saw” the recent Astor House Russian
programme, and “went fifty better.” The delicious
juices of meats, the delicate flavors of fishes, the
wild sweetness of game, the ravishing tenderness of
fruits, the quivering sensibilities of jelly, and the sharp
titillations of ice, were all present on the board in
prodigal profusion and perfection.

THE CARD OF INVITATION.

The invitations issued by the committee were
worded as follows:—

And seventy others, Committee of Arrangements
for the Miles O'Reilly Banquet.”

THE DISTINGUISHED GUESTS.

At half-past six precisely the guests assembled,
the army being represented by Generals Truman
Seymour, U.S.A.; Thomas F. Meagher, of the Irish
Brigade; Alfred H. Terry, of the Tenth army corps;
Lieutenant-Colonel E. W. Smith, of the Department
of the South; Col. D. T. Van Buren, Captains S. W.
Stockton, Horace Porter, and F. E. Howe; Lieutenant-Colonel
J. H. Wilson and others; the navy by certain
very distinguished officers, whose names, for
reasons connected with the Navy Department, are
specially omitted; the bench by Judges Bosworth,

Hilton and McCarthy; the bar by James T. Brady,
Samuel J. Tilden, John Van Buren, Surrogate
Tucker, Wm. M. Evarts, Daniel Lord, James W.
Gerard, Richard O'Gorman, C. Bainbridge Smith,
ex-Judge O'Connor, Malcolm Campbell, and many
other brilliant lights, too numerous to mention; the
press by Messrs. Greeley, Raymond, Hudson, Godwin,
Gay, Nordhoff, Swinton, Clapp, Willis, Guernsey,
and others; our business men by A. T. Stewart,
Edward Cooper, Oliver Charlick, A. V. Stout, Wm.
F. Havemeyer, E. H. Miller, Royal Phelps and
company; the Church by the Rev. Dr. Bellows, and
Chaplain Hudson, of the New York Volunteer
Engineers; Congress by Messrs. Benjamin Wood,
Winthrop Chanler, Anson Herrick, and Mr. Brooks
of the Express; the heads of the city departments
by Messrs. Cornell, Boole, and Devlin; the Board
of Supervisors by Messrs. Ely, Purdy, Tweed, and
Blunt; the Board of Aldermen by Messrs. Farley,
Hardy, Chipp, Long, and Walsh; and the public
generally by Professor E. Meriam, of Brooklyn
Heights; David Dudley Field, Judge Edmonds,
Mr. Wm. Jewett, of Colorado, and several hundred
others. It was remarked, however, at this time that,
owing to an oversight by the Committee of Arrangements,
no sub-committee had been appointed to
escort Private O'Reilly to the banquet—an oversight
which was at once remedied and the Sub-committee
appointed.

The following letters were received by the Committee
of Arrangements and Invitations:—

[ILLUSTRATION]

THE SECRETARY'S VISION.--Page 83.

[Description: 564EAF. Illustration Page. Image of an old man in a chair with his eyes closed. His hair is long and wild, and his beard is past his knees. In the background there is a table with a model boat on it. The boat resembles an ark, with a house on the deck. There is smoke coming out of the chimney of the little house. There is also a picture of a sailboat on the wall behind the man.]

Tickets were issued for only three hundred persons,
but it was reported that over six hundred had
squeezed themselves into the room. Mr. A. V. Stout
presided admirably, and grace was said by Dr.
Bellows.

After the cloth was removed, Mr. Stout introduced
the intellectual part of the proceedings with
some remarks, as follows:—

PRESIDENT A. V. STOUT'S SPEECH.

He said that while awaiting the return of the Sub-committee
with the Guest of the Evening, he would
remark that he had once before been selected to preside

at a somewhat similar meeting. It was when a
stand of colors was presented to the old Sixty-ninth
State Militia, and a sword of honor to its Colonel, as
a testimonial of our sympathy with a sentiment
which made him refuse to parade an Irish regiment
in honor of the Prince of Wales. (Cheers.) He was
selected to preside on that occasion, probably, from
the same motive which had led to his selection in the
present case. It was an Irish demonstration for an
Irish object and to illustrate an Irish sentiment.
They therefore took an American to preside on that
occasion as a token of the sympathy that exists between
the American and Irish people. (Loud cheers.)
That ceremony took place in peaceful times, months
—though not many—before the war blast startled the
North from its false dream of security. Since then
the festal flag which he had an humble share in presenting
had cast its flashing radiance over many
a battle-field, had been lost in desperate charges of
the enemy, and regained by such sacrifices of life
and limb as could only fitly be described by his
friend, General Thomas Francis Meagher, whose
words are not less trenchant than his sword, whose
genius to describe can only be surpassed by the
heroism of action which has become a part of our

[ILLUSTRATION]

THE BANQUET.--Page 87.

[Description: 564EAF. Illustration Page. Image of men at a banquet. Most are in civilian dress. One man in a soldiers uniform is being held by the arms by another man. The solder faces a man with a stern look on his face.]

proudest history. (Loud and long continued cheering.)
To this pleasant side of his recollections of that
last Irish festivity, however, there was a side which
was unpleasant enough at the time, though it might
appear ludicrous when mentioned now. On the
very day after that demonstration, the English depositors
at his bank bustled up to the counter, in one
long continued current, and withdrew every dollar
of theirs that was in his keeping, to the amount of
many hundred thousand dollars. (Uproarious laughter,
and cries of “Good, good.”) He could assure
them it was no laughing matter at the time, either
to him or his fellow directors. Mr. Stout would now
apologize for having detained them, and would introduce,
during the temporary absence of Private
O'Reilly, who would be present in a very few moments,
the first regular toast of the evening, to which
Mr. James T. Brady would respond:—

The President of the United States.

MR. JAMES T. BRADY'S SPEECH.

Mr. Brady commenced by remarking that it was
a peculiarity of the race from which he came, and
with which all the dearest recollections of his childhood
were associated, to be diffident of their own

powers and to shun all occasions of publicity, whether
festive or professional. They had met that night
to do honor to an humble hero—to vindicate a sentiment;
and, amidst glowing fruits and the melody
of ringing glasses, to renew their allegiance to the
banner of the old National Democratic Faith. (Loud
cheers.) Of Private O'Reilly—after whom the
members of the Sub-committee were now scouring
the city in carriages—it was not his part just at present
to speak. He was called upon to respond to the
toast of “The President of the United States;” and
to that duty he would confine himself. He regretted
that, by another oversight of the Committee of Arrangements—almost
as bad as that by which the
Guest of the Evening had not been sent for in proper
form—no ladies had been invited to brighten by
their smiles and inspire by their beauty such forlorn
bachelors as himself. Rich as were the bouquets on
the board, dazzling as were the gold and silver chasings
of the plate, refreshing to the eye as were the
flower-gemmed bowers of evergreens with which art
had so lavishly filled the background of this brilliant
picture, it needed only, but it needed still, to complete
his happiness, the presence of some few representatives
of that gentler sex to whom we owe our
highest inspirations, our noblest virtues, and all of our
purest raptures. But he was not responding to the
toast of Woman—that divinity whom in childhood
we adore as mother, or draw to our hearts with the
sweet name of sister. He was to respond to the toast
of the President of the United States, Commander-in-chief
of all the land and naval forces of the Union,
and to that task he would steadily address himself.
(Cheers.) We need a country—we must have a
country. As well might a forest try to preserve its
freshness and vitality if torn up by the roots and cast
on some granite spur of the Rocky Mountains, as for
a race of men—free, intelligent, self-governing, and
progressive—to exist without a nationality in whose
soil should be interwoven all the roots and fibres of
their being. (Loud cheers.) For himself, he had no
ambition to try the experiment of supporting life
without that feeling of nationality which is life's most
precious stimulus. He came of a race which had
long centuries ago been taught by wrongs and degradation
in their native land, the full value of emigration.
If the worst should come to the worst—if the
twenty millions of Northern white men could not
vindicate their equality, man for man, with the eight
millions of the South, their numbers giving them the
victory over men as brave and high-spirited as themselves—then
it would be time to inquire the price of
passage to New Zealand or Australia, to Otaheite or
to Borneo—some land where, amidst savage solitudes
or herding with savage men, we might cease to be
reproached with the memories of that heritage from
which our crimes, our follies, and our lack of manly
qualities had driven us. (Loud applause and cheers.)
There are some who lay claim to patriotism and profess
themselves anxious to prosecute the war for the
Union with vigor, while, in the same breath, they
denounce the constitutional head of the government
and all his acts with a bitterness never shown when
they speak of those conspiratorial miscreants who
have brought all this wretchedness and mourning on
our once happy land. (Cheers and hisses.) Indeed,
he had not forgotten that it was by prominent representatives
of this facing-both-ways type of democracy
that he had been solemnly read out of the party not
many months ago, for having visited Connecticut and
there performed his duty as a National Democrat—
one of full growth and stature in the party, when
these mushrooms of to-day were still in the rank soil
out of which they have since ominously cropped—by
opposing the election of Colonel Thomas H. Seymour,
once his valued friend, as were these mushrooms
once his very obsequious good servants. [Loud
applause, and cheers, amidst which a bustle took
place at the door, caused by the return of a member
of the Sub-committee, who reported that he had
heard from his associates, and that they had found
Private O'Reilly, who would be with them in a very
few moments. This announcement was received
with cheers.]

Mr. Brady, when the hubbub had subsided, said
that he stood where stand all the clear-headed
and independent men of the country—on the platform
of unfaltering and unchangeable devotion to the
Union. (Loud cheers.) He cared not to discuss at
present such details as the emancipation proclamation,
the confiscation bill, the draft and the suspension
of the habeas corpus in loyal States. Men
might differ in judgment on these matters and still
be the truest of true patriots. There were many
measures of the administration which, in the words
of General Dix, “he certainly should not have advised;”
and two or three of the measures referred to
might have had, if it were the time, his disapproval.
But all minor issues faded out of view when we raised
our eyes to the grand banner of our country, and saw

its stars appealing to us for that protection in this
hour of trial which heretofore they had shed upon us
in every land and under all vicissitudes of fortune.
(Loud and ringing cheers.) It was no idle boast ten
years ago when President Franklin Pierce—(hisses,
mingled with cheers and applause)—from the white
steps of the Capitol spoke of that flag as “the inviolable
panoply of the American citizen,” no matter in
what remote corner of the earth his Yankee love of
adventure might have led him. (Laughter and loud
cheers.) Those days would come back to us. They
must. It is the vow of all the manhood of our people.
In the homely words of a poet whose name, if
he ever had any, had escaped the speaker's memory:—

(Loud cheering, and cries of “Good,” “That's
the talk,” “So say we all of us,” &c.)

Our duties, if he had read their order rightly,
were first to our God, next to our common country,
whether ours by birth or adoption. The first of
these duties he would not speak of in public. It
was for the solitude of the closet, the attitude of

the bent knee, and the eloquence of silent invocation.
But to do our duty to our country, in its
grandest and widest significance, we must, as with
charity, begin at home. We must interest ourselves,
however distasteful the task, in regenerating
the dismal swamp of local politics. We must drain
the fetid marsh now swarming with unclean things,
refence the ancient boundaries of popular rights,
and perform for the toads, reptiles, and other vermin
which coil and swelter in those hot-beds of corruption
— our local party organizations — another
miracle of like character with that for which St.
Patrick claims the gratitude of Ireland. (Loud
laughter and cheers, continued for several minutes.)
We must, he said, break up and destroy that coalition
between Republicans of easy virtue and Democrats
of no virtue at all, which has been the primary
cause of the present degradation of politics—a degradation
so utter, that to be now called a politician
is almost equivalent to being called a rogue. (Cheers
and laughter.) We must, above all things, and as
the first step in a right direction, teach these vampires
one lesson of respect for the independence of
the Judiciary. From the table at which Justice sits
down to measure out the priceless treasures of her
uncorrupted store, their Harpy hands must be remote.
They must be driven so far from the Bench,
that not even in imagination can they clutch the
sacred ermine, or whisper one word of entreaty,
still less a threat, into the ear of those ministers
upon whose purity and independence the whole
fabric of a free government has its broadest and
securest base. (Vociferous cheers, and loud cries
of “Hilton,” “Bosworth,” “McCarthy,” “No meddling
with the Judges,” &c.) Mr. Brady spoke more
in sorrow than in anger—from an impulse of imperative
duty. All other evils could be endured, if not
cured; but let the ermine once pass under the dominion
of politicians, and all assurances of personal
freedom and property would be at the mercy of the
basest and most unscrupulous class of the community.
He spoke, it might be said, with feeling—with
interest—and he was not ashamed to own it. He
did feel outraged by the attempt now being made
against the official life of his friend, the upright
man, the honest jurist, Henry Hilton. (Cheers.)
His friend, the upright man, the honest jurist, Mr.
Bosworth. (Renewed cheering.) His friend, the
upright, kindly, and whole-souled Judge Florence
McCarthy. (Vociferous shouts of “They shan't do
it,” “They can't,” &c.) Of one of the candidates
put up against one of the gentlemen he had named,
he felt it but justice to speak in terms of personal
commendation.[1] Under other circumstances, it
would have given him pleasure to support one of
the adverse nominees for the Superior Court, assured
of his integrity, his talents and his capacity.
(Hear, hear.) But situated as these matters now
were, it had become the first duty of every good
citizen to trample down all considerations of personal
liking or disliking, and to lend his every effort
to the task of preserving unimpaired and in all the
fresh lustre of its purity the independence of those
officers who are entrusted, in last resort, with the
maintenance of all the rights which are dearest to
us as free citizens of a great and civilized republic.
(Applause.)

SOME ANXIOUS INQUIRIES.

At this point the bustle at the door was renewed,
and loud cries announced the return of another
member of the Sub-Committee, of whom eager inquiries
were made as to the whereabouts of Private
O'Reilly, the Bard of Morris Island. The Sub-Committee
man explained that he had heard that Private

O'Reilly had been overtaken some half hour
before by the associate who had previously returned,
and that he had come there expecting to find
the Guest of the Evening in the seat of honor. The
matter was annoying enough, but there could be no
doubt but that the other members of the Sub-Committee
would soon be back and bring the Guest of
the Evening with them. This assurance satisfied the
audience, more especially when it became known
that one of the Sub-Committee had gone to the residence
of Mr. James O'Reilly, in the Sixteenth
Ward, where Private Miles was awaiting the carriage.

Order being once more restored, the Chairman
said that, in the absence of the gallant soldier
whom they had all met to honor, he would propose
the next regular toast of the evening—“Our Army
and our Navy.”

SPEECH OF MR. LUKE CLARK, OF MORRIS ISLAND.

On this the hubbub was renewed with increasing
elangor, various cries being raised for “Meagher,”
“Terry,” “Sickles,” “Graham,” “Let us have Halleck
himself,” “Little Mac's the boy,” &c. While the
confusion was at its height, a sturdy Irishman named

Luke Clark of the 5th Ward, lifted himself on one of
the chairs and demanded to know—What had the
Sub-committee done with Private Miles O'Reilly?
Some were beginning to say that the committee had
sold him for a substitute—perhaps to go in place of
Mr. Theodore Tilton, of the Independent, or of Mayor
Oydyke's son, both of whom were drafted. He had
known Miles down on Morris Island, and knew he
was too decent a boy and too good a judge of a good
dinner to stay away from such a feast of his own
accord. He (the speaker) had thrown up as many
shovels full of dirt with his own two good looking
hands on Morris Island as the next man; and he
appealed to General Terry and Lieutenant Colonel
Smith, who were both present, to see justice done to
him. (Cheers and renewed demonstrations.)

DR. CARMICHAEL'S SONG.

In order to restore harmony, Dr. Carmichael was
here introduced, and sang with excellent spirit and
voice the following song, composed by “a gentleman
of this city,” whose name, unfortunately,
our reporter was not able to catch. The Doctor has
a delicious voice, brilliantly cultivated; and gave
the following words to the air of “When the twilight

bat is flitting,” with an earnestness, pathos, and tenderness
which could not have been surpassed:

THE CAPTAIN'S DAUGHTER.

This song was received, as any song by Dr. Carmichael
is sure to be, with vehement applause; on
the subsidence of which the Chairman said that he
was now about to propose, “The Health of Miles
O'Reilly,” on which subject, before they drank it,
his friend Judge Charles P. Daly would make a few
remarks, so well timed that they should only cease
on the appearance of their absent guest. (Laughter
and cheers.)

SPEECH OF JUDGE DALY.

Judge Daly regretted that, having been absent in
the bridal party of General Michael Corcoran, he had
not time to prepare as he could have wished for this
occasion. All were aware that he traced his origin
to that “Green Isle” in which their absent guest
first knew the blessings of a mother's smile and the

wholesome nourishment of potatoes (Loud laughter.)
The practice of receiving, without regard to rank,
those who have faithfully served their country in the
field, is of remote antiquity. He had found in the
course of his artistic, antiquarian and archæological
researches that a similar compliment had once been
paid to a non-commissioned officer in the army of
Wallenstein, during the Thirty Years' War, as mentioned
by the learned historian, Von Schneidermark.
In the early histories and traditions of the Scandinavians
also, such instances were not uncommon. Count
Ptosotoff, the earliest historian of Russian Tartary,
mentions no less than three cases of a similar character,
and of all these the famous Gen. Kütsoff speaks
in terms of commendation. He trusted that these
citations from high authority would completely satisfy
everybody —

AN INTERRUPTION.

Mr. Clark again raised himself upon a chair,
declaring that he was ready to admit, for argument
sake, that the old lords and gentlemen Judge Daly
had just named might be very respectable people in
their way; but nothing could “completely satisfy”
him—nothing that Mr. Wallenstein, or Mr. Putusoff,

or Mr. Cutusoff could do or say, until the Sub-committee
could be made to account for what they
had done with his friend and countryman. (Loud
applause, and cries of “That's the talk, Luke;”
“They've sold him as a substitute.”)

SPEECH OF LIEUTENANT-COLONEL E. W. SMITH.

As Mr. Clark had referred to General Terry and
to himself, Colonel Smith had a few words to say.
As an officer of the Department of the South he had
known Private Miles O'Reilly, and had, in fact,
signed the very furlough on which Private O'Reilly
was now in their midst. (Loud cries and laughter.
“He ain't in our midst;” “That's what's the
matter,” &c.) As an officer of the regular army, it
was somewhat against his sense of discipline to sit at
a banquet where a private soldier was present as a
guest. (Here again broke out cries—“He ain't
present;” “Wish he were.” “It's all Putusoff and
Cutusoff with the Sub-committee.”) Colonel Smith
would be compelled to resume his seat if these interruptions
were continued. He knew Private O'Reilly,
and he also had known Mr. Luke Clark while that
patriot was working in the trenches. Luke, if he
remembered rightly, had been in the employ of a

sutler, and was condemned to spadework in the
parallels for having given more whiskey to some
soldiers than was good for them. (Roars of laughter,
and cries of “Good boy, Luke.”) As to the labors
performed by the army under General Gillmore in
the Department of the South, he felt that words were
inadequate to describe their vastness. (Loud cheers.)
No description, however, could be more perfect than
that given in one stanza of the now famous song for
which Private O'Reilly had first fallen under the
Provost Marshal's censure. He referred to the stanza
commencing:
That was just it. If ever lines were “held hard,”
Gillmore's had been when they first captured Morris
Island. For months one half the army was up
all night in the trenches, with spade and pick, while
the other half stood guard against the enemy with
the bayonet.

A Voice.—What might the third half be doing?
(Laughter.)

GENERAL GILLMORE FOR NEXT PRESIDENT.

Colonel Smith then paid a high tribute to the qualities
of Generals Sherman and Hunter, the former
commanders of the Department of which he had
now the honor to be an humble officer; and before
resuming his seat would only propose the health of
General Q. A. Gillmore, the hero of Pulaski and
Sumter; and might the country never have a worse
fate than to have such a man for its next President.
(Uproarious applause.)

TRIUMPHANT RETURN OF THE SUB-COMMITTEE.

Just at this moment volleys of cheers and joyful
shouts from the staircase announced that the long
expected Sub-committee were at length approaching.
“Have yez Miles O'Reilly wid you?” shouted
a burly Hibernian, elbowing his way through the
crowd, and leaning over the staircase. “We have
James O'Reilly, his cousin,” was the answer, “and
Miles, he says, is amongst you, only that he is in
plain clothes, so that you don't know him.”

GREAT QUESTION OF THE DAY—“ARE YOU MILES
O'REILLY?”

The confusion following this announcement was
perfectly indescribable. Every man turned round
to his neighbor, seized his elbow, looked square into
his eyes, and asked eagerly—“Are you Private
Miles?” Everybody asked the question of every
other person, and every person said “No” to everybody.

Mr. Luke Clark said he had been all round the
tables, and couldn't see Miles anywhere. He asked
that the Sub-committee should be seized, and never
let go until they gave him up. (Hear, hear.) The
more he thought of it the surer he felt that they had
sold the Guest of the Evening for a substitute to
either Tilton or Opdyke. The Sub-committee were
a collection of Judases, and he was individually in
favor of at once holding them personally responsible
for the production of their missing friend. (Immense
applause, followed by the immediate institution
of threatening demonstrations against the committee.)

SPEECH OF HON. BEN WOOD.

Mr. B. Wood rose as the friend of “Peace.” He
was for “Peace,” under all circumstances, and for
submission as the means of attaining it. To say
that his views, if carried out, would degrade the
North, was folly, which no sensible man, who knew
the worth of “Peace,” could believe. All he wished
on behalf of the South—with one of whose “peculiar
institutions” his own fortunes were largely connected—all
he wished was, that we should withdraw
our armies from every square foot of soil south of
Mason and Dixon's line, divide our navy into two,
giving the South half, accept the Montgomery constitution,
and confer on Mr. Jeff. Davis the Loyal
Union League nomination for the next Presidency.
[Groans, hisses and hootings. Loud cries of “Put
him out,” “Scotch the copperhead,” and so forth.
Mr. Ben Wood kept on gesticulating, and shouting—
the only words we could catch being “four, eleven,
forty-four or fight.”]

A PRESIDENTIAL SONG.

Mr. John E. Develin at last made himself heard
above the tumult. He wished to introduce to the

meeting ex-Coroner Frank O'Keefe, who would now
give them a song in the chorus of which all present
he knew would gladly join—his friends General Terry
and Colonel Smith not least. Thus introduced, Mr.
O'Keefe sang the following stanzas to the well-known
West Point and old army air of “Benny Havens,”
which is the American edition of “Irish Molly.”

The applause which followed these verses was
flattering not only to Mr. O'Keefe, but to the generals
thus mentioned. By unanimous consent the
song was encored, and the applause was, if any
thing, louder, and the chorus heartier, when sung
the second time.

CHIEF ENGINEER DECKER'S SPEECH.

Mr. Decker said he had been to a good many fires
and had helped to put out a good many. But there
was one fire he would never try to extinguish—that
of patriotism. (Enthusiastic cheers.) He had run
with a good many “machines;” but the shakiest
machine he ever had run with was that joint-stock-consolidated
engine company, called the Tammany-Mozart
“Little Six.” It was pretty well played out.
(Loud cries of “Hi, hi!” and groans for the Tammany-Mozart
managers.)

SPEECH OF MR. OLIVER CHARLICK.

Mr. Charlick desired to be allowed the floor, if
only for one moment, in order to reply to the

denationalized, the undemocratic sentiments in which
Mr. Benjamin Wood had recently indulged. He
could not but attribute the present false attitude of a
great portion of the Democratic party in this City
and State to the miserable kind of material that was
now in control of the regular Democratic machine-organizations
of Manhattan Island. The council
fires of Tammany may be lighted, but where are
the great braves and warriors who once sat there,
toasting their shins in the good days gone by?
Where now are such men as Charles O'Conor,
George Douglas, John J. Cisco, Edwin Croswell,
Churchill C. Cambreling, Samuel J. Tilden, Greene
C. Bronson, Wm. F. Havemeyer, John Targee, C.
W. Lawrence, De Witt Clinton, Gulian C. Verplanck,
John A. Dix, Azariah Flagg, Daniel D. Tompkins,
and all that glorious old galaxy who once sat in the
Conventions of our party, and ruled its destinies with
the solemnity and conscientiousness of the Council
of Elders in the best days of the Venetian republic?
Have we any successors to these men? Contrast the
names recited with those which are prominent in
politics to-day. Every great man in our city Israel
is excluded merely because he is a great man—too
great to be cramped to the pattern of spoil coalitions
—too pure to be allowed inside the charnel-house in
which lie mouldering the sad remains of democratic
principle. Charles O'Conor is outside the organization
to-day; James T. Brady has been read out of the
party by the managing leaders, and so has Gen. Dix;
Henry Hilton and Florence McCarthy are to be
slaughtered; Bosworth is a phœnix expiring amidst
the flames of petty wrath and jealousy. (Cheers.)
But, gentlemen, to birds of this description there is a
certain resurrection, and from its ashes we shall yet
see arising a fresh and revivified democracy. Gentlemen,
I am of the opinion that “freedom's battle
once begun” will require a great deal of good
management to make it stop.

ANOTHER INTERRUPTION—FIERCE CRIES FOR O'REILLY.

Whatever more Mr. Charlick might have intended
to say was here lost amidst the yellings, cries,
stamping, and other noises, which the friends of
Private Miles, and those anxious to see him, now
raised. Mingled with these were the criminations and
recriminations of the various members of the Sub-Committee
of Arrangements, each saying that it was
the duty of the other to have invited the Guest of the
Evening, and to have called for him in a carriage at

the proper time. Mr. James O'Reilly gave it as his
opinion that his cousin Miles had never received any
official invitation, it being everybody's business to
invite him, and, therefore, nobody doing it. There
was never one of the Reillys who wanted to thrust
his company anywhere. He thought that Miles had
the family pride, and had stayed away to show that,
though only a private soldier, he had still in his veins
the thrue O'Reilly blood.

COLORADO JEWETT'S REMARKS.

Mr. Jewett, of Colorado, here produced a large
manuscript, and said that, with the permission of the
company, he would now proceed to read for them an
exposition of the exact state of his peace and gold
negotiations with the various crowned heads of
Europe, with all of whom he was on terms of personal
intimacy. This announcement was followed by loud
cries of “Oh, shut up,” “Print it in the Tribune,”
&c., amidst which Mr. Jewett indignantly withdrew.

MR. FRANK O'DONNELL'S SONG.

In order to amuse the company while they were
waiting, Mr. Frank O'Donnell kindly volunteered to
give them a song, the authorship of which is ascribed

to ex-Judge Bartholomew O'Connor. Mr. O'Donnell
sings delightfully, and his lyric, of which we append
a copy, is called—

THE SPRIG OF TAMMANIA.

Air—The Sprig of Shillelah.

GRAND BURST UP OF THE BANQUET.

How much longer Mr. O'Donnell might have
continued singing, nobody can tell, as he appeared
fresh and had any number of additional verses in his
head. But the excitement about the continued nonappearance
of the Guest of the Evening now rose
almost to the point of frenzy, and threatened to
assume some violent shape. Loud objurgations
were heaped on the Sub-Committee of Arrangements
for their gross neglect in not inviting and
properly escorting Private Miles O'Reilly to the
banquet. It was in vain that Surveyor Andrews
offered the use of his government steam yacht to
scour the bay, go up to Albany, or cross over to
Ireland, in pursuit of the absent guest. He was
received with much the same cries as had greeted
Mr. Colorado Jewett; but peace was partially
restored when Mr. Gideon J. Tucker proposed that
all present should resolve themselves into a Committee
of the Whole for the purpose of hunting up

the missing hero. Several more songs were sung
before our reporters left, but the noise was too great
for them to catch the words, the fun growing too fast
and furious for weak heads. The steadier portion of
the audience left by the back exit as rapidly as they
could just about this time; and we deem it just as
well, if not a little better, to here drop the curtain.
The play of “Hamlet,” with the part of the Prince
left out, will not again be repeated.