To the members of the House of Representatives I would express my sincere acknowledgments for the readiness with which they have interpreted the public feeling, and provided for my establishment under the new relations which I am about to assume.
I have no expectations that any necessity will arise for calling you together before the stated session of 1858, and I trust that the interim will be full of prosperity to you and the nation, the blessing of God making fruitful those exertions from which I now release you by proroguing the session.
November 3, 1856.
THANKSGIVING.
PROCLAMATION BY THE KING.
We, Kamehameha, King of the Hawaiian Islands, hereby issue our Proclamation agreeably to former custom, that:
Whereas, during the year now drawing to a close, we have enjoyed, as a people, numerous and great blessings; peace and tranquility have prevailed throughout our islands; we have been not only free from dangers from abroad, but have continued to enjoy the most friendly assurances of protection in our independence from the most powerful governments in the world; although the times have been hard through the scarcity of money, and our people have suffered from a drought almost unparalleled, neither our agriculture nor commerce has entirely failed; both begin to revive; the crops in most places have been good; perhaps we have never enjoyed a year of more general health; our laws have been sustained; religion and education have been free and prosperous: For all of which numerous and invaluable blessings we owe, as a nation, a formal, general and heartfelt tribute of thanksgiving to the Almighty, on whose favor all prosperity, whether individual or national, depends.
We do, therefore, with the advice and consent of our Privy Council of State, designate and recommend Thursday, the 25th day of December next, as a day of general and public Thanksgiving to God, our Heavenly Father, throughout our islands; and we earnestly invite all good people to a sincere and prayerful observance of the same.
Done at our Palace this 3d day of November, A. D., 1856.