“My Lords and Gentlemen,—It now becomes my duty to propose that which is pre-eminently the toast of the evening, and to ask you to return to our distinguished guest our warm and hearty acknowledgments of the great service he has rendered to England, to America, and to the world by his exertions in promoting the success of the Atlantic telegraph, an enterprise which is the culminating triumph of a long series of discoveries prosecuted by many generations of men. It is not easy to apportion with exactitude the merits which may belong to those who have engaged in it; but I much mistake the character of our distinguished guest—and I have now known him for several years, and have had much communication with him—I much mistake his character if he desires to displace for a single moment any of those who have preceded him in the history of electrical discovery. This great triumph may be looked at from various points of view, and in the first place I think I am safe in saying that we all feel it to be a triumph of pure science—I say, of pure science, of the pure desire and love of knowledge.... I have the honor of speaking to many distinguished scientific men, and I think they will hear me out when I say that if there is one question which they hear with the utmost indignation and contempt addressed to them when they are in the course of their investigations it is the question, What is the use of their discoveries? The answer which the man of science returns to this question, as to what is the use of his discovery, is, ‘I only tell you what is the interest of that discovery, that interest which compels and impels me to go on in the path of investigation.’ It is knowledge, mere knowledge of the facts and laws of nature, that the scientific mind seeks to gain. Nevertheless, I think it is a great comfort to scientific men to be sure that even those discoveries which for years, and even for centuries, remain apparently entirely useless may at any time and at any moment become serviceable in the highest degree to the human family.... And I believe the success of this enterprise would have been delayed for many years—perhaps for whole generations of men—had it not been for the single exertions, for the confidence and zeal, for the foresight and faith, amounting, as I think, to genius, of our distinguished guest, Mr. Cyrus Field. None of us in our day, I rejoice to think, are disposed to undervalue the influence which the spirit of commercial enterprise is having upon the progress and civilization of mankind. In nothing perhaps is there so strange a contrast between the spirit and the wisdom of modern times and the spirit and wisdom of ancient philosophy. It is surely a most wonderful fact that in the most brilliant civilizations of the ancient world the wise men of those times—and they were men so wise that many of us to this day are influenced by their thoughts—many of those men held that commercial enterprise was the bane of nations. Now I must say this, that of all commercial enterprises which have ever been undertaken, this one on the part of Mr. Cyrus Field represents the noblest and purest motives by which commercial enterprise can ever be inspired. I believe it was the very greatness of the project—the great results which were certain to issue—I believe it was this, and this alone, which supported him with that confidence and decision which through many difficulties and many disappointments has carried him at last to the triumphant conclusion of this great project. And, gentlemen, I rejoice to say that whilst as a commercial enterprise it has come from the other side of the Atlantic, it has been well seconded and supported by the capitalists not only of America but of England. And surely this is another link of friendly intercourse between the people of the two countries. Now let me also say this—and this is a point which I have ascertained from other sources—I believe so great was the confidence of Mr. Field in the triumph of this great undertaking that he risked every farthing of his own private fortune in promoting its success. On these grounds, ladies and gentlemen, I ask you to drink his health. But on one other ground also I ask you to drink it, and that is this, that he is personally one of the most genial and kindly-hearted of men. At a time when his country was in great difficulty, and when many Americans thought at least they had something to complain of in the tone of English society, I was in the constant habit of meeting Mr. Field, and I never saw his temper ruffled for a moment, I never heard any words fall from him but words of peace between the two countries; and I often heard him express a hope that a time would come when a better understanding would arise in the minds of the people of this country and those of the United States; and I have reason to believe that his services and exertions in the United States have not a little contributed to secure the return of that feeling, what I believe is the real and permanent feeling of the people of those two great countries. Allow me, then, to ask you most heartily to drink this toast with me—the health of Mr. Cyrus Field, as the promoter of this great enterprise, and as a gentleman whom we all know and honor.”
The Right Hon. Sir John Pakington said:
“There are few men who, more than myself, have in their own personal experience been struck by the greatness of the event which we are now assembled to celebrate. I am one of the few—and they are quickly becoming fewer—who made a tour in the United States not only before electric telegraphs were thought of, but before even steamboats had crossed the Atlantic. I went to America in the quickest way it was then possible to go, in one of the celebrated American liners; but it so happened that the wind was in the west, as it generally is, and I was exactly six weeks from shore to shore. My next personal communication with America was just ten years ago. It then became my duty, on account of the office I held, to attend the Queen upon the occasion of her visit to the Emperor of the French at Cherbourg—one of those interchanges of courtesy which have done so much to create and prolong good feeling between France and England. One of the festivities during that visit was a banquet given by the Emperor to the Queen, on board one of his finest line of battle ships. I had the honor of being present, and during the dinner a servant came to me and delivered a letter which contained a telegram from the United States, announcing the completion of telegraphic communication between America and England. I can never forget the interest of such a communication at such a moment, nor the feeling which it excited among the distinguished persons of both nations by whom I was then surrounded.
“Another agreeable memory of the same period was the assistance which my office enabled me to give by lending the ships of war of this country for the accomplishment of that extraordinary event. It is true that the communication so established was shortly afterwards interrupted, but it is now restored. We may now, without exaggeration, say that England and America are no longer separated by the breadth of the Atlantic Ocean, for even during this dinner we have been corresponding briskly with our American friends; and it is impossible, gentlemen, to resist the conclusion that this greatest triumph of modern science must have the effect of softening prejudice, increasing and cementing good feeling, and in every way promoting the welfare and the prosperity of the two great peoples so brought together.
“That communication, which at the time to which I first referred occupied six weeks, may now be effected in as many minutes, and I rejoice that I am enabled to attend here to-day to join in doing honor to the man to whom, more than to any other human agency, we are indebted for this wonderful change.”
Mr. John Bright spoke as follows:
“In attempting to respond to the sentiment that has been submitted to us, I have a certain anxiety with regard to a mysterious box which is said to be on these premises, containing an instrument by which every word we utter to-night, be it wise or be it foolish, will be transmitted with more than lightning speed to the dwellers on that part of the earth’s surface which we describe as the regions of the setting sun. But we are so entirely agreed that there seems no possibility that anything will be said to-night which any one who hears it will desire to contradict, and I hope we may avoid the charge of saying anything that is foolish or hasty.
“Sir Stafford Northcote has submitted this sentiment, ‘The peace and prosperity of Great Britain and the United States,’ which means, I presume, that we are here in favor of a growing and boundless trade with America, and at the same time desire an unbroken friendship with the people of that country. With one heart and voice I presume to accept that sentiment, and without any fear of contradiction we assert that we are on that point truly representative of the unanimous feeling of the three kingdoms. There are those—I meet them frequently, for there are cavillers and critics everywhere—there are those who condemn the United States, and sometimes with something like scorn and bitterness, because at this moment the people of the United States are bearing heavy taxation, and because they have a ruinous tariff; but if these critics were to look back to our own position a few years ago they would see how much allowance is to be made for others. During the years which passed between 1790 and 1815, for nearly twenty-five years the government and people of this country were waging a war of a terrific character with a neighboring state. The result of that war was that which is, I believe, the result of every great war—enormous expenditure, great loans, heavy taxation, growing debt, and, of course, much suffering among the people, who have to bear the load of those burdens. But after that war, during twenty-five years, from 1815 to 1841, there was scarcely anything done by the government of this country to remedy the gross and scandalous inequalities of taxation, and to adopt a better system in apportioning the necessary burdens of the state upon the various classes of the people. But since 1841, as we all know, we have seen a revolution in this country in regard to taxation and finance, and I need not remind you that this has been mainly produced by the teaching of one who is not with us to-night, but who would have rejoiced, as we now rejoice, over the great event which we are here to celebrate, whose spirit and whose mind will, I believe, for generations yet to come stimulate and elevate the minds of multitudes of his countrymen. But this revolution of which I speak is not confined to this country, for, notwithstanding what we now see in the United States, it may be affirmed positively that it is going on there, and that in the course of no remote period it will embrace in its world-blessing influence all the civilized nations of the globe. The United States have had four years of appalling struggle and disaster. It was, nevertheless, in some sort a time of unspeakable grandeur, and it has had this great result, that it has sustained the life of a great nation and has given universal and permanent freedom over the whole continent of North America. But as was the case with our war, so with the American war: it has been attended with enormous cost, with great loans, with grievous taxation, and with a tariff which intelligent men will not long submit to; but at this moment and for some time the strife has been ended, the wounds inflicted are healing, freedom is secured, and the restoration of the Union, surmounting the difficulties that have interposed, is being gradually and certainly accomplished. I conclude that such a nation as the United States—such a people, so free and so instructed—will not be twenty-five years before they remedy the evils and the blunders and the unequal burdens of their taxation and their tariff. They will discover, in much less time than we discovered it, that a great nation is advanced by freedom of industry and of commerce, and that without this freedom every other kind of freedom is but a partial good. This sentiment speaks, also, of unbroken friendship between the two countries. May I say now, in a moment of calm and of reason, that with regard to the United States both our rulers and our people, and especially the most influential classes of our people, have greatly erred? Men here forget that, after all, we are but one nation having two governments, we are of the same noble and heroic race. Half the English family is on this side of the Atlantic in its ancient home, and the other half over the ocean (there being no room for them here) settled on the American continent. It is so with thousands of individual families throughout this country. No member of my family has emigrated to America for forty years past, and yet I have far more blood relations in the United States than I have within the limits of the United Kingdom; and that, I believe, is true of thousands in this country. And I assert this, that he is an enemy of our English race, and, indeed, an enemy of the human race, who creates any difficulty that shall interfere with the permanent peace and friendship of all the members of our great English-speaking family. One other sentence upon that point. No man will dare to say that the people of the United States or the people of the United Kingdom are not in favor of peace.... But leaving for a moment—in fact, leaving altogether—the sentiment and the toast which have been submitted to us, you will permit me to turn more immediately to the purposes of this banquet only for a sentence or two. I rejoice very much at this banquet, because we are met to do honor to a man of rare qualities, who has conferred upon us—and, I believe, upon mankind—rare services. I have known Mr. Field for a good many years, and although, I dare say, to any sailor who may be here it is not much, to me it seems a good deal that Mr. Cyrus Field, in the prosecution of this great work (not being a sailor, always bear that in mind), has crossed the Atlantic more than forty times; and he has, as you know, by an energy almost without example, by a courage nothing could daunt, by a faith that nothing could make to falter, and by sacrifices beyond estimation—for there are sacrifices that he has made I would not in his presence relate to this meeting—aided by discovery and by science and by capital, he has accomplished the grandest triumph which the science and the intellect of man have ever achieved. Soon after the successful laying of the cable I had an opportunity of referring to it in a speech spoken in the north of England, when I took the liberty of describing Mr. Cyrus Field as the Columbus of the nineteenth century; and may I not ask, when that cable was laid, when the iron hand grasped in the almost fathomless recesses of the ocean the lost and broken cable, if it be given to the spirits of great men in the eternal world, in their eternal life, to behold the great actions of our lives, how must the spirit of that grand old Genoese have rejoiced at the triumph of that hour, and at the new tie which bound the world he had discovered to the world to which but for him it might have been for ages to come unknown!... I believe no man—not Cyrus Field himself—has ever been able to comprehend the magnitude of the great discovery, of the great blessing, to mankind which we have received through the instrumentality of him and his friends, the scientific men by whom he has been assisted. I say with the greatest sincerity that my heart is too full, when I look at this question, to permit me to speak of it in the manner in which I feel that I should speak. We all know that there are in our lives joys, and there are sometimes sorrows, that are too deep for utterance, and there are manifestations of the goodness, and the wisdom, and the greatness of the Supreme which our modes of speech are utterly unable to describe. We can only stand, and look on, and wonder, and adore. But of the agency—the human agency—concerned we may more freely speak. I honor the great inventors. In their lifetime they seldom receive all the consideration to which they are entitled.... I honor Professor Wheatstone and Professor Morse and all those men of science who have made this great marvel possible; and I honor the gallant captain of that great ship, whose precious cargo, not landed in any port, but sunk in ocean’s solitary depths, has brought measureless blessings to mankind; and I honor him, our distinguished (may I not say our illustrious?) guest of to-night, for, after all that can be said of invention, and of science, and of capital, it required the unmatched energy and perseverance and faith of Cyrus Field to bring to one grand completion the mightiest achievement which the human intellect, in my opinion, has ever accomplished.”
Viscount Stratford de Redcliffe, in closing his speech, said:
“If the share I had in bygone transactions between the two countries is indifferent to you, as it may easily be, you will feel, nevertheless, with me how naturally the Atlantic cable and all its prospective advantages bring to mind that state of things which formerly estranged us from America and threatened the interruption of those friendly relations which so many motives of interest and sympathy concur in urging both parties to maintain and improve. Mr. Cyrus Field has called forth our present expressive tribute to his character and merits of the signal exertion he made, at so much hazard and self-sacrifice, to realize the grand conception of the cable. He crossed the Atlantic more than forty times in pursuit of that glorious object, and I, who have crossed it but twice, have learned thereby to appreciate the results, as well as the perils, of so immense an undertaking. Eternal honor to him, and also to those of our countrymen who, in concert with him, have enabled the two worlds to converse with each other.”