[BRATTLEBORO, VERMONT, AUGUST 27.]
Just before the train reached Brattleboro the rain ceased, and the President rode in a procession to the house of Col. J. J. Estey. The Committee of Reception consisted of Colonel Estey, Col. Kittredge Haskins, Dr. H. D. Holton, N. I. Hawley, F. W. Childs, ex-Governor Holbrook, Judge Wheeler, Hon. B. D. Harris, Hon. J. L. Martin, E. C. Crosby, Judge R. W. Clarke, C. F. Thompson, Col. W. C. Holbrook, George S. Dowley, Colonel Fuller, Dr. Conland, Dr. Ketchum, and G. A. Hines. Veterans of the G. A. R., and the Estey Guard, escorted the Chief Executive through the city. Several thousand were assembled on the grounds.
Colonel Estey welcomed and presented the President, who made the following address:
My Fellow citizens—Governor Proctor held out to me the suggestion that this trip to Vermont would be a very restful one. He has the queerest appreciation of what rest means of any man I know. [Laughter.]
When I attended the centennial demonstration of the inauguration of Washington in New York, I spent part of one day on the bridge of the Despatch bowing to the fleet in the bay as we moved down to the Battery, and the balance of the day shaking hands at the City Hall, attending a ball at night; ten hours the next day reviewing a procession, with a banquet at night; and about as many hours the day following reviewing the civic procession; and when released from the stand about 5 o'clock in the evening I hurried to the Jersey City depot to take the train, scarcely able to stand upon my feet. One of the gentlemen of the committee said to me: "Well, Mr. President, I hope you have enjoyed these three days of rest in New York." [Laughter.]
I wish I could see you more satisfactorily than I am able to do on a hurried trip like this, but Governor Proctor kept me up very late last night, and he was the last man down to breakfast this morning himself.
All that I have seen in your State has but increased the respect I have always entertained for your people. My recent journey of somewhat great length through the country has very deeply impressed upon me the fact of the unity of our people. The building of these great railroad lines making every part of every State familiar, and stretching across the continent so as to bring within easy access the most distant parts of our country, has had a great tendency to unify our people and to wipe out whatever there was provincial or local in our character. It has rubbed off some of the edges of the New England character, and has rubbed on some of the New England polish upon the West. In fact, wherever we have any combining, nothing makes it homogeneous except a thorough mixer, and the American people have certainly had a most thorough mixing. [Cheers.]
One of your war Governors was saying to me to-day, as we came along in the train, your own distinguished fellow-citizen, that on a journey West not long ago everywhere Vermont men came to meet him; and as I went recently across the continent the railroad train scarcely stopped at any station that some one from Indiana did not reach up his hand and claim recognition; and so it is in all the States.